Music and Family

For the music and family blog, I interviewed my mom about her music-related opinions during childhood, her teenage years, and the most recent years of her adulthood. Beginning with childhood, she said that she didn’t have any specific memory of her first encounter with music. She said she thought one reason for this might be because music was harder to listen to back then because access to music at that time wasn’t as easy as it is for us now with the invention of iPhones and other technology. However, she specifically remembers that, although rock was probably the most popular and mainstream genre at the time, she listened primarily to country. This was partially because she enjoyed it, but also because it was what she grew up hearing her parents listen to. She said that country is what was played in her home every Sunday morning as her family cooked breakfast and cleaned the house. Due to all of this, one of her favorite artists as a child was George Strait. I was surprised to learn that as a kid my mom and her classmates didn’t have any music classes that they were required to take. Chorus, band, and similar activities were offered but there weren’t any fine art credits that required a musical course to be taken.

Although her favorite genre of music has always been country, my mom did get into rock in her teenage years. She said she really gravitated towards it when she first heard AC/DC, even though they had risen to popularity a while before she became a teen. Of course, she also listened to a variety of super popular artists in other genres during the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, such as Madonna, Michael Jackson, and Billy Joel. When asked what technology she used to listen to her favorite music, the first thing she thought of was boomboxes. And of course, she also used cassettes and walkmans. But another method of listening to music that she remembered very vividly was records. Her grandmother had a big record player in her living room and they would listen to music on it together anytime she visited her grandma’s house. Another place to listen to music was school dances, which my mom said she attended with her friends anytime the school hosted one. Again, much of the music played there was in the pop and rock genres. However, she specified that it was mostly “soft” rock because, much like today, schools wouldn’t play anything that was too “risque”. She said that during her teenage years she didn’t attend many concerts, likely because she lived in such a rural area where the most popular artists rarely performed. However, she did go to school with someone who was in a rock band and heard his music occasionally. Surprisingly, she said artists didn’t really influence the fashion of her or any of her friends at the time. I was pretty surprised by this because I definitely thought hair bands would have influenced both hairstyles and fashion. But when I asked about this she said that within the small town rural area she lived in, kids and teens were still expected to be “clean-cut” and she didn’t know anyone who really rebelled against that norm.

Although she still primarily listens to country music, my mom said she has added some new stuff to her musical repertoire in the last decade or so, including more current mainstream pop and soul. One of her favorite artists right now is Adele, and she also enjoys stuff like Harry Styles (admittedly that one is because of the stuff I make her listen to when we’re in the car together). When asked what she thinks of the music kids listen to today (although she likes some of the stuff I’ve introduced her to) she said she doesn’t really “know” much of “our music” but a lot of it doesn’t really appeal to her and she believes much of it could be better. Finally, when I asked if there were any artists she wished were still alive and making music, the first ones she thought of were George Jones and Conway Twitty.

She said back then, and still, her favorite AC/DC song was "You Shook Me All Night Long" which, coincidentally, is also my favorite AC/DC song.

Her favorite Adele song at the moment is Easy On Me but she's been listening to the whole "30" album pretty often for months now.

When my mom said one artist she wish was still alive was George Jones, I knew I recognized the name but I didn't realize until I looked further into him that I've also heard several of his songs. Just like my mom was influenced by the music her parents listened to, I heard much of her favorite country music when I was a kid because my parents would play it in the car and around the house.