Everything about Ballads totally explained
A
ballad is usually set to music; thus, it often is a story told in a
song. Any myth form may be told as a ballad, such as historical accounts or fairy tales in verse form. It usually has foreshortened, alternating four-stress lines ("
ballad meter") and simple repeating
rhymes, often with a
refrain.
If it's based on a political or religious theme, a ballad may be a
hymn. It shouldn't be confused with the
ballade, a 14th and 15th century French verse form.
Broadsheet ballads
Broadsheet ballads (also known as
broadside ballads) were cheaply printed and hawked in English streets from the sixteenth century. They were often topical, humorous, and even subversive; the legends of
Robin Hood and the pranks of
Puck were disseminated through broadsheet ballads.
New ballads were written about current events like fires, the birth of monstrous animals, and so forth, giving particulars of names and places. Satirical ballads and
Royalist ballads contributed to 17th century political discourse. In a sense, these ballads were antecedents of the modern
newspaper.
Thomas Percy,
Robert Harley,
Francis James Child, Sir
Walter Scott and
James Hogg were early collectors and publishers of ballads from the oral tradition, broadsheets and previous anthologies. Percy's publication of
Reliques of Ancient Poetry and Harley's collections, such as
The Bagford Ballads, were of great import in beginning the study of ballads.
Literary ballads
Literary ballads are those composed and written formally. The form, with its connotations of simple folkloric authenticity, became popular with the rise of
Romanticism in the late 18th century. Literary ballads may then be set to music, as
Schubert's Der Erlkönig and
The Hostage, set to a literary ballads by
Goethe (see also
Der Zauberlehrling) and
Schiller. In
Romantic opera a ballad set into the musical texture may emphasize or play against the theatrical moment. Atmospheric ballads in operas were initiated in
Weber's Der Freischütz and include Senta's ballad in
Wagner's Der fliegende Holländer, or the 'old song' 'Salce'
Desdemona sings in
Verdi's Otello. Compare the stanza-like structure and narrative atmosphere of the musical
Ballades for solo piano of
Chopin or
Brahms.
Ballad opera
A particularly English form, the ballad opera, has as its most famous example
John Gay's
The Beggar's Opera, which inspired the 20th-century cabaret operas of
Bertolt Brecht and
Kurt Weill (
q.v.). Ballad strophes usually alternate between iambic tetrameter and iambic pentameter, though this isn't always the case.
Popular song
In the
20th Century, "ballad" took on the meaning of a popular song "especially of a romantic or sentimental nature" (
American Heritage Dictionary). Casting directors often divide songs into two categories: "ballads" (slower or sentimental songs) and "up" tunes (faster or happier songs). A
power ballad is a love song delivered with power often using rock instruments.
Famous ballads
Traditional
Modern
Washed Away
I Must Be Dreaming
The Ecstasy of Gold
Ballad of Buckethead
Ballad of a Dead Soldier
Ballad of a Thin Man
Ballad of Davy Crockett
Ballad of the Alamo
Ballad of the Green Berets
Bohemian Rhapsody
Carry On Wayward Son
Frankie and Johnny
Frankie Silver
Hotel California
Hurricane
I Dreamed I Saw Joe Hill Last Night
Infinite Dreams
It Must Have Been Love
Listening to Freddie Mercury
Me And Bobby McGee
November Rain
Sweet Child O' Mine
Ode to Billie Joe
On Top of Spaghetti
Piano Man
She's Leaving Home
Space Oddity
Spread Your Wings
Stairway to Heaven
Dazed and Confused
Still Loving You
The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins
The Ballad of Curtis Lowe
The Ballad Of Gerda And Tore
The Ballad of Gilligan's Isle
The Ballad of John and Yoko
The Ballad Of Moon Dog Mayne
The Ballad of The Sneak
The Devil Went Down to Georgia
The Unforgiven
The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald
Tom's Diner
Trapped in the Closet
Two Out of Three Ain't Bad
Uneasy RiderFurther Information
Get more info on 'Ballads'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://ballad.totallyexplained.com">Ballad Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
