The 1950s
When Rock & Roll exploded on the world in the mid Fifties with the successive thunderclaps of Bill Haley, Elvis Presley and Little Richard, it all seemed to come from nowhere. Rock & Roll started, like the universe itself, with a big bang - or perhaps a rapid succession of big bangs, followed by a lot of smaller ones. Or so it seemed. 

Rock & Roll was, in fact, a music with a long history - or rather, several parallel histories, for it was the result of years of foundation work in the worlds of country music, blues, gospel, bluegrass, swing, rhythm & blues (R&B), Doo-Wop and jazz. None of these forms became Rock & Roll, but each played some part in the process from which Rock & Roll was distilled. 

When the fermentation was complete, Rock & Roll was greeted in the US with fear and trepidation by racial and religious segregationists, political opportunists, self-appointed arbiters of public morality and the previously ultra-complacent old-guard of the record industry. In Britain, similar claptrap spouted from predictable mouths, culminating in May 1958 with the public pillorying of Jerry Lee Lewis. British band-leader Ted Heath said; "I don't think the Rock & Roll craze will come to Britain. You see, it is primarily for a colored population. I can't ever see it becoming a real craze" . . .

By the time Heath had said that - in May 1956 - he was already wrong and the 'craze' had arrived. Bill Haley and The Comets already had six British chart entries, Lonnie Donegan had two hits to his credit, and on the very day that Heath's prophecy was published, Elvis Presley first entered the British Top 20 with Heartbreak Hotel. A week later Carl Perkins was in the chart too, shortly followed by Frankie Lymon and The Teenagers, Fats Domino, Gene Vincent and The Platters. 

The invasion of American Rock & Roll irrevocably changed the lives of many British teenagers of the 1950s and the first British artists specifically promoted as Rock & Rollers began to appear. By 1959 there were as many British rockers vying for success as there were American originators.
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The 1960s
The Sixties saw a revolution in popular music. In a few short years interest switched from singles to albums, from mono to stereo and from dance music to move the body to cerebral music to please the intellect.  New styles emerged out of old ones - Girl Group pop, beat music, folk-rock, country-rock, acid-rock, soul - and the spirit of Rock & Roll was re-enlivened by four young self-taught beat musicians from Liverpool, England.

Yet the decade began with little hint of the upheaval to come. Rock & Roll had reached a low creative ebb by 1960, not least because several of the original purveyors were missing in action: Chuck Berry was in jail for abducting a minor; Jerry Lee Lewis was in disgrace after marrying his 13-year-old cousin; Little Richard had renounced Rock & Roll for religion; Buddy Holly was dead, and Elvis Presley was serving his National Service with the US Army in Germany.

In the USA, more young girls than ever before were buying records and a new musical subculture was to emerge, based on the tastes, fantasies and hormones of Little Miss America. Teenage magazines appeared, packed with fan gossip, love stories and exclusive interviews with the new, male, teen idols. Meanwhile, a sharp black businessman named Berry Gordy Jr put the city of Detroit on the music map with a string of small record labels that were soon amalgamated into one huge corporation called Motown.

Britain seemed like the most unlikely place for a musical revolution, and British teenagers had traditionally looked to America for excitement - on record, on television and in the cinema. But the real impetus for British rock music came not from these infatuations (and imitations), but from the Skiffle boom of the late 50s. Skiffle was do-it-yourself music at its simplest: the 'authentic' line-up was guitar (three chords would suffice), washboard and thimbles (percussion) and a tea-chest with a strung broom handle (bass). 

Guitar sales rose phenomenally and a new British pop music began to develop - especially in provincial cities such as Liverpool, Manchester and Newcastle where one-time Skiffle outfits were evolving naturally into Rock & Roll groups. In 1961 it was estimated that around 350 groups were operating in Liverpool alone, and it was almost inevitable that one of these would rise to the top eventually. What nobody could have foreseen was what an effect The Beatles would have on rock music around the world . . .

The success of The Beatles revitalized the music scene as never before. Literally thousands of groups were formed in the aftermath of Beatlemania, and between 1964 and 1966 home-grown British beat music swamped Britain, and the world. The Fab Four effectively put America back in touch with its own rock heritage, reviving the dynamism of Rock & Roll and breathing new life into half-forgotten styles. As in Britain, they sparked off a massive explosion of new groups - an explosion which was further enhanced by the 'British Invasion' of other innovative groups from the UK.

As the music world entered the late Sixties, many of the changes set in motion earlier in the decade ultimately came to fruition. Popular music became more socially aware, more experimental, and musicians attained a degree of artistic control over their music that would have been unthinkable a short ten years before. Perhaps most significantly - thanks especially to the efforts of Bob Dylan, The Beatles and The Rolling Stones -  rock music was coming to be seen as an instrument of change. 

The late Sixties were a time of great social and political upheaval, a time when traditional values were being questioned or discarded altogether. A new spirit of affluence and optimism engendered a liberal atmosphere whish the youth of the Western world could embrace and exploit (albeit with the inevitable clash with authority, in the shape of parents, laws and governments).

Popular music underwent a change which was both a reflection and an essential ingredient of the social revolution. A whirl of psychedelic noise ushered in the 'Summer of Love' and as word spread there was a sudden migration of young people to the Haight-Ashbury area of San Francisco. By 1966 the area was a thriving artistic community and also boasted two of the most influential radio stations - KSAN and KMPX - which were forerunners of the FM radio boom.