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1. History of music videos
Jack Regan

2. Description of music videos
• Music videos are often called promotion videos or just simply promos, due
to the fact they are basically promotional devices.
• Sometimes music videos are termed short form music videos to
distinguish them from full length movies pertaining music

3. Music videos in the 1920’s
• An early example of a music video from the 1920’s would be ‘St Louis
blues by Bessie smith’
• Bessie smith appeared in a short film called St Louis blues in 1929 which
featured the song with a dramatized performance, it was then shown in
theatres until 1932.

4. 1950’s and 60’s development
• In 1956, Tony Bennett was filmed walking along the serpentine in London
for his recording of “stranger in paradise”. This film was the produced and
distributed to televisions around the world and Tony Bennett claimed he
had made the first music video.
• The defining work in the development of the modern music video was the
Beatles first major motion picture “A hard days night” in 1964 directed by
Richard Lester. The musical segments in this film arguably set out the basic
visual vocabulary of today’s music videos, influencing a vast number of
contemporary musicians, and countless pop and rock group music videos.
• Although unashamedly based on “A hard days night” The American TV
show “the monkees” since every episode contained a film segment for a
specific monkees song each episode.

5. Modern era music videos
• The key innovation in the development of the modern music video was of
course the video recording and editing processes, along with the
development of a number of related effects such as chroma key.
• The advent of high quality colour video tape recorders and portable video
cameras coincided with the DIY ethos of the new wave era and this
enabled many pop acts to produce promotional videos quickly and
cheaply, in comparison to the relatively high costs of using film. However,
as the genre developed music video directors increasingly turned to 35mm
film as the preferred medium, while others mixed film and video.
• By the mid 1980’s releasing a music video to accompany a new single had
become original. Acts like The Jacksons made lavish music videos with
million dollar budgets, most notable for the music video “can you feel it”.

6. Modern era of music videos – 1970’s
• The early self produced music videos by Devo, including the pioneering
compilation ‘The truth about devolution’ directed by Chuck Statler, were
also important (if not subversive) developments in the evolution of the
genre and these Devo video cassette releases were arguably among the
first true long-form video productions.
• Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” also started a whole new era for music
video promos.

7. Music videos in the 1980’s
• In 1981 MTV was launched and the first video to be aired live was ‘Video
killed the radio star’ by the buggles.
• In the early to mid 1980’s, artists started to use more sophisticated effects
in there videos and added a storyline or plot to the music video. Michael
Jackson was the first artist to create the concept of a short film. It wasn’t
until the 1984 release of the thriller short film that he took the music
video format to another level.

8. Music videos today
• In the information technology era, music videos now approach the
popularity of the song themselves, being sold in collections. Enthusiasts of
music videos sometimes watch them muted purely for there aesthetic
value. Instead of watching the video for the music, the videos are
appreciated for there visual qualities, while viewers remain uninterested
in the audio portion of the performance.
• This is a normal sociological reaction, some say, to the increasing trend in
the music business to focus on visual appeal of artists, rather than the
quality of the music. Critics say that the corporate music managers, over
the course of logical calculated business decisions, have sought to
capitalize on the sex appeal of women in music videos rather than in
choosing less profitable musicianship based music.