blues orig. U.S.
(bluːz)
[A use of the pl. blues (see blue n. 12), treated as either sing. or pl.]
A melody of a mournful and haunting character, originating among the Negroes of the Southern U.S., freq. in a twelve-bar sequence using many ‘blue’ notes. Also attrib.
| 1912 W. C. Handy (tune-title) Memphis Blues. 1917 Lit. Digest 25 Aug. 29/2 ‘Must I Hesitate?’, ‘The Blues’, ‘Franky and Johnny’, and other classics of the levee underworld. 1921 Outward Bound May 58/2 These ‘labour songs’,..like the ‘blues’ of to-day, were rather humorous. 1923 Daily Mail 28 July 7 Noisy ‘jazz’ music..is being driven out..by the soft pulsing of muffled melody in new tunes known as ‘Blues’. Ibid., A special ‘Blues Trot’ has been devised for dancing with the tunes, which are slower than [those of] a fox-trot. 1927 Melody Maker Sept. 865/2 The Yale..is danced to ‘blues’ tempo. 1928 Oxf. Mag. 1 Nov. 84/2 The use of a blues for the slow movement is interesting. 1949 R. Blesh Shining Trumpets i. v. 107 The blues scale..enters into and colors all singing and playing by American Negroes. Ibid. ii. xi. 247 The blues-shouting trombone. 1956 Morgan & Horricks Modern Jazz 16 The twelve-bar blues, long a source of expression for the outpouring of emotion, underwent a startling change with the introduction of the riff in jazz. |