History of Music Videos

Music Videos have been a progressive challenge for many years. They originally stemmed from short sound films and talkies in 1926. Spoony melodies were the first true musical videos, they lasted about 6 minutes and featured deco style animations, with a performer singing the song. The early animated Walt Disney films were built around the songs. Due to this invention artists then performed their songs in short films which then later followed on to be big hits in theatres and radio.
Promotional clips were then founded in the 1940'S for the panoram visual jukebox which were short films of musical selections, these were performed on a bandstand made for the artist to perform on. Thousands of soundies were made which were usually jazz, the music was the star and then years later this wasn’t the case as the artist became more recognisable then the song itself. Soundies were popular in taverns and night spots but disintegrated after World War II.
Musical films were another huge influence to music videos. Some of the first well known music videos originated from films made in the 1920's-1940's for example Madonna 'Material Girl' drew on the song sequence, 'Diamands are a girls best friend' in Steven Hawks, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.Several of Michael Jacksons videos for example 'Bad' directed by Michael Scorsese which was influenced by the fights from the musical 'West Side Story.'

Lots of artists made films to get noticed and to have a bigger chance at been more successful and famous. The films included the artists records, so when the film was released and the soundtracks were included, people began to recognise the artists aswell as the songs.

The Beatles-Hard Days Night-1964
Bob Dylan-Don’t Look Back-1965
David Bowie-Space Odeisty-1972
Peter Gabriel-Sledgehammer-1986
R.E.M-Loosing myeligion-1991
Radiohead-Street Spirit-1995
Michael Jackson-Thriller-1983

These were all sucessful films that were made to advertise and promote artists.

Analysis relating to the progression of music videos throughout history, and evidence of how music videos resulted by the high rise of MTV.
Madonna-'Material Girl'



This video was released January 30th 1985 by Sire Records.
"In the single's music video, scenes of Madonna mimicking Marilyn Monroe's performance of "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend" from the 1953 film Gentlemen Prefer Blondes were interspersed with scenes of a Hollywood director trying to win the heart of an actress, played by Madonna herself. Finding out that, contrary to her song, the young woman was not impressed by money and expensive gifts, he pretended to be poor, bringing her hand-cut flowers and paying a poor man a large amount to borrow (or possibly buy.) His plan seemed to work because the final scene was of him and Madonna kissing in the truck in an intimate position. This video was ranked #54 on VH1's 100 Greatest Videos. After making the video, Madonna said she never wanted to be compared to Monroe despite posing as the Hollywood icon and recreating many of Marilyn's signature poses for various photos shoots most notably a 1991 issue of Vanity Fair(quote-Wikepedia)
The video indicates how similar to films music videos used to be by the use of continuity editing and abstract imagery, . The video uses graphic matches for example at the very beginning, the colour red is used frequently to symbolise lust and romance, the first shot has a red background, the second is Madonna in a red dress. this isn’t a major necessity for music videos in the 21st century but was in the earlier days. This video is a prime example of how music videos have progressed and altered throughout the years.
In the late 1950's the visual jukebox was invented which is where French artists produced short films to accompany their songs, the faze then spread to other countries such as cinebox in Italy and Color-sinc in USA.
The music Video phenomenon hit its peek in 1981 when MTV started broadcasting and it marked the beginning of music videos taking over the music industry. The first music video ever played on MTV was Video Killed the Radio Star’ by The Buggles. Music videos are known to make a huge impact on the artist themselves, as the videos give a more sexy, appealing, interesting and enjoyable experience to listening to a song. MTV has been highly controversial: some saw as the beginning of an amazing, new, fresh era in music, others considered it to mark the end of true musical talent, as artists have been become more appreciated for their looks instead of their vocal abilities (quote by ezine articles.)
All this information shows how music videos have improved and progressed throughout the years. It also shows how much of an influence technology and MTV has had in the development.