Important musicians of the United States

For nobody is a secret that music has been one of the most influent factors in the way of thinking of society, this is the reason why today I’m going to talk about some of the most legendary people and some of the most recognized bands worldwide.

The first one I’m going to talk about is the singer and songwriter Elvis Presley; he is the most significant figure in Rock and Roll history. He was born on January 8^th 1935 in Tupelo, Mississippi; he started to record at Sun Records in 1954, at that moment Elvis began to revolutionize music and his influence changed the entertainment industry forever because in the 1950’s the South was heavily racially segregated, but Presley’s music broke these racial barriers. He allowed African American music to be accessible to white American people, who had never really been exposed to it. Elvis challenged the social and moral values as his music and provocative dance moves created an entirely new generation.

By 1955 Elvis he went from being local to international sensation, people quickly fell in love with his amazing voice and pelvic thrusting hips. As Elvis became more popular, the older generation began to resent him and controversy quickly about him. The fact that Elvis shook his hips, thrust his pelvis, and danced passionately on stage, turned parents against his music. Presley posed a threat to the values that white American society strongly believed in. Elvis set in motion a style of music that dominated the world for the rest of the century. It was the beginning of youth culture, the breakdown of sexual inhibition, and the end of racial segregation.”

In 1958, Presley was drafted into the U.S. Army, staying there he said that he didn’t want to be treated different and that they army could do anything it wanted with him; sometime before his mother was diagnosed with hepatitis, her condition worsened rapidly and Presley had to visit her emergency of emergency but some days later she died of heart failure at the age of 46, Elvis was devastated because he had a very strong relationship whit his mother. Later he returned to the army in Friedberg, being there he met Priscila Beaulieu, who was just 14 years old, they were boyfriends during 7 years and then they got married.

Being in the army Elvis Presley had ten top 40 hits, including "Wear My Ring Around Your Neck", the best-selling "Hard Headed Woman", and "One Night" in 1958, and "(Now and Then There's) A Fool Such as I" and the number-one "A Big Hunk o' Love" in 1959; during the next years he performed with very important singers as Frank Sinatra.

He had just one child with Priscila, Lisa Marie who was born on February 1, 1968 during a period when he had grown deeply unhappy with his career. Of the eight Presley singles released between January 1967 and May 1968, only two charted in the top 40, and none higher than number 28.

Presley's divorce was finalized on October 9, 1973. By then, his health was in major and serious decline. Twice during the year, he overdosed on barbiturates, spending three days in a coma in his hotel suite after the first incident. Towards the end of 1973, he was hospitalized, semi-comatose from the effects of a pethidine addiction. On the evening of Tuesday, August 16, 1977, Presley was scheduled to fly out of Memphis to begin another tour. That afternoon, Ginger Alden discovered him in an unresponsive state on a bathroom floor. According to her eyewitness account, "Elvis looked as if his entire body had completely frozen in a seated position while using the commode and then had fallen forward, in that fixed position, directly in front of it. It was clear that, from the time whatever hit him to the moment he had landed on the floor, Elvis hadn't moved." Attempts to revive him failed, and his death was officially pronounced at 3:30 p.m. at the Baptist Memorial Hospital.

In my opinion, Elvis was the most important singer in history because he influenced the way music were seen, he broke racial barriers, revolutionized the dance with his moves, he is an historical icon and his mark will remain forever.

The second artist I’m going to talk about is Michael Jackson, who was born on august 29th, 1958; he was singer, songwriter, dancer and actor. He is known as the “King of pop”; he is regarded as one of the most significant cultural figures of the 20th century and one of the greatest entertainers. Jackson's contributions to music, dance, and fashion, along with his publicized personal life, made him a global figure in popular culture for over four decades. Michael started his career in 1964 with his siblings in a bland called The Jacksons 5; but he began his solo career in 1971, and in the early 1980s, became a dominant figure in popular music. His music videos, including those for "Beat It", "Billie Jean", and "Thriller" from his 1982 album Thriller, are credited with breaking racial barriers and transforming the medium into an art form and promotional tool. Their popularity helped bring the television channel MTV to fame. Bad (1987) was the first album to produce five US Billboard Hot 100 number-one singles. He continued to innovate throughout the 1990s with videos such as "Black or White" and "Scream", and forged a reputation as a touring artist. Through stage and video performances, Jackson popularized complicated dance techniques such as the robot and the moonwalk.

Jackson is one of the best-selling music artists of all time, with estimated sales of over 350 million records worldwide; Thriller is the best-selling album of all time, with estimated sales of 66 million copies worldwide. His other albums, including Off the Wall (1979), Bad (1987), Dangerous (1991), and History (1995), also rank among the world's best-selling. He won hundreds of awards (more than any other artist in the history of popular music), has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice, and is the only pop or rock artist to have been inducted into the Dance Hall of Fame. His other achievements include Guinness world records (including the Most Successful Entertainer of All Time), 15 Grammy Awards (including the Legend and Lifetime Achievement awards), 26 American Music Awards (more than any other artist), and 13 number-one US singles (more than any other male artist in the Hot 100 era). Jackson was the first artist to have a top ten single in the Billboard Hot 100 in five different decades.

In the late 1980s, Jackson became a figure of controversy for his changing appearance, relationships, behavior and lifestyle. In 1993, he was accused of sexually abusing the child of a family friend. The accusation was settled out of court. In 2005, he was tried and acquitted of further child sexual abuse allegations and several other charges.

 On 1993, he was addicted to the drugs. He searched Lisa Marie Presley, the daughter of Elvis and Priscilla Presley, for emotional support; she was concerned about his health and drug addictions. They had known each other since she was seven and attended one of Jackson's family engagements. The two stayed in contact every day on the phone. Presley sympathized with Jackson and believed he was innocent; she persuaded him to settle out of court with the boy's family, and go into rehabilitation. Jackson proposed to Presley by phone in late 1993.They married secretly in the Dominican Republic in May 1994.

On June 25, 2009, Jackson died from a cardiac arrest. Conrad Murray, his personal physician, had given Jackson various medications to help him sleep at his rented mansion in Holmby Hills, Los Angeles. Paramedics received a 911 call at 12:22 pm, and arrived three minutes later. Jackson was not breathing and CPR was performed, resuscitation efforts continued, but were unsuccessful, and he was pronounced dead at 2:26 pm. Jackson had taken propofol, lorazepam, and midazolam, his death was caused by a propofol overdose. News of his death spread quickly online, causing websites to slow down.

I think he was one of the most important characters of the music history, but due to all those problems about child abuse his reputation wasn’t so good, however I cannot deny he was very talented and he did an important changes on the music world.

And finally one of the most important bands; Metallica who was formed in 1981 in Los Angeles, California, by the drummer Lars Ulrich and vocalist/guitarist James Hetfield, The band's fast tempos, instrumentals and aggressive musicianship made them one of the founding "big four" bands of thrash metal. Metallica earned a growing fan base in the underground music community and won critical acclaim with its first five albums. The band's third album, Master of Puppets (1986), was described as one of the heaviest and most influential thrash metal albums; its fifth album, Metallica (1991), the band's first to root predominantly in heavy metal, appealed to a more mainstream audience, achieving substantial commercial success and selling over 16 million copies in the United States to date, making it the best-selling album of the SoundScan era. After experimenting with different genres and directions in subsequent releases, the band returned to its thrash metal roots with the release of its ninth album, Death Magnetic (2008), which drew similar praise to that of the band's earlier albums.

Metallica has become one of the most influential heavy metal bands of all time, and is credited as one of the "big four" of thrash metal, along with Slayer, Anthrax, and Megadeth. The band has sold more than 125 million records worldwide, making Metallica one of the most commercially successful bands of all time. The writers of The Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll said Metallica gave heavy metal "a much-needed charge”. Stephen Thomas Erlewine and Greg Prato of Allmusic said Metallica "expanded the limits of thrash, using speed and volume not for their own sake, but to enhance their intricately structured compositions", and called the band "easily the best, most influential heavy metal band of the '80s, responsible for bringing the music back to Earth".