of
Popular Music from 1900 to 2009
Contents:
1. Introduction
2. Hypothesis
3. Previous Research
4. Research Method
5. Results and Discussion
6. Appendix
7. Sources
8. Ideas for Future Research
Introduction
Few will argue with the concept that popular music has changed over
time. The citizens of the 1940s would be shocked and startled at rap's heavy
vulgarity, and the avid electronica fans of today would be bored and
What makes today's music more popular than yesterday's? Could there be
something subliminal, some aspect of the music that is driving this change?
Hypothesis
One of the major aspects of a song's structure is its beats per minute
certain rhythmical pattern which is pleasing to the ear in general, and is not
reliant on cultural modes. This tempo would not change over time. Also,
Previous Research
almost no studies about BPM trends in popular music have been completed.
There have been several studies about how tempo affects mood, beginning
have found that faster music is considered happier, while slower music is
Research Method
For this study, a process was devised to allow for quick but accurate
Many sources claim to provide lists of the most popular songs by year,
but each of these lists differ slightly, perhaps reflecting editorial opinion or
bias. In an effort to average all of the available popular music lists, a source
was found which provided universally popular songs (in other words, all of
the songs on the list used could also be found on multiple popular music
listings). This list of popular songs by year was obtained from TsorT, a
music in the last 109 years (Hawtin 2009). TsorT combines 133 sources
charts with 342,768 data entries and scores each song based on how many
charts it appears on, for how long it appears on that chart, and the
around the world are used in TsorT--not just North American or even Western
charts in general. However, non-Western charts did not develop until the
second half of the century, resulting in American music dominating the first
few decades of charted popular music. By the early 1980s, this imbalance
has mostly disappeared, and the songs listed reflect much more
seem like improper placements to an American audience who has not heard
songs that were far more popular in Europe than in the States. Since music
Napster, a music download service, was used to play the songs for
recording. Almost all of the songs were on Napster in their original form,
however some of the older music required deeper research. Most of the
songs that were not on Napster were on the Internet Archive, a website
music. The few songs that were not on Napster or the Internet Archive were
found on either rare music websites or within Youtube videos featuring the
attain the original recording from the year it was a hit, to ensure that the
Cohen 5
musicians.
years when the same song was covered by two different musicians (e.g., the
song "Bedelia" by the Haydn Quartet was #1 in 1904, and the same song
played by Billy Murray was #2 in the same year. The original recordings for
both were used, and indeed the tempos were slightly different). This
variation in tempo validated the decision to include covers of the same song
within the same year, which also occurred in 1917 when both Nora Bayes
and the American Quartet recorded "Over There." Some covers within the
same year were at exactly the same tempo, such as when the Victor
Orchestra and Lucy Isabelle Marsh both recorded "The Glow-Worm" in 1908.
Covers of the same song many years apart were an obvious (and intriguing)
inclusion (e.g., The Fugees' 1996 cover of "Killing Me Softly With His Song" is
song was recorded and saved in a catalogue by year, artist, and title. These
songs were then uploaded into Rapid Evolution 2, a music analysis software
It was found that the Rapid Evolution software was not consistently
reliable, and had to be checked by the researcher. Since the software uses a
Cohen 6
computer algorithm to determine the BPM, the result was sometimes double
or half of the actual BPM (e.g., if the algorithm mistakenly assumed that the
syncopated bass drum beat on the second and fourth beats of a measure
was the normal quarter beat, the resulting BPM would be half of what it
erroneous. Although some mistakes have no doubt crept into the data,
diligent data verification did correct most software errors. Other seemingly
Once analyzed, the data was plotted in Microsoft Excel, and analyzed
increase in the data set to the top songs per year would certainly increase
the reliability of the results, the top three songs are a suitable source from
BPM shows a definite upwards trend from 1900 to 2009 (see the linear line in
Figure 4). This is most clearly observed when one considers that from 1900-
1954 the average BPM was 82.19, while from 1955-2009 the average BPM
The average of the top one song for all 110 years (87.84) was very
close to that of the second most popular song (90.94 BPM) and the third
most popular song (89.05 BPM). The average BPM of all the top songs from
1900-2009 is 89.276. This does not necessarily mean that 89 BPM itself is a
popular tempo, but the tempo range defined by one standard deviation
Marvelously, this range is very close to the 70-110 preferred BPM range
found by previous researchers, and the average of that range (90 BPM) is
astonishingly close to the average tempo of the past 110 years (89 BPM).
be war-related musical fatigue. BPM levels are normal through 1917 (which
featured the speedy national pep-up song “Over There”), but then in 1919,
as WWI ended, BPM levels come crashing down. From 1919-1925, BPM
In 1942, BPM levels also take a hit, and WWII plays out in Figure 4 through to
1948.
The data also reveal two fascinating cultural trends. From the 1950s to
the 1960s, the average BPM increased by more than 15 from 84.2 to 99.8 as
Elvis Presley and The Beatles pushed post-war lethargy off the charts. This
period 1960-1979, the average BPM increased also by more than 15, from
82.02 to 97.18.
Another major jump can be seen when comparing the 1990s (average
BPM 88.23) with the 2000s (average BPM 106.1), showing a leap of almost
18 BPM. This leap can be distinguished from the 1950s-1960s leap when one
notes that the 1990s were a remarkably slow decade musically. Tempo
steadily increases from the 1920s to the 1960s, plateaus for the next 30
years, and then drops ten BPM from the 1980s to the 1990s. However, after
this slow decade, listeners seemed to demand recovery music, and indeed
after the year 2000 the average BPM per year has not dropped below 100--a
findings of this research. Through analysis of BPM data, cultural shifts can
Appendix
Figure 1: Collected Data, catalogued by Artist, Song Title, Year, BPM, and
Key. The songs are listed by year in declining status on the charts (the first
song listed per was the most popular song, the second song was the second
most popular song, and the third song was the third most popular song), with
one exception: the #2, #4, and #5 songs were unavailable from any
electronic source, a problem which was resolved by placing the #3 song in
the #2 slot and the #6 song in the #3 slot. The key was analyzed by the
Cohen 9
Rapid Evolution software as well, and is noted here purely for referential
purposes and to allow for further research.
1960s 99.80
1970s 94.57
1980s 98.20
1990s 88.23
2000s 106.10
Figure 4: Graph of average BPM per year (where t=1 corresponds to 1900,
etc.)
Cohen 28
Figure 6: Average BPM per two decades (t=1 is 1900-1919, t=2 is 1920-
1939, etc.).
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Figure 7: Chart of the BPM of the top three songs per year. This data is
mildly overwhelming at first when presented in this format, but it allows for
the observation of an interesting trend: In 1945-1947, the BPMs of the top
three songs were very similar. Those BPMs also represent some of the
lowest BPMs through the past 110 years. These slow tempos are possibly a
result of international fatigue following WWII.
Cohen 30
Sources
Song Sources:
The recording for Bert William's song "Nobody" was unavailable on any
Internet source except for the Library of Congress Performing Arts
Encyclopedia:
Previous Research:
• The American Journal of Psychology, Vol. 49, No. 4 (Oct., 1937), pp. 621-
630. Published by: University of Illinois Press
• The Journal of Marketing, Vol. 54, No. 4 (Oct., 1990), pp. 94-104. Published
by: American Marketing Association
revealing. There is much room for data expansion (e.g., including the top
five songs of each year in the analysis) and data analysis (e.g., looking at
distribution ranges and examining the peak within each range in contrast
with peaks from other decades). It would also be intriguing to examine how
with World preferences. TsorT allows the user to sort the data using only
Cohen 31