Beach Music Definition

Beach Music is original style American Rhythm & Blues and Rock & Roll that always maintained its popularity in both Carolinas as popular music tastes changed elsewhere. Carolina artists and others who headquartered in the Carolinas played and recorded this music style during the ensuing years, thus being largely responsible for its continuity. The focal point where it has always been heard is the Grand Strand Myrtle Beach area of South Carolina, thus the linkage to the term Beach Music. Though often accurately aligned with the shag dance, Beach Music and the shag are not synonymous, as not all Beach Music can be shagged to and much of what is shagged to is not Beach Music. Although Beach Music has become a part of the lifestyle of the Carolinas, the music itself is universal in recognition and appeal.

The Reason for a Beach Music Association

I am constantly asked why we need a beach music association and why it has an international market. Rather than piecing an explanation together I decided to put in writing a history of how beach music evolved from the late 1940s to today and its corresponding relationship to the shag dance. This is meant to be an honest and factual assessment of where beach music stands and why. Any criticisms contained herein are not meant as attacks, but as statements of truth that may be hard hitting. There has never been a concentrated effort to hold the music back. It has simply happened for reasons that I shall now outline.

Ever since the 1940s there has been a unique love affair between Carolinians and original rhythm and blues. There has also been a love affair between Carolinians who dance and the shag. Even though the shag was done to original rhythm and blues, many people believe that the shag was the only dance done to this music. No doubt in the Carolinas it was the most popular of the dances. But there were many others as well: the twist, the jitterbug, the stroll, the bop, the hully gully, the mashed potatoes, the swim, the watusi, the jerk, the boogaloo, the pony, the funky chicken and others. And don't forget the many lovey-dovey slow songs. Many of those who loved the music didn't dance to anything but slow tunes.

During the 50s and 60s the shag was a free-spirited dance and dancers shagged to much faster songs as well as medium beat songs. If it were fast, they speeded up their shag steps. If it were slow, they slowed them down. The trend to smoothness and sexiness in the dance didn't really take hold until the 1970s. Some of that influence was always there, but was the exception rather than the rule. During the 70s there was an increase in the number shag lessons being taught. Most instructors taught the smoother, sexier more serious style. About the same time there was an explosion of shag contests. That's when things began to get too serious. Magazines published in those days began writing almost as much about shag contests as the music itself, thus unwittingly giving the shag nearly equal importance. The shag dance was successfully organized over 2 decades ago through S.O.S. (Society of Stranders) and the Association of Carolina Shag Clubs. Beach music had never been organized until recently with the formation of the BMAI (Beach Music Association International). As a result, since then the shag dance has dictated too much of what music is played.

Many hardcore shaggers today would rather get in free and dance to a deejay than pay to see a live band. They have a reputation for not spending much money. The number of clubs that has catered to shaggers on a full time basis and didn't make it is staggering. Other than a couple at North Myrtle Beach, SC very few clubs have made it over the long haul.

Another sad fact is that several radio stations have tried to make it by playing beach music to the shag market and have much too quickly bitten the dust. I was directly involved with Beach 106 in Salisbury, NC and know firsthand of its struggle before it was sold. The Breeze out of Charleston, SC was syndicated in four markets and lasted but a few years. Radio stations in a couple of larger markets are presently trying it and barely show up in the ratings. Shaggers constantly call these stations making it seem like there are many thousands of listeners out there. The fact is that the stations' deejays know many of their callers. It is like a family. On the surface that is great, but from an economic standpoint it is not. My experience as general manager of a radio station taught me that having a large number of unknown callers is a true indicator that there is a broad base of listeners. Listeners tune in to the familiar and when much of what is played is unfamiliar, it is a natural tune out for many of them. If most music on these stations has a consistency as to beats per minute think how monotonous and boring it must be for listeners who don't shag to songs with that beat. Several listeners have told me that they don't like much of the music on those stations, but it is better than what they hear on other music stations. That's like voting for the candidate who is the least offensive. If the stations would feature a solid mix with beach music of all beats as the main portion and less non-recognizable shag music it could reverse the trend. This could lead to the beginnings of an American music based format that could work nationally. Additionally, when it is estimated that only 10% of Americans dance at all it is difficult to understand why these stations narrow their format to reach such a small market.

The future to any movement is getting young people involved. There are some young shaggers, but most of them have become a part of the shag scene not because they saw it and loved it spontaneously, but because they grew up around their parents who were hardcore shaggers. In the late 70s and early 80s there was a spontaneous movement on the part of young people on college campuses toward the shag. Trouble was, they invented their own version, a much jerkier fun-based dance requiring much energy. The older shaggers shunned them because it wasn't being done "the right way." If they had been willing to compromise a little there would be a much younger demographic than there is today and the shag would not be dying.

With regards to the shag world's relationship to beach music, many hardcore shaggers couldn't care less. The most important thing seems to be that the song they shag to has 120 beats per minute. It matters not what kind of music it is as long as they can shag to it. Therefore today's beach music is not beach music at all, but shag music. If you attend one of the shag events, you will hear all kinds of music: country and western, rock, disco, rap, big band, pop, gospel, smoothies, the blues, and some rhythm and blues. Recently, I spent an evening at the Ocean Drive section of North Myrtle Beach, SC and paid close attention to the music mix. It consisted of some of all of the above listed music types. But three things jumped out at me: 1. I heard only one slow song ("Over The Rainbow" by The Band of Oz and the dance floor was packed). 2. I heard only one classic beach song ("Ms. Grace" by The Tymes and the dance floor was packed). 3. The only songs well over 120 beats per minute were the occasional line dance songs.

Most new beach music recordings have the standard 120 beats per minute and aim squarely at the shag market. If they don't, deejays now have equipment that allows them to adjust recordings to that speed. If I were an artist, that would be the ultimate insult. I heard Joe Turner's "Morning, Noon and Night" slowed down to 120 beats and he sounded like he was moaning. When songs like the Fantastic Shakers' "Shakin' The Shack" and Billy Scott's "My Kind Of Girl" were the number one songs on the so-called beach music charts for many weeks in 1998 and 2001, respectively, and had to stretch to sell 3000 copies, there is something terribly amiss. Billy Scott told me recently that he had garnered almost no bookings for his group from the success of his number one record. Yet shaggers love him to death when he will come to one of their clubs and sing the song to a track for free.

Even though the shag market is extremely small compared to the beach music market many Carolina bands are recording almost exclusively to that market. If the CD does make it to the charts, they still may not even recover the costs of recording it. For some reason many deejays too often resist playing locally recorded material. They lean to finding obscure songs, for which they can be recognized as being the one to discover it, or so they can make money out of it. It is a no-win for artists and others in the beach music industry.

This brings me to why beach music had to finally organize. Fans never lost their love for beach music and young people love it when exposed to it. It is just good clean fun and nothing has ever brought people together in an uplifting manner better than this music. There are millions of fans in the beach music world, while the shag world might consist of 20,000. When bands play in public, they see few hardcore shaggers, but play to thousands of beach music fans. Until now there has never been an organized effort to market to the real beach music fans.

Beach music (with oldies as a part of it) consists of a combination of soul music, doo-wop, the blues, Motown, New Orleans rhythm and blues, good-time rock and roll, rockabilly, boogie-woogie and the like. It is black-based rhythm and blues and primarily involves music recorded from the late 1940s to the mid 1970s. The recording industry began to turn its back on this music type with the Beatles-led British invasion in the 1960s. Since then there has been little of this type music recorded. Still millions of fans in Europe, Asia, Australia and Africa passionately love this music as well as here in the U.S.

In the 50s and 60s there were three basic forms of popular music. What was left of the big band era, rock and roll, and country and western. Big band had a historically solid foothold through New York (Broadway) and Los Angeles (Hollywood movies). Country and western was headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee. American rock and roll never had a single geographic center yet it was king in popularity from the mid-50s to the mid-60s with big band second, and country and western third. Big band faded as its fans aged. In the late 50s country and western organized the Country Music Association in Nashville, which set goals to broaden its base through image changes, and via the hot new medium then, television. And did it ever work? Look at its popularity today.

The United States, the country that invented rock and roll, handed what had become of rock and roll to Great Britain and the British have been telling us about our own music since the 60s. Lost in the shuffle was original American rock and roll, which we in the Carolinas call beach music. The public never tired of it, the recording industry simply quit making it in favor of British influenced rock. Two things should help convince the doubters: 1. The soundtrack (mainly featuring this music) from the movie "Dirty Dancing" is one of the biggest selling soundtracks (if not the biggest) in movie history, despite little promotion when it was released. 2. The recent doo-wop and oldies shows on public television are far and away the biggest fundraising and ratings successes nationwide in ETV history.

Now we have this music organized and are poised to again place it in its true position of importance and influence. This is not a Carolina movement; it is a worldwide movement with Myrtle Beach, South Carolina as its geographic center. It is not a music of "oldies" alone, it is also a music of new sounds with the original style as its core. Just as country and western has evolved through the years, beach music will also evolve as time goes on, but not because of the exaggerated influence of a single dance. We can and will educate and make Americans proud of our homegrown product plus showcase and market it to an already receptive world.