Soul Criteria
Soul in a sense is taking a gospel tune and singing secular lyrics to it. Some soul songs can get down-right raunchy but on the whole, the metaphor is dancing, right? Right!
Once you can identify soul elements, you’ll be able to hear the aggregate development of the soul genre out of gospel and R&B. The elements are as follows:
The Vocals
The lead vocals in soul have to have a strong gospel influence complete with many gospel vocal techniques. These vocal techniques can consist of vibrato (a regular pulsating change of pitch); coloratura (or the coloring of a melody with runs, trills, leaps and other voice projection techniques); sostenuto (the sustaining of a note over a long period); singing in legato, subtly connecting notes and phrases in a smooth manner; and melismas (the singing of one syllable while moving between different notes in succession).
Call and response is a technique whereby the lead singer (or the Preacher) sings out the call while the backing vocals or the congregation respond to the lead vocalists calls. This was a technique adopted from field hand hollering. The lead vocalist has to be very skilled and has to put his whole heart and soul into the music, whether down on your knees begging and pleading or just light as a feather in joyous exhilaration, the lead singer has to mean it.
* Experienced vocal technique of gospel singing
* Call & response gospel choir technique
The Strings
Depending on the label and the region the strings start to take a more integral part in the sound of soul music. This is particularly evident with Atlantic, RCA/Victor, and Tamla/Motown. In this type of soul music, the strings seem to flow around the band and singers and take a foundational role. In the early 60s, the strings sometimes take on the leads in the intros, verses, and the choruses or play middle instrumental parts. This is very different from the older R&B use of strings which was very tempered if even they were used at all.
* Strings are used more often, depending on the label and/or region.
The Brass
The brass is also dependent on the region, label, studio, and musicians’ influences. Some labels have fully integrated orchestrated strings with the brass, some have limited brass support or solo accompaniments and then other labels rely solely on the brass section without strings.
Brass is used in a number of ways. Some have the brass as rhythmic support using stabs (quick syncopated blasts) and riffs (the playing melodically harmonic chords or phrases) or pans (the sustaining or extending a harmonic chord) and then some use the brass in fully elaborate arrangements and syncopations.
The brass section has a more active role in soul music alternating between harmonic syncopated brasses and then more supportive as a foundation that sometimes carries the melody, counter melodies or instrumental breaks. This is all depending on the regional aspect of soul, of course. With labels like ABC – Para, Memphis’ Stax, the studio at Muscle Shoals, or New Orleans’ Fury have brass that is the primary foundation without the use of strings in small and/or large combos. Motown also makes frequent use of a strong, complex arranged brass section with special attention baritone saxophones.
In soul music in general, the brass, usually of horns and saxophones, was now branching off into the use and experimentation of other brass instruments. Usually, in older R&B music there might be a trumpet (sometimes coronet), an alto sax, tenor sax and maybe a baritone sax, sometimes a trombone but on the whole horn sections were traditionally small consisting of one to five players.
Starting in the 60s soul artists started trying out all sorts of horns like cornets, Fluegel horns, French horns, trombones, tubas and other rare brass instruments including flutes. The saxophones remained in the mix with experimentation with soprano and baritone saxophones as well as the traditional alto and tenor saxophones. The tenor and baritone saxophones take on a particularly gregarious role in early soul music.
* Brass arrangements are more elaborate, depending on the label and/or region.
* New brass instruments, rare to R&B and gospel, are tried out.
The Guitar
The guitar starts exhibiting greater independence switching between a rhythmic-harmonic supporting role and to flat out carrying the lead. The guitar becomes very versatile in the 60s showing a wide range of uses. The guitars start experimenting with fuzz, distortion, overdrive and other interesting effects. The rhythm guitar begins collaborations with one or more guitars to come up with some interesting syncopated effects. With the use of new Latin beats, the guitar is pivotal in supporting the beat and also harmonically mapping out the song with its use of arpeggios (a chord broken into a sequence of notes).
* Guitars prominence, experiments with effects, syncopation with rhythm guitars.
The Organ and Keyboards
The organ takes on many new roles in soul music. The organ steps up giving that gospel edge ala Ray Charles the Father. Sometimes the organ plays harmonic support giving a song a gospel feel. Other times the organ leads the rhythm section of a song mimicking the vocal parts. Most of the time, the organ is playing blues and jazz-influenced trills, phrases and flourishes whether leading or backing. Little by little the tinkering and banging piano so prominent in early R&B music gradually changes its role to a more harmonically supportive instrument much like the role of the strings.
* Organ versatility, gospel presence, jazz & blues flourishes.
The Rhythm Section
The rhythm section goes through a great change, affected by each region that takes place throughout soul music’s development and lifespan.
* The rhythm section experiments with Latin & World Beats.
The Drums
The drums in soul music start out heavily influenced by R&B, eight to the bar, boogie-woogie but slowly adopt either a face paced gospel beat or a slower blues triple meter beat. The drums were doing funky fills and tricks and were given more freedom to try new things. The bass drum started to drop in funky bombs during a groove or just pound away four on the floor.
Depending again on the region and label the beats were diverse indeed yet mostly all soul beats at the time, benefitted from new recording technologies and techniques.
Motown had mostly fast-paced, crisp beats for most of the hits and occasional triple meter slower beats for the ballads. Atlantic had big orchestral and jazz room facilities with access to many differing instruments.
Stax was more laid back, as was the studio sounds of Muscle Shoals or the New Orleans flavored Fury label. These southern labels offered a more blues based beat.
* Faster gospel like beats for dance songs and slow blues rhythms for ballads.
* Drum rhythms get funkier, inventive fills, bass drum and overall technique.
The Percussion section
In the beginning soul as a genre began to experiment with Latin rhythms such as rumba, cha cha cha and clave rhythms. In percussion there is a Latin rhythmic concept called clave (not to be confused with the rhythm instrument) please see my article on the concept of clave.
The percussion section becomes fully integrated in the early days of soul. In addition to the drums, there are now congas, bongos, cow bells, woodblocks, tambourines, triangles, marimbas, bells, chimes and many more Latin rhythmic instruments. Much of early soul has a Latin tinge, that is using a clave or semi-clave beat, a rumba beat or a hybrid Latin rhythm.
* Percussion becomes standard in soul, utilizing a wide variety of Latin & World instruments.
Much of Atlantic’s output would explore these Latin beats, whereas Motown had a faster upbeat four/four pulse. Stax had a more laid back beat that could either be straight forward or a slower triple meter blues beat more akin to the southern Muscle Shoals or New Orleans beats.
Soul Criteria Quick List
* Knowledge of gospel singing
* Call & response gospel choir technique
* Strings are used more often, depending on the label or region.
* Brass arrangements are more elaborate, depending on the label and/or region.
* New brass and non-brass instruments are tried out.
* The rhythm section experiments with Latin & World Beats.
* Guitars prominence, experiments with effects, syncopation with rhythm guitars.
* Organ versatility, gospel presence, jazz & blues flourishes.
* Faster gospel like beats for dance songs and slow blues rhythms for ballads.
* Drum rhythms get funkier, inventive fills, bass drum and overall technique.
* Percussion becomes standard in soul, utilizing a wide variety of Latin & World instruments.
Disclaimer
The following songs are merely suggestions. I have researched songs from many sources that are generally accepted as measures of the popularity, sociology, theory and all around mystique of music otherwise known as musicology. The songs here are songs that were popular in 1960 and 1961 and that have since grown popular throughout the decades of the 20th Century. There were a lot of unknown and/or uncharted gospel and early sixties R&B songs that didn’t make the list which is provided on an R&B top 40 list.