The Beatles, The Who, The Rolling Stones. Many from the past
have had a hand in influencing artists of today. We catch up with
local music aficionados to see who they think had the most
impact
Do you know who Freddy Mercury is? Or, if stopped on the street and asked, could you spell Lynyrd Skynyrd? Perhaps both names are Greek to you. Whether they are or not, both artists were major influences in the music world. To find out about other musicians who have had an important impact on artists of today, but whose names may have been forgotten by some, we asked local musicians and music experts to weigh in.
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“Classical music definitely influences music today. If you think about modern composers – people like John Williams who do movie soundtracks – they’re all striving to live up to people like Mozart and Beethoven. They write these big involved pieces that have the hallmarks of the classics and they put them in box office hits. One recent example I can think of is the “Pirates of the Caribbean” soundtrack. It’s got strings and bass and this gorgeous symphonic sound. The classics have true staying power – they’ve been around for hundreds of years and people are still emulating them. The music has a point to it, they tell a story and they flow a certain way. You can listen to it again and again and again.”
– Sue Piccardo, a violinist for the South Valley Symphony
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“Unless you really study music, it’s hard to know all the people that have been major influences on today’s music. I think there’s a gap in every generation. You get locked into a certain kind of music and you’re unaware of anything else. But, I think it is important to know the greats of whatever music you love. If you’re into jazz, you should know about Duke Ellington. If you’re into the blues, you need to know about John Lee Hooker. For me, I’m an organ player, and Jimmy Smith is the godfather of just about every organ player there is. He revolutionized how the instrument is played. You should know the originals because they’re the ones who set the tone, they started it, and that’s important to remember.”
– Dave Porcella, owner of Porcella’s Music in Gilroy
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“As far as rap and hip-hop go, you have to talk about Marvin Gaye, Run-DMC and Stevie Wonder. Stevie Wonder especially – I think you can hear his influence in past artists and today’s artists. If you listen to people like Mary J. Blige, you can certainly hear Stevie Wonder, and you hear some Aretha Franklin. Music is an ever-evolving art that is constantly reinventing itself, but I think the artists that make it big know where their music came from.”
– Darin Dixon, 34, an owner of The Music Tree in Morgan Hill
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“The Beatles certainly have had an influence on bands of today, but I think they were on a different level. I mean, you have bands like N’Sync that only dance and sing. The Beatles played their own instruments and wrote their own songs.
“I think it’s good for different generations to listen to each other’s music. You broaden your horizons. My son listens to a lot of my music from the past and I listen to the current music he likes.”
– Noelle Sladon, owner of Noelle’s Music in Hollister
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“There are so many great influences in music, it’s hard to know where to start. Of course, Bob Dylan, Stevie Wonder, Michael Jackson, Crosby, Stills & Nash, Joan Baez, Simon and Garfunkel – a lot of them are people who created milestones and changed the face of music. All the people who pioneered rap and hip-hop were clearly involved in a major milestone. And look at The Jayhawks. Their influence goes back to the Grateful Dead. Many of those influential people wrote songs reflecting what was happening in society, and you can see people carrying that torch and writing about the issues of today. Neil Young is still doing it and look at the hubbub the Dixie Chicks got into a while back.
“I don’t think there are any groups today like Led Zeppelin that we’re still going to be talking about in 25 years, but there’s some good music out there. I like India.Arie, Nelly Furtado, Gnarls Barkley, Outkast are two guys that are really pretty talented. Maybe we’ll be talking about India.Arie in 25 years. Who knows?”
– Rocco Tavani, owner of Gilroy Guitar Gallery
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“Every genre has influential roots, and I think most musicians are influenced by their parents’ music. I’m a musician and I was influenced by my uncles who used to listen to Metallica, Nirvana and Guns N’ Roses and my dad who listened to Zeppelin and The Who. Then you start listening to other music on your own, and for me that was punk. So, I’d say my influences are also Black Flag, Rancid, Operation Ivy and Blink 182, who’s more pop punk.
“But in a rock history class I took, I learned that if you really want to talk about a major influence on music, you have to talk about Elvis. He took a kind of music that was considered ‘black’ music that was really underground and he took it over and made it mainstream. You can still see people doing that today. Eminem did the same thing, and the punk bands that influenced me did it, too. They took a kind of music that was really underground and made it mainstream. It’s like a big cycle.”
– Richie Valencia, 19, an employee at The Music Tree in Morgan Hill
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“It’s interesting to listen to Richie talk about punk influences, because he left out some of the originals from when punk was still underground like The Clash, The Sex Pistols and Suicidal Tendencies. Whenever I hear groups like Blink 182 or Yellowcard, I think of those older groups.
“When I think about other influential artists, I think about Led Zeppelin, The Stones, The Who, The Clash, Hendrix, The Beatles, of course. But it’s interesting – I was just reading an article in Rolling Stone Magazine that said a lot of kids aren’t satisfied with a lot of today’s music, so they’re going back and discovering classic rock and old school music. I actually see evidence of that here in the store. We see kids coming in wearing Jimi Hendrix T-shirts or AC/DC. A lot of those kids are involved in music and their own bands, and they’re doing original music and taking it one step forward. It’s exciting.”
– Jeff Nunes, 35, an owner of The Music Tree in Morgan Hill
