Narratives in Music

The art of telling a story has roots in the very earliest strands of time. Before any form of writing had been created, oral stories were dominating. We've all heard those stories: folktales, moral stories for children, old wives' tales, nursery rhymes, etc. The list goes on and on. Songs were sung, and most of these songs had a story tied to them. With the advent of written language, stories began to transfer from orally to books and newspapers. However, telling stories orally and in literature are not the only ways one can convey a story, and as technology has advanced, so has story telling. Music, in particular, is a very diverse way to tell a story, and it is one method almost anyone can have a part in.

Volbeat's third album, Guitar Gangsters & Cadillac Blood.
(source: www.metal-archives.com)

For instance, I am a big fan of a Danish rock band named Volbeat. Volbeat has released four albums with a fifth due later this spring. As like any other musical group, many, if not all their songs, tell a story. These stories are all incredibly varied, from positive topics, such as chasing after a girl, to dark situations, such as coping with suicide. In fact, espyrock.com went through a Volbeat album and elaborated on the story of each song on the album. However, one interesting aspect that made Volbeat stand out to me is that all of their albums continue a story that was created in their first album. The story follows a man who is being hunted by a killer. The killer eventually catches up to him and shoots him multiple times, leaving him in the desert to die. After the killer leaves, the man gets up, crawls to his car, and goes after the man that "killed" him. While it is not uncommon for artists to tell stories in their work (recently, Taproot released an album called The Episodes, which recalls the tale of a man who, after a long night of partying, pieces together what exactly happened the previous night) , Volbeat is extraordinary in the fact that while each song on the album tells a story, most of the stories on each album pertain to an even larger story carried on throughout each album.

But yet, one does not need words in telling a story musically. When I took high school band, we played a piece called Lincolnshire Posy. This piece, constructed in 1937 by Percy Grainger, is a 6 movement piece, with each movement reflecting on old English stories. While I will not in depth on each movement, philharmonicwinds.org does cover the basis of each movement. A very interesting listen if you like classical music, Lincolnshire Posy stands out as a beautiful piece and an excellent source for story telling.

When we think of story telling, we tend to think of oral stories, books, or movies. However, story telling is a lot more diverse than we think. Music plays a large part in society and is a subtle storytelling method. What other overlooked methods of storytelling can you think of?