A music video is a short film or video that accompanies a song (a complete piece of music).
Modern music videos were primarily made as a tool to promote and market the product, for a hopeful increase in the sale of music recordings. Music videos are often called promotion videos ('promos'), due to the fact that they are promotional devices.
The earliest music videos were filmed mid 1950's, however, before then as early as the 1920's, films by animators such as Oskar Fischinger were accompanied by musical scores labelled 'visual music'.
An early example of a music video dates back to the 1920's, St Louis's Blues - Bessie Smith 1929.
From the 1930's to early 1960's, musicals were dominated genres in films, as many were used to promote the music.
1950's and 1960's developments
In 1956 Tony Bennett was filmed walking along The Serpentine in Hyde Park, London as his recording of "Stranger in Paradise" played; this film was distributed yo and played by UK and US television stations, leading Bennett to later claim he made the first music video.
Around 1960 the Scopitone, a visual jukebox, was invented in France and short films were produced by many French artists, such as Serge Gainsbourg, Françoise Hardy and Jacques Dutronc to accompany their songs. Its use spread to other countries and similar machines such as the Cinebox in Italy and Color-Sonic in the USA were patented.
Scopitone Jukebox
In 1966 the clip of Bob Dylan performing "Subterranean Homesick Blues" filmed by D A Pennebaker was much used. The clips ironic portrayal of a performances and the seemingly random inclusion of a celebrity (Allen Ginsberg) in a non-performing role also became mainstays of the form. The clip has been much imitated.
The main two elements of a music video are narrative and performance. Music videos also benefited film makers from art schools as they became more challenging with new ideas.
Modern Era
The key innovation in the development of the music video was, of course, video recording and editing processes, along with the development of a number of related effects such as chroma-key. the advent of high-quality colour videotape recorders and portable video cameras coincided with the DIY (do it yourself) ethos of the New Wave era and this enabled many pop acts to produce promotional videos quickly and cheaply, in comparison to the relatively high costs of using film. However, as the genre developed music video directors increasingly turned to 35mm film as preferred medium, while others mixed film and video.
By the mid-1980's releasing a music video to accompany a new single had become standard, and acts like the Jackson's sought to gain commercial edge by creating lavish music videos with million dollar budgets; most notable with the video 'Can You Feel It'.
A good music video would increase the songs sale as the view hoped to see the video again in the following weeks. As Michael Jackson was the first one to make a short film for his music video, that has a beginning, middle and end in Billie Jean and then in a West Side Story.
Modern Era of Music Video 1970's
In the UK the importance of Top of the Pops to promote a single created an environment of innovation and competition amongst bands and record labels as the show's producers placed strict limits on the number of videos it would use, therefore a good video would increase a song's sales as viewers hoped to see the video again the following week.
1980's Television and Music Videos
In 1981, MTV was launched.
The first music video to be aired was the Buggles 'Video Killed the Radio Star'.
In the early to mid 1980's artists started to use more sophisticated effects in their videos, and added a storyline or plot to the music video. Michael Jackson was the first artist to create the concept of the short film with the concept of a beginning, middle and end. It wasn't until the 1984 release of the Thriller short film that took the music video format to another level.
Top of the Pops was censorious in it's approach to video content, so another approach was for an act to produce a promo that would be banned or edited and so use the resulting controversy and publicity to promote the release. Early examples of this tactic were Duran Duran's "Girl's On film" and Frankie Goes to Hollywood with "Relax" directed by Bernard Rose & White lines by Grandmaster Flash.
MTV
Music video would, by mid-1980's, grow to play a central role in popular music marketing.
Madonna, owed a great deal of her success to the skilful construction and seductive appeal of her video's. Some academics have compared music video to silent film, and it is suggested that stars like Madonna have constructed an image that in many ways echoes the image of the great stars of the silent era such as Greta Garbo. Although many see MTV as the start if a "golden era" of music videos and the unparalleled success of a new art form in popular culture, others see it as hastening the death of the true musical artist, because physical appeal is now critical to popularity to an unpredictable degree.
Music Video's Today
Music Video's Today
New technologies have advanced with new software and new ideas which allows music videos to never die and continue to be made and successful. However, in the modern days the typical video follows narratives to do with heartbreak and relationships, where the artist is portrayed in a sexual and provocative way. This all differs on the genre however, but there is nothing that can't be done. As we even have some videos in the form of cartoons, animations, comic and fast moving pictures. Despite all of this they still work in the same way they were intended to, which is to identify with the song and audience to keep them entertained and interactive.
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