About Encyclopedia of Music Genres

This is an “Encyclopedia of Music Genres” that I put together in 2021. It defines a wide range of genres in a concise fashion, focusing on recognizable characteristics (form, tempo, melody, rhythm, lyrics, instrumentation, origin and influences, relationships to other genres, and venue) with a minimum of historical details and musician name-dropping. I think there are about 1,110 genres included.

It also provides a link to a YouTube video that gives an example of what each genre sounds and looks like. When you read a definition, you can listen to the music and look for the attributes at the same time. I believe this is the most important added value that I’ve brought to this project.

This is something that I’ve been thinking about doing for the past 30 years or so, but it would have taken weeks in specialized research libraries and a mastery of multiple languages and knowledge that I don’t have.

I’ve been able to do this for two reasons: Wikipedia and YouTube.

Most of the text comes from Wikipedia, although carefully extracted and edited for sense. Wikipedia has all the information — it just needed a finding guide and some repackaging.

YouTube has much more music than Spotify or SoundCloud, much of it supplied by music publishers as well as music buffs. I had no problem finding even the most obscure genres.

I am neither a musicologist nor a musician, but I am a music collector. I began taping music off the radio and searching the “miscellaneous” bins in record stores in 1964. I have many of these genres in my own collection and in the YouTube playlists I’ve put together (see my channel, https://www.youtube.com/user/cryptokaptar ). Genres are important to organizing a collection.

A few more observations (in no particular order):

  1. YouTube videos go away occasionally, so none of these links are permanent. However, I will try to replace broken links when I notice them. (And sorry about the ads! That’s why I subscribe to YouTube Premium.)

  2. Genres apply best to particular pieces of music, and only sometimes to entire albums or CDs. Although some artists do play only one genre, most qualify for at least several. After all, a heavy metal band could start playing polkas next week. Tag the music, not the musician.

  3. I was watching an interview with the late actor Harry Dean Stanton (who also wrote and played music) in which he grumpily said, “Applying a label to music is a way to dismiss it.” Wrong, Harry. Applying and understanding a genre is a way to better understand and appreciate the music.

  4. Dances are not necessarily genres, so you won’t find the twist or the waltz here. You can twist or waltz to several different genres. However, other music styles are inseparable from the dances they originated from. The dance then becomes an attribute of the genre.

  5. The format of a band is not necessarily a genre, so you won’t find conjunto or small combo here. Conjuntos and small combos can play all sorts of things.

  6. A particular instrument (including the voice) is rarely a genre on its own, so you will not find piano jazz or á capella song here. Pianos play numerous jazz genres, and voices can do all sorts of things on their own. (Of course, there is at least one exception—Highland bagpipes, which can only play 9 notes.)

  7. The structure of a classical work is not a genre, so you won’t find cantatas, sonatas, or oratorios here. Classical genres are best stated in terms of the period in which they were composed (baroque) or the philosophy through whose lens they were envisioned (modernism).

  8. Genres often overlap, so even one piece of recorded music can fall into two or more at the same time. This should be considered a good thing, rather than a source of confusion.

  9. Don’t feel bad if after looking through this genre list, you still can’t tell the difference between, say, deathcore or black metal after listening to a few bars. I sure can’t. However, in its entries Wikipedia often suggests one or more genres for artists, albums, and even individual songs (largely based on pioneering work by allmusic.com), so I often find myself looking there for help. Discogs.com is also a useful tool.

I’m certain you can find a few genres I’ve missed, or a few mistakes that I or Wikipedia have made. Please let me know about them. You may also disagree with some of my samples or genre choices. Please let me know about those too. I will probably expand this list over the next year, so there is a good chance your suggestions will be incorporated.

Since the text is largely derivative and the YouTube links are not permanent, I don’t think there is a good way to distribute this information other than informally, so I am not planning a book or a website.

However, I don’t mind if you share this with others who might have an interest. Just remind them that I am the aggregator.

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Definitions of musical styles, with examples.

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Editor, librarian, music enthusiast, cryptozoologist, historian, ufologist, researcher, Fortean, postcard collector in Chicago.