Rock Legends: December

Rock Legends continues on Foxtel Arts in December with episodes on Soul Crooners, US Heavy Metal, Progressive Rock and Jazz Rock.

A documentary series that explores the careers and lives of famous rock musicians. We discover the story of their lives and the impact they made on popular culture. Interviews with well-known music critics, news archive and performance.

Thursday December 5 at 8pm – Soul Crooners
Soul began essentially as uplifting black gospel music. Otis Redding took the genre to its next stage with Mr Pitiful. This set the backdrop for artists such as Lionel Ritchie, Michael Bolton and Billy Ocean to emerge in the 1970s into the 1980s.

Thursday December 12 at 8pm – US Heavy Metal
The US heavy metal sound has big hooks, melodic choruses, and monster ballads with nearly every song featuring one guitar solo. Vocals are melodic, and high-pitched. They also include extensive use of harmonies, particularly in the ballads – slow, emotional songs that gradually build to a strong finale. Lyrics tended to deal with love and lust. With Motley Crue, Poison & Ratt.

Thursday December 19 at 8pm- Progressive Rock
By the dawn of the seventies, progressive rock freed bands of the limitations of four-minute songs, allowing musicians to evolve a single track over a whole side of vinyl, draw on classical sources and create music in more complex, time signatures. Moog Synthesizers were portable and affordable, allowing bands to create orchestral effects. Such devices added a spectrum of new sounds and possibilities for musicians. This new world brought artists such as Rush, Yes & Atomic Rooster into the mainstream.

Thursday December 26- Jazz Rock
Jazz rock generally grew out of the artistically ambitious rock subgenres of the late 1960s and early 1970s; psychedelia, progressive rock, and the singer-songwriter movement. Jazz rock includes extensive improvisation and features soloists with distinctive sounds. This programme explores the music of artists Steely Dan, Doobie Brothers, Boz Scaggs.