Genre Conventions of R&B

Rhythm and Blues, often refereed to ask R&B or R'n'B, is a genre of music which originated from African/American people. the term Rhythm and Blues first came about when Billboard magazine first used it in the late 1940's. R&B was an African/ American urban sound that generally involved jazz.

When R&B was first introduced, it was known to be described as a rocking jazz based with a heavy beat. R&B became popular because of its dance ability and became popular in clubs.The lyrics of R&B were about everyday life. The songs were about work, sex, drinking and love.

By the 1950's R&B was starting to define the sound of rock and roll but by the 60's R&B included soul and music, then by the 70's it was seen as funk. However, by the 80's R&B was defining pop, soul and jazz.Going into the 21st century, R&B would include New jack swing, hop-hop, neo-soul, pop and funk, also known as contemporary R&B.

R&B artists

• R Kelly
• Mariah Carey
• Chris Brown
• Beyonce
• Rihanna
• Ray Charles
• Stevie Wonder
• Mary J Blige
• James Brown

With in R&B music videos they often contain groups of men or women together in clubs and bars, aiming to seek out a sexual parter. R&B has become very sexualised over the past years and has brought a lot of strong, independent women to the music scene. Instead of R&B music often being about religion and soul in the early stages, its seen as being about gangsters and sex rather than something meaning full. A lot of females portray themselves to be sexual objects within videos in order to sell the video, whereas on the other hand, men are seen to be the dominant character wearing a lot of 'bling' with their bodies showing.

Target Audience

A majority of R&B target audience when it first started was a range of ages from teens to people in their 70's. Where as now fans are teenagers/ young adults between the ages of 15-25. This could be because of the explicit lyrics and sexual videos that they show, however, a majority of this age group are teens of both  genders, it is usually this age group that are attracted to this music as they are usually associated with heart brake, love or drugs.- this is something that greatly influences teenagers.

 The target audience could be seen a very female orientated  audience because they are portrayed in a sexual way that they would want to look like, through nudity and lyrics. As well as this, females will be physically attracted to the male artists (many R&B artists are male). Then again some males are attracted to the naked women that are now portrayed in a R&B music video.