AN ESSAY - DEFINITION OF PROGRESSIVE ROCK

"The progressive rock movement began in Britain in the late 1960s and early 1970s branching off from the fields of psychedelic and underground rock... and it seems today to be one of the most interesting and widely overlooked musical phenomena of the 20th Century."

Progressive rock (also shortens to prog rock, or simply prog) is a form of rock music that evolved in the late 1960s, principally from the psychedelic movement - that somehow progressed beyond the constraints of traditional musical structures by adopting influences of from jazz-rock fusion ("fusion" in the U.S. & "jazz-rock" in the U.K.), classical, folk and world music. Progressive rock started from this plentiful field of emancipation compared to the gold rules of the "rock". It is through these various tendencies that many sub-genres later will be established : Canterbury, symphonic (probably the most famous names in prog), space rock, folk prog, Krautrock, Zeuhl, neo-prog, prog metal, post-rock, experimental etc…

The main defining characteristics and tendencies are that the compositions are more elaborate than the standard rock song structure of verse, chorus etc. Musicianship was often taken to the limit - and, indeed, many of innovative and open-minded bands in "prog rock" had their origins in the late 1960s art school of Britain. They were created to represent a philosophical approach to rock by experimenting with unusual musical instruments including wind sections (flute, saxophone) and string sections (violin, cellos, harpsichord, etc.), electronic experiments (MOOG & ARP synthesizers, the Mellotron, HAMMOND B-3 organ) and full orchestras. The arrangements incorporate stylisation based on jazzy theory, classical elements, world or even avant-garde music. The lyrics, where they exist, are often poetic, conceptual (musical "journey") or based in fantasy.

Another fundamental characteristic of this “cerebral” genre, is its universality (without any commercial or media support) : vibrant "progressive rock" communities span the globe, in South America, Japan, Western Europe (Italy, Holland, Sweden and where it all started, in the UK), Eastern Europe (Poland and Hungary), the USA and in Quebec, Canada with concerts, magazines and specialised distributors devoted to the cause of quality music.

With the advent of the World Wide Web, it is safe to assert that "Progressive Rock" is in full expansion, even though it will probably never again dominate the charts, destined to “progress” perpetually beyond the shallow silliness that has, for so long, been polluting the airwaves.

Progressive rock is not a genre, it is a state of mind which makes a point of being exceeded constantly with its particular musical characteristics, its sounds, its structures and its attitudes... and finally, progressive rock, for all these reasons, is only one kind (thus a limitation) moreover to add to the multiple faces of the record industry. The absurdity is however that in spite of the passion which pushes us towards this music, it is rather regressive .. is it not?

All intelligent music lovers should be made aware of the wonders of this style!

"You call yourselves progressive
I say it's all regressive
You think you can stand in judgement
So listen here and I'll remind you :

Preaching the converted
"cause it's all you know
Music's dead because
It"s all about the money now…"
(Preaching the converted - "Test Of Willis" - MAGELLAN 1995)

"Music speaks through one language but in many dialects."
(Tracts Promo Discipline Global Mobile 1996)

ProgLucky (Ronald Couture)
founder of progarchives.com
Quebec, CANADA