Why was there such a reaction to rock music in the 1950s?

Answer 1

Rock Music likely functioned as an outlet for teenagers who want to be different from their parents. Teens like to rebel and rock music offered them an outlet to do that. It represented independence and a way to do their own thing, and show that they could make their own decisions.

Answer 2

Rock & Roll started as a spinoff of R&B (rhythm and blues). R&B originated as a popular style within the black community, but soon started gaining crossover sales among white young people. The country was still strongly segregated, however, so some enterprising music producers, particularly in the south, started making "covers" of R&B songs using white artists (Jerry Lee Lewis and Bill Haley, for example). In particular, they removed some of the more risqué lyrics to make the songs more acceptable to white audiences.

However, many conservative parents and religious leaders were convinced that re-packaging R&B as "Rock & Roll" to sell it to white teenagers was worse than leaving it in the black community. They felt that R&B reflected and promoted the loose morality of the underclass. They insisted that the rolling rhythm of swing eighth notes behind a strong 4/4 backbeat was just as sexually-charged as the suggestive lyrics. More than anything else, the idea of cultural crossover in dance music--black and white young people listening to the same kind of music--gave rise to fears of miscegenation. None of this was a new argument; exactly the same reaction had occurred in the Jazz Age when young people from both sides of the tracks began dancing to Jazz and Swing in the 1920s and '30s.

Answer 3

because it was so different to what anyone had heard before and it was related to black american culture

Answer 4

The music was good and was fun to dance to. James Dean embodied the rebellion of the teenager and Marlin Brando got everyone to wear jeans with a biker jacket.

Answer 5

A style they could call there own. :)

Answer 6

it helped the younger generation rebel