A music video is a short film that accompanies a piece of music. They are often called ‘promotional videos’ or ‘promos’ as they are primarily used as a marketing device to help promote the sale of music recordings. They first became popular in the 1980’s when the American music channel MTV began to feature this new style of entertainment.

Music videos typically involve a wide range of contemporary video making techniques such as; animation, live action filming, documentaries, and non-narrative sequences which can be combined together to create an interesting and eye-catching music video. Some music videos also interpret scenes to suit the song’s lyrics while other music videos involve a filmed version of the songs live performance.

The creation of talkies and soundies

In 1926, musical short films began to incorporate synchronised dialogue also known as ‘talkies’ or ‘talking pictures’. The first feature film originally presented as a talking picture ‘The Jazz Singer’ was released in October 1927. A few years later in the 1930’s cartoons began to feature popular musicians who would perform their hit songs on-camera during the programme. Later on in the mid 1940’s musician Louis Jordan produced short films for his songs which were named the ‘ancestors of music videos’ by historian Donald Clarke. Musical films also known as ‘soundies ’also became popular in the mid 1940’s. The first music video ‘Jailhouse Rock’ staring Elvis Presley was released in 1957.

The introduction of promotional clips

In 1965 the Beatles first promotional clip was produced and by late 1966 the group progressed and filmed two series of colour promotional clips for their hit singles ‘Rain’ and ‘Let It Be’. In 1967 the

The history of music videos

Beatles made two further clips for ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ and ‘Penny Lane’ which used a series of techniques including reversed film, slow motion, dramatic lighting and a range of unusual camera angles. The Rolling Stones also appeared in many promotional clips featuring their songs including their single ‘We Love You’ which was released in August 1967. The clip primarily included scenes of the group recording in the studio.

The beginning of music on television

The British TV show ‘Top Of The Pops’ began featuring music videos in the late 1970’s. This helped increase particular song sales as viewers hoped to see music videos again the following week. However, this also brought competition amongst bands and record labels as the shows producer placed limits on the number of videos it would feature. In 1975 Bruce Gowers made a promotional video for the band Queen and their hit single ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ which was later featured on ‘Top Of The Pops.

Music videos go mainstream

By the 1980’s the success of music videos began to increase with the development of new video recording and editing equipment involving the development of visual effects and high-quality videotape recorders. In 1981 the American video channel ‘MTV’ was launched with the first music video to be aired called ‘Video Killed the Radio Star’ by Buggles. The channel presented viewers with the opportunity to access music on television 24 hours a day. MTV later launched their own music channel known as ‘VH1’ in 1985. The channel featured much softer and calmer music in comparison to MTV to suit an older demographic audience. MTV also began to branch out with the launch of MTV Europe in 1987 and MTV Asia in 1991. Another important development in music video history was the creation of Channel 4’s ‘The Chart Show’ in 1986. The programme primarily consisted of music videos accompanied by computer graphics to suit the viewers taste. The Chart Show later moved to ITV in 1989.

The rise of directors

In 1992 MTV began to show directors names listed on the credits of music videos. This included French film director Michel Gondry and American director Spike Jonze who later went on to direct feature films. Music video director Mark Romanek was also one of the first to be listed by MTV and became well known through his work with Michael Jackson’s hit single ‘Scream’ which cost a total of $7 million to produce and Madonna’s ‘Bedtime Story’ which cost $5 million resulting in Romanek to be part of two of the most expensive music videos in history.

The involvement of the Internet

In 2005, the online entertainment website ‘YouTube’ was created enabling music lovers to access their favourite music videos online. This resulted in an increase of new artists including the band ‘Ok Go’ which proved to be success ful with two of their songs ‘A Million Ways’ and ‘Here It Goes Again’ showing increased popularity online. In 2009 the band Thirty Seconds to Mars’ uploaded their music video ‘Kings and Queen’ to YouTube on the same day as the single’s release where it gathered over one hundred million views in a day. The video was also shown as video of the week on the iTunes Store with one of the most downloaded videos ever to be featured. With the help of several different music publishers, the music video website ‘Vevo’ was released in late December 2009 giving viewers the chance to watch high-quality music videos.