by Richard Sprigg

Created on: July 19, 2009

This is an interesting choice, lying as it does between a poor southern white boy who rose to fame performing largely black- influenced music to a white audience and a poor northern black boy who rose to fame performing largely white-influenced pop music to a mixed audience.

The greatest influence on popular music must go to Presley, mainly due to the fact that he had a much greater resource to draw on. It must be remembered that in the mid 1950's radio was segregated; most white teens were totally oblivious of the musical tradition that extended from Mississippi to Chicago.

Drawing heavily on this heritage enabled Presley to develop a stage presence that was fascinating to young people of the time and abhorrent to their elders. His importance lies in this area, that he began the process of exposing white audiences to music that had previously been almost exclusively the province of black clubs and radio. With time, especially after his army service, his style became more and more that of a white pop singer/cabaret artist and his audience aged with him. This paved the way for the influx of British talent who continued the process of selling American Black music to white audiences.

Jackson on the other hand started his solo career at a later time, when the segregation of music was largely past. He started out with a number of exquisitely crafted pop tunes that could not have been written or performed by any other American artist, his intelligence belied his years; he was indeed a prodigy at that point.

As his career progressed it seemed that his themes became simpler and less complex musically. Over time, in fact, his output appeared to come from an increasingly younger performer, almost as if his musical development was running in reverse. The last songs lack the coherence, immediacy and excitement of the early works.

Jackson's impact on popular music is significant, yet as noted above, largely due to time, place and personal style it is considerably less than that of Presley. It might be instructive to consider that had Jackson made his debut in the 1950's, he would have been stuck in the ghetto of black radio, largely unknown to any but black audiences.

This in no way suggests that Presley was a greater talent, merely that due to time and place he had an impact on popular music that Jackson could not hope to equal.

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