1. Give an overview of American pop music during the early 1960s; discuss the Brill Building, Motown, Phil Spector, the Beatles, and the Beach Boys.
2. Describe the “British Invasion” by the Beatles in 1964. How did they influence American popular music? Include a description of the Beatles’ music and the songwriting talents of Paul McCartney and John Lennon, and describe two or three representative songs.
3. What made the decade of the 1960s one of the most disruptive, controversial, and violent eras in American history?
4. What important trends in popular music emerged in the early 1960s?
5. Discuss “The Twist” and its significant impact on popular dance styles.
6. Who was Phil Spector? Discuss the “wall of sound” and Spector’s studio recording techniques.
7. What was Motown? Who founded it, and why did it proclaim itself “the sound of young America”?
8. What was the defining model for the career of a self-sustaining, trend-setting rock group of the 1960s?
9. Describe surf music and its major artists.
10. What were the unique, groundbreaking elements in the Beach Boys’ recording of “Good Vibrations”?