How useful is Richard Peterson's Production of Culture Perspective to the birth of Rock n Roll?

Rock n Roll refers to rock music recorded around the 1950's, it became a national form in this era. Artists such as Bill Haley, Rock Around the Clock and Elvis Presley emerged. Who would believe that this would be the start of a music revolution?

Richard Peterson’s perspective identified six factors that he believed influenced the emergence of Rock n Roll. His views are useful as he covers all the aspects of how it was possible for rock n roll to emerge, but what he fails to focus on was the nature of the music itself and how early Rock n Roll was popular 

because it was music to rebel by. The musical movements were familiar and the listener was

 comfortable. Peterson is only interested in how music gets from ‘A – B’, he does not explain how the change in music occurred and unlike music before, it appealed to a younger audience.

What is Popular Music?

Popular music is very difficult to define. There isn’t just one definition, it can be any genre of music that has a wide appeal to lots of ‘common’ people. It can also be music belonging to any of a number of musical styles that are accessible to the general public and distributed through the mass media as a commercial product. The criteria for what counts as popular and its application to specific music styles and genres is open to debate. Record sales, air time on the radio and television are some of the indicators of popularity. Roy Shuker, had the closest definition to what i believe popular music is: Essentially all popular music consists of a hybrid of musical traditions, styles and influences and is also an economic product which is invested with the ideological significance by many of its consumers. In conclusion Popular music is a very broad subject.