The 1960s was a time of breakthroughs in rock and roll innovation. We now call much of this music, "classic rock," and it all seemed incredibly "cool" at the time. Much of it still does, and that's all that matters. Our music was distinctly our own and the 1960s are still regarded as an unparalleled "golden age" in popular music history.

Great classical music is both beautiful and timeless. In contrast, popular music provides a fleeting snapshot of our times--our collective hopes, dreams, fears, triumphs and tragedies. It's often called the soundtrack of our lives, and as such, it's often a key part of our most cherished memories.

The sixties were the age of youth, as 70-million children from the post-war baby boom became teenagers and young adults. The 1960s saw an explosion of popular music styles. Unlike the 1950s, in which the birth of rock and roll dominated the decade, jazz, pop, and folk music all gathered devoted listeners in the 1960s. Throughout the decade, rock and roll continued to grow as a musical form, with a clear split between "hard," rebellious rock, and lighter, "soft" rock, which sounded a lot like pop music. The continuing movement away from the conservative fifties produced music that generally offered a more upbeat, socially-oriented message than did that of the 1950s.

Many things come to mind when we think of 1967's "Summer of Love": hippies, San Francisco, free love, be-ins, LSD. etc. Hippies eventually became yuppies and a house in Haight-Ashbury would eventually run you at least a million dollars, but the legacy of one of that summer's elements hasn't faded: the music. The five years at the end of the 1960s took the electric guitar from Chuck Berry to Jimi Hendrix, the LP from an afterthought to an art form, and changed pop culture forever. Right in the middle was 1967, a year during which so many classic albums were released it's hard to believe.

Folk music was reborn in the 1960s, thanks to several young performers who wanted to rescue the musical form from what they saw as its sad decline. Bob Dylan (1941–), Joan Baez (1941–), and the group Peter, Paul, and Mary adopted folk styles—simple musical arrangements played on acoustic instruments—but filled them with political commentary on contemporary issues. Their songs addressed the problems of the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s and the Vietnam War (1954–75) and helped them gain huge audiences. As the decade wore on, folk merged into folk-rock as performers increasingly used electrified instruments and more sophisticated songwriting. Dylan, and the group Simon and Garfunkel, led the way in folk rock.

There was a major change in popular music in the mid-1960's, caused in part by the drug scene and antiwar sentiment. Acid Rock, highly amplified and improvisational, and the more mellow psychedelic rock gained prominence. When the Beatles turned to acid rock, their audience narrowed to a younger group of people. Bands like Jefferson Airplane, the Grateful Dead, the Doors, and the Jimi Hendrix Experience grew out of the counterculture in 1967.

Locally, the Northwest gave birth to the "garage band," which included the likes of The Wailers, The Kingsmen (Louie Louie), Merrilee Rush & The Turnabouts (Angel Of The Morning), Paul Revere & the Raiders, The Sonics, The Regents, and many more. Seattle-native Jimi Hendrix led the more cutting-edge Northwest sounds of the late 1960s. Other notable 1960s Northwest groups included The Ventures (Hawaii Five-O theme), and The Brothers Four. Only a few of these great early Northwest groups survived past the sixties, being overtaken by the British invasion, psychedelic music, large-venue concerts, the demise of small music labels, and related developments of the day. However, they led the way for trend-setting Washington State music to continue exploding across the international scene, where it remains prominent today.

Nearly all of this Northwest music and the powerful memories it stirs can be revisited at Paul Allen's remarkable Experience Music Project (http://www.emplive.org), in downtown Seattle. Also, visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_of_Washington for more informaton about Northwest music and musicians.