Rock music of Canada the 1920s, rock and roll did not acquire its name until the 1950s. "Rock"' or its forerunners electric blues (Chicago blues) and rhythm and blues (Jump blues) was first heard in the late 1940s by Canadians who were living close enough to the American border to tune into American radio station broadcasts. In 1951, Cleveland, Ohio, disc jockey Alan Freed began playing rhythm and blues music for a multi-racial audience, and is credited with first using the phrase "rock and roll" to describe the musical sound of the Doo-wop vocal groups and the rockabilly singers who emerged in the 1950s.
Rock and roll in parts of the United States. The coming together of white youth audiences and black music in rock and roll inevitably provoked strong white racist reactions within the US, with many whites condemning its breaking down of barriers based on color. Many observers saw rock and roll as heralding the way for desegregation, in creating a new form of music that encouraged racial cooperation and shared experience. Many authors have argued that early rock and roll was instrumental in the way both white and black teenagers identified themselves. Several rock historians have claimed that rock and roll was one of