Is rap tomorrow's jazz?

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Another, crucial factor in all this evolution that cannot be overlooked is the decimation of instrumental music programs in urban schools, especially in the "inner-city".

They've never had instrumental music programs in urban schools in West Africa. And the governments that sponsored bands in the sixties and seventies fell to the World Bank. Most of the bands are young, not old guys (though there are some of them still about).

I'd think that your argument was special pleading, but I know you're not in the jazz education biz.

MG

Point being simply that there was a fundamental change in the "tools" that were widely/generally available to the inner-city American youth, but not a correlative diminishing of creative energy or impulse. So instead of saxophones and trumpets, you get people starting to work with records and turntables, and practicing rhymes and flow instead of scales and arpeggios.

Also in West Africa - people started making music with saxophones, trumpets, trombones, guitars, basses, electronic keyboards (and a bit later turntables), none of which were widely available to inner city West African youth. I did say I wasn't arguing against you. The point I was trying to make was that in America, inner city youth weren't compelled by the system to take up turntables, any more than in West Africa they were compelled by the system to take up saxes etc - they did so from plain choice, to make the music they heard in their heads.

MG

[JSngry]

American public schools had an ongoing practice spanning several generations of providing instrumental musical instruction for all students, with many school systems even providing instruments at no cost to the students. That practice began to deteriorate in the early-mid 1970s, expense being given as the reason (and rightly so) but a view of humanity that devalues exposure to "the arts" as a beneficial force for all gleefully making the big push, and the inner-city schools were among the first to be impacted.

No, inner-city American youth weren't "compelled" to take up turntables and such, but it became a much more practical outlet, as did the focus away from "trained" musical practices. No band, no orchestra, no instruments provided, hey - to where and to what do you turn if you want to make music? And what "musical rules" do you follow when there's really nobody to teach you any?

I'm sure that West African youth have their own stories to tell, but theirs is not the story of how hip-hop took root in inner-city America and never let up.

[John L]

Another, crucial factor in all this evolution that cannot be overlooked is the decimation of instrumental music programs in urban schools, especially in the "inner-city".

They've never had instrumental music programs in urban schools in West Africa. And the governments that sponsored bands in the sixties and seventies fell to the World Bank. Most of the bands are young, not old guys (though there are some of them still about).

I'd think that your argument was special pleading, but I know you're not in the jazz education biz.

MG

Point being simply that there was a fundamental change in the "tools" that were widely/generally available to the inner-city American youth, but not a correlative diminishing of creative energy or impulse. So instead of saxophones and trumpets, you get people starting to work with records and turntables, and practicing rhymes and flow instead of scales and arpeggios.

Also in West Africa - people started making music with saxophones, trumpets, trombones, guitars, basses, electronic keyboards (and a bit later turntables), none of which were widely available to inner city West African youth. I did say I wasn't arguing against you. The point I was trying to make was that in America, inner city youth weren't compelled by the system to take up turntables, any more than in West Africa they were compelled by the system to take up saxes etc - they did so from plain choice, to make the music they heard in their heads.

MG

I think that economics does have something to do with it. Even back in the golden age of West African music, I understand that many of the single string guitar styles that emerged came out of guitarists playing rhumba horn lines because a horn section was too expensive. New technology has empowered many people on the streets with the ability to produce hip hop at a rather small cost. As far as West African music is concerned, I find it a bit disappointing that so much of the Hip Hop being made now retains so little African roots. Much of it sounds like it could have been made in L.A. In fact, a lot of it probably is.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

I'm sure that West African youth have their own stories to tell, but theirs is not the story of how hip-hop took root in inner-city America and never let up.

Certainly.

American public schools had an ongoing practice spanning several generations of providing instrumental musical instruction for all students, with many school systems even providing instruments at no cost to the students. That practice began to deteriorate in the early-mid 1970s, expense being given as the reason (and rightly so) but a view of humanity that devalues exposure to "the arts" as a beneficial force for all gleefully making the big push, and the inner-city schools were among the first to be impacted.

No, inner-city American youth weren't "compelled" to take up turntables and such, but it became a much more practical outlet, as did the focus away from "trained" musical practices. No band, no orchestra, no instruments provided, hey - to where and to what do you turn if you want to make music? And what "musical rules" do you follow when there's really nobody to teach you any?

You're not wrong, of course, but I feel this argument undervalues the originality that is expressed in rap as a cultural expression arising out of its specific environment. I know you know this stuff had been around for years in one form or another. Comedians who didn't sound like Cosby, eg Redd Foxx, Richard Pryor and, particularly, Rudy Ray Moore; Johnny Otis & Mighty Mouth Evans, with "Signifying monkey", and the rude part 2 on the Snatch & the Poontangs LP; blaxploitation films; the Last Poets and Gil Scott-Heron; the Jamaican influence that others have discussed here; preachers, too. Lots and lots more were all in the air and contributing to the formulation of a different and black set of rules.

Also contributing was the movement of the black middle class out of the ghetto. I read somewhere that a large proportion of black jazzmen came from the middle classes. Don't know whether it's true, but if it is, then bang goes a big influence out of the inner city. But anyway, a lot of people who were interested in compromise with mainstream culture.

To imply that rap happened because no one was around to teach people the old musical rules just seems wrong to me. I think people chose these new, black, rules (or perhaps influences) because they fitted their lives better, not because they couldn't aspire to anything "better" (whiter?)

MG

[JSngry]

You're not wrong, of course, but I feel this argument undervalues the originality that is expressed in rap as a cultural expression arising out of its specific environment...To imply that rap happened because no one was around to teach people the old musical rules just seems wrong to me. I think people chose these new, black, rules (or perhaps influences) because they fitted their lives better, not because they couldn't aspire to anything "better" (whiter?)

You're seriously misreading my intent!

The target(s) of my comments are those who constantly bemoan the disappearance of "real music" in the wake of hip-hop. My point is that hip-hop as a whole is exactly an expression of a specific culture's creative energy rooted in a particular time and place which btw coincided with the all-but-disappearance of institutionalized music instruction within that culture's immediate availability.

I'm not saying that something similar would not have happened anyway, it almost had to, really, but it might well have taken a somewhat different form if "traditional" musical rules were still in general circulation. Different in no way implies "better".

What I get really tired of is all the middle-aged white folk who reflexively go off on hip-hop as anti-music, anti-this, anti-that, anti-everything, w/o displaying even half a clue about how it happened, why it happened, and, even if they would have liked it if it had somehow taken a different form, why it would have been all but impossible for it to take a different form. It's like, hey, this is the reality, if you don't like the reality, what are you doing to improve it, or are you instead just hoping that it all goes away, one way or another, up to and including the extinction of the people whose reality it is?

Of course it's big business now, and of course it's multi-generational and multi-layered now, and of course by now there's a lot of unreality in the reality (which there has to be for there to be big business around & about it), but...to reflexively hate a people's expression w/o displaying any discernment whatsoever is pretty much to hate the people themselves, and yeah, there is a lot of hate in America right now, and no, ain't nobody got to "love" hip-hop in any way shape or form, but hate will kill you over the long haul, and damned if I want to go down with somebody else's ship, but also damned if the fools want to give that even half a rat's ass worth of consideration.

[JSngry]

And inevitably...this devolves into "just because I hate the noise that pretends to be music known as rap doesn't meant that I hate black people, or even Ghetto Negroes, and how dare you say that I do!?!?!?!?!?!?!" and...no it doesn't necessarily mean that, not at all. But I do posit that there is a "general" level of "discomfort" present that is just not being owned up to, a discomfort that would at least have the possibility of having some basis in rationality if it was fessed up to up front, but...it isn't. I mean, I'm extremely uncomfortable with the notion of being dropped of in a known "drug neighborhood" (be it ghetto crack or trailer-park crystal meth or backwoods moonshine) and being left to fend for myself, I mean, that is rational. But an automatic recoil at a black teenager playing loud bass-heavy music and being all blinged out just because they are a black teenager playing loud bass-heavy music and being all blinged out is so not rational.

Fear and loathing in America...it's not just for Gonzos any more, it's for ANY damn fool!

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

OK, we're cool. Well, I always thought we were, anyway

MG

[JSngry]

Definitely.

Just that there's a malevolence at play in the whole movement to reduce eliminate "arts education" from the public schools here in America that is very much of a piece with the other malevolences at play, and too many of the people who uncritically "support" it all are really, really...unhappy with the inevitable results.

Well, DUH!

[clifford_thornton]

Someone with real knowledge on the subject, similar to some of y'all's knowledge on hard bop, wouldn't know where to begin with this discussion.

Like a bunch of interior designers analyzing contemporary architecture. If you don't understand it, you make the decision to either try, or not. Simple. Just say so.

Amen. I find this thread infuriating and I'm not even an expert on hip hop.

[JSngry]

I find many of the jazz threads here infuriating, but hell, if this board existed only for experts to redundify their expertise, it wouldn't be too much of a place at all.

[cih]

Anyway, what's wrong with a "bunch of interior designers analyzing contemporary architecture"? - what about Le Corbusier, Theo Van Doesburg, Marcel Breuer, or any of that stuff that went on at the Bauhaus?

Where does one thing stop and another start...

What's wrong about discussing the creative process, as it applies to any genre - nobody's claiming to be an expert. Wouldn't it be interesting to see what a Hip Hop forum would have to say about jazz - as long as the question was considered carefully, like some people here are doing?

Marcel Breuer

Le Corbusier

(But... if there are some incorrect statements of 'fact' here you should point them out)

Edited September 27, 2010 by cih

[umum_cypher]

The decreased funding for music in schools has always been the big explanation for the turn to sampling etc, and you wouldn't argue against it. But Prince Paul would, at least somewhat:

You know, everybody went to a school that had a band. You could take an instrument if you wanted to. Courtesy of your public school system, if you wanted to. But man, you playing the clarinet isn’t gonna be like, BAM! KAH! Ba-BOOM-BOOM KAH! Everybody in the party [saying] ‘oooohhhhh!’ It wasn’t that ‘Yes, yes, y’all’ … with echo chambers. You wasn’t gonna get that [with a clarinet]. I mean, yeah, it evolved from whatever the culture is. But it’s just an adaptation of whatever else was going on at the time … It wasn’t cats sittin’ round like, ‘Man. Times are hard, man … a can of beans up in the refrigerator. Man, I gotta – I gotta – I gotta – do some hip hop! I gotta get me a turntable! … Ask Kool Herc! … He’s not gonna sit there and be like, ‘Man. It was just so hard for me, man. I just felt like I needed to just play beats back to back.

This is from Joseph Schloss' thoroughly good book Making Beats: The Art of Sample-Based Hip Hop. The way that some of his producer interviewees talk about hip hop is pretty jazzoid.

[JSngry]

Prince Paul is right as far as he goes (and he goes pretty far correct, imo), but at the same time, the "it ain't gonna be the same as..." argument worked for rock music too. No way that clarinet is going to create the tinglies of Van Halen (or whoever you want to use) in your average young-ish person.

I'll use the early M-Base music as a highly-qualified example of might might have gotten some reciprocity if 6 was 9 and all that...or not...but I'm (again) just saying that sampling & drum boxes were too accessible (and too cool) to have not been jumped on no matter what the circumstances, but why nothing else came in except by "conscious attempt" has to be looked in the face of what was becoming more easily accessed and what wasn't. Out of sight, out of mind...

(and I've had my eyes on that book for a few years now...might be time to go ahead and get it...)

[JSngry]

[.:.impossible]

This doesn't reveal anything about how Dilla's music sounds to those unfamiliar with J Dilla's music (because it is so low in the mix), but it does reveal how much his peers thought of him. If you are at all interested in hip-hop, and you have not yet listened to Donuts, this is your next move. Being turned on to Dilla almost turned me off of other hip-hop, Madlib and much of Stones Throw being the exception.

Please bear in mind that I am not a hip-hop expert by any stretch and I have no hypotheses or theories on anything. I just think his music is beautiful.

http://www.youtube.c...h?v=ZLVtAZQixOA

http://www.youtube.c...feature=related

Edited September 28, 2010 by .:.impossible

[.:.impossible]

http://www.youtube.c...feature=related

http://www.youtube.c...feature=related

I don't know who can afford this book, but I've looked through it at book stores and it seems relevant and contemporary.

http://www.amazon.co...s/dp/1584231971

[.:.impossible]

Beat Konducta Dil Cosby Suite is also pretty good. I like all of the Madlib mix tapes dedicated to J Dilla. This was an official release.

I'd also submit Panda Bear "Person Pitch" as a great example of what hip-hop has bloomed.

[MomsMobley]

Hip hop is as dead as be-bop and with more good riddance, mostly.

J. Dilla is no better than Sonny Stitt; reason for his veneration is ig'nant frame of reference, mostly. He was fine, whatever, but hardly a visionary-- rather than discuss Hannibal Lokumbe (of Bastrop?!), however, it's like oooh, Dilla. If only... He wasn't even Booker Little, and he had a decade more to prove otherwise.

Madlib is like, I dunno, a second rate Phil Woods? Idea of a black Zappa is great but stick to Johnny 'Guitar' Watson until the real thing comes along.

[Noj]

Hmmm, I happen to like Sonny Still, Booker Little, Phil Woods, Frank Zappa, and Johnny 'Guitar' Watson, so I'm not really catching that as much of a slam--not that I really follow the comparisons at all.

Madlib's got some super cool crates, that's for sure. The Quasimoto and Loot Pack albums have damn good beats. I'd rank him lower than guys like Prince Paul and Shayeed, but it isn't like falling short of those guys is anything to be ashamed of.

Hip hop is dead for those who say it is. I take blanket statements like that just like ones about who is "overrated." Overrated to whom? Dead to whom? I'll decide for myself, thanks.

Edited September 30, 2010 by Noj

[JSngry]

Plenty of dead stuff lying around. The air is rife with the stench of death not properly buried.

Thing is, there's plenty of parts to be had, for those with the wits to put 'em together, the ingenuity to not try to put them back together in the form from whence they came, and the smarts to know that doing it sustains life instead of letting it perish.

[.:.impossible]

Is human tomorrow's monkey?

[MomsMobley]

Correct. And the fact that approximately ZERO (+/- 1) hip-hop producers ** ever ** have developed beyond their initial inspirations tells us something; an exception to that is RZA. Your supposed greatest MC Rakim hasn't done shit worthwhile since what... 1992? Word for word Sean Price is the only dude who holds a mic that come close to that elusive blend of Richard Pryor and Donald Goines

Dilla was dead at what, 33? Booker at 23 and the latter did way way way more/further was my only point. Dilla v. Dolphy? Please!!

There might be a handful of MCs in the entire game who have any literary significance.

And again, comparison of hip-hop dudes to Wadada, Hannibal etc is laughable.

There are def. elements of hip-hop which survive, should be incorporated elsewhere but for the most part it's on a par with the jump blues or somesuch, except not much hip-hop can match Wynona Carr's ding dong--

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLt7FCRxyY8

(listen thru the awful video.)

Someone like DJ Spinna is a real musician but he is so because he works far beyond 'hip-hop' too.

Plenty of dead stuff lying around. The air is rife with the stench of death not properly buried.

Thing is, there's plenty of parts to be had, for those with the wits to put 'em together, the ingenuity to not try to put them back together in the form from whence they came, and the smarts to know that doing it sustains life instead of letting it perish.

[Noj]

Hip hop/rap doesn't really lend itself to serious discussion, because it isn't serious (for the most part). I guess one can be serious about it, but it's music that is supposed to be fun (for the most part).

There's this whole generation that grew up on it, and they LOVE the lyrics. So, literary significance...according to whom? Musical significance...according to whom? I go to a hip hop club here in LA, and it's as "significant" as it gets to some.

I mean, how "significant" are most top ten hits? How significant are jazz musicians to classical snobs? Rock musicians to jazz snobs? Classical musicians to hip hop snobs?

Funny thing, to crate diggers like (real) hip hop producers...just about any record can be "significant." Four seconds can be "significant." The DJs love music like few others love music.

[umum_cypher]

Hip hop/rap doesn't really lend itself to serious discussion, because it isn't serious (for the most part). I guess one can be serious about it, but it's music that is supposed to be fun (for the most part).

The reason I love certain periods of jazz so much is that they show that this is a distinction that doesn't have to be made. And the recent history of western art music shows it can be just as much of an aesthetic cop out to claim high seriousness as it is to aim for low fun. ('Can be': I mean serialist lick-spinners etc, not the big names).

The big names are always few and far between though! I'll take MF Doom over Dolphy, if anyone ever makes me, which seems unlikely.

For various reasons I spent the summer with a lot of late-80s early 90s hip hop that I haven't heard since that period, at which point I loved it. I should have left it in my memory, where most of it meant a lot more.

[John L]

That Hip Hop might be dead is a disturbing thought. Is music now dead?