re: Do you consider rap and hip hop to be music?

This thread has also brought to the forefront another absolute when it comes to music.

Non musicians tend to concentrate more on lyrics versus chord progressions, key, arrangement, harmony, theory.

The really “deep thinkers” then begin to analyze the “true meaning” of the song and what the artist was trying to impart. They’ll even move into the social construct of the lyrics and how 99% of listeners have totally missed the true meaning.

This is all BS, based on the fact that they have little to no ability to recognize the differences in musical construct, right down to not being able to feel the differences in songs played in major or minor keys.

When you see people doing this, dismiss their ability to understand music and how it’s created.

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Mother fricker, I’ve been playing music (guitar, bass, singing, writting, etc.) for over 45 fricking years. I’ve forgotten more than your arse will ever know about music.

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All of that may be true.

But saying that rap/hip hop contain no live instrumentation is so profoundly stupid as to make this apply to yourself:

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To anyone who knows anything about music… you sound like the fricking idiot you are.

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Mother fricker, I’ve been playing music (guitar, bass, singing, writting, etc.) for over 45 fricking years. I’ve forgotten more than your arse will ever know about music. To anyone who knows anything about music… you sound like the fricking idiot you are. Kiss my Rosie white arse you punk arse piece of shite!

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Hahahahaha.

Ignorance is bliss!

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I'm gonna be watching you...

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There has been a debate for awhile about whether rap and hip hop truly meet the definition of what we would define as “music”.

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Only by boomers who think anything they don’t like isn’t music

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Only by boomers who think anything they don’t like isn’t music

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Not a boomer and I don't think rap isn't music, I know its not.

Rap is closer to spoken-word poetry than music

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SaintlyTiger88

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Yes, I don’t listen to rap and hip hop

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Sure, there may be certain rap songs that have instruments, but this is not the norm.

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How the hell do you know if they use instruments or not if you don't listen to it?

Saying rap isn't music is one of the most stupid takes imaginable.

Here's some awesome horns for ya.

Spittieottiedopealicious

OutKast isn't music? LMAO

TL;DR

Yes. Just because an art is not to someone's liking, doesn't mean it isn't art.


To decide if something is music, one must determine what the parameters are OF "music". Garcia said rap was just talking, that implies it must be sung. Are pieces with no vocals whatsoever "not music"?

I have found people often will say something is "crap" or not valid simply because THEY don't like it. While it is fine they don't like something, that does not necessarily invalidate the thing they don't like. Garcia didn't like rap so he tried to invalidate it by claiming it wasn't music and trying to use some vague standard to justify his opinion.

In the most general sense music can be defined as "sound organized to express human emotion". Under this definition there are no specific parameters of melody, harmony, rhythm, instrumentation or lyrics. I have heard some say music must have melody, well then much of work of Penderecki. Ligeti, Lutoslawski, Stockhausen, Crumb etc would not be "music" even though it is (and some I highly enjoy). If it must have harmony, then anything monophonic is called into question. If it must have rhythm, then ambient music is questioned. If it is devoid of melody and harmony and just rhythm, is it not music? Is Stomp not music? Are percussion ensembles without definite pitch instrument not playing music? Of course it is music.

So what if the voice isn't singing? The fact is this was being done long before rap in folk music of many cultures including the West African Griots. Even some German lieder were using a form of speech-singing in the late 19th century. Some of the 20th Century's most famous composers used this technique. Arnold Schoenberg wrote Pierrot Lunaire in 1912 using Sprechstimme where the vocalist uses the specified rhythms and pitches but does not sustain the pitches.

Rap is certainly sound organized to express human emotion. It also uses several quantifiable musical elements, therefore it has to be music. If it is not music you like, that's fine. There is a lot of music I don't like (went to a performance of Steve Reich's Three Tales at Disney Hall. It is certainly music, but I'd rather have all my teeth drilled out without pain meds than sit through that again...), that doesn't mean it isn't music.

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To me it’s like juxtaposing Mozart to African tribal rhythms.

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And they are BOTH music.

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Sampling is nothing more than a technical copy and paste.

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Spoken like you have only a cursory knowledge of what sampling is, how it works on a technical or creative level, and what can be done with it. Like any tool, it can be used in lazy and hackneyed ways or in ingenious and creative ways.