March 27, 2009
Rap music worked its way to mainstream music around the late 70s to the early 80s. Those who study history would trace rap musics roots way back in American history when Griots or West African folk poets used to deliver their stories in a rhythmic tone accompanied by drums and other sparse instrumentation. Today, the art of rapping has evolved into something that spans cultural and lifestyle dimensions.
Folk roots meet Jamaican-style
Rap music combines the poetry of the Griots with Jamaican-style toasting. Toasting is used by Jamaican disc jockeys or DJs in dance parties to coax people to dance to their music. DJs are the first rappers or MCs (short for master of ceremonies). They would speak over their music to shout out slogans like Work it, work it and Move it to keep encourage continuous dancing on the dance floor. Soon, toasting became longer and became less about dancing and more about life and having fun. Contextually, these raps can be insult raps, news raps, message raps, nonsense raps, and party raps.
This early way of rapping was soon enhanced to include manual manipulation of the sound system to heighten the dance experience. It has been said that people dance because of the beat and not of the lyrics. And so, DJs soon incorporated other techniques like dubbing and scratching to the rap music appeal. Dubbing enhanced Jamaican toasting by cutting back and forth between vocal and instrumental tracks and isolating the beat for danceability. Scratching, on the other hand, is done by moving the record in the turntable from one direction to another and back again while the needle is still in the groove.
Rappers deluxe
Rap historians cite young Jamaican Clive Campbell as one of the proponents of rap music when he migrated to the Bronx and brought with him the art of Jamaican toasting. In the Brox, Campbell was known by his monicker, Kool Herc (short for Hercules). Other early rappers rappers were Jamaican toasters such as U Roy, Duke Reid, Sir Coxsone, and Prince Buster. They were followed by the next decade of rappers like MelleMel, Fatback Band, Sugarhill Gang, Grandmaster Flash, and Run-D.M.C.
The early nineties saw the entry of white American rappers like Ice Cube to the African-American-dominated world of rap music. Even women rappers surfaced in the mainstream rap music scene. Women rappers like Salt N Pepper, Monie Love, and Queen Latifah rapped over R&B melodies and expressed lyrics that touched on women-related issues.
The look of rap
From its origins in the gang dominion of Bronx and the dancehalls of downtown ghettos, rap music soon found its way into the mainstream music scene. Soon, not only African-Americans were dancing to rap music. Rap music evolved into lyrical reflection of urban life. Rastafari-clad youth wore oversized shirts and jackets paired with low-riding oversized jeans that exposed their underwear. Heavy chain accessories also became part of the rapper look.
Rap music, while considered by some to be a fad that would eventually lose its appeal, is really a form of musical art that has become a way of expression. Modern mouth percussion, vocal improvisation and stripped down melody, these elements of rap music make it a unique musical experience.
By: Sayid Aksa
About the Author:
Folk roots meet Jamaican-style
Rap music combines the poetry of the Griots with Jamaican-style toasting. Toasting is used by Jamaican disc jockeys or DJs in dance parties to coax people to dance to their music. DJs are the first rappers or MCs (short for master of ceremonies). They would speak over their music to shout out slogans like Work it, work it and Move it to keep encourage continuous dancing on the dance floor. Soon, toasting became longer and became less about dancing and more about life and having fun. Contextually, these raps can be insult raps, news raps, message raps, nonsense raps, and party raps.
This early way of rapping was soon enhanced to include manual manipulation of the sound system to heighten the dance experience. It has been said that people dance because of the beat and not of the lyrics. And so, DJs soon incorporated other techniques like dubbing and scratching to the rap music appeal. Dubbing enhanced Jamaican toasting by cutting back and forth between vocal and instrumental tracks and isolating the beat for danceability. Scratching, on the other hand, is done by moving the record in the turntable from one direction to another and back again while the needle is still in the groove.
Rappers deluxe
Rap historians cite young Jamaican Clive Campbell as one of the proponents of rap music when he migrated to the Bronx and brought with him the art of Jamaican toasting. In the Brox, Campbell was known by his monicker, Kool Herc (short for Hercules). Other early rappers rappers were Jamaican toasters such as U Roy, Duke Reid, Sir Coxsone, and Prince Buster. They were followed by the next decade of rappers like MelleMel, Fatback Band, Sugarhill Gang, Grandmaster Flash, and Run-D.M.C.
The early nineties saw the entry of white American rappers like Ice Cube to the African-American-dominated world of rap music. Even women rappers surfaced in the mainstream rap music scene. Women rappers like Salt N Pepper, Monie Love, and Queen Latifah rapped over R&B melodies and expressed lyrics that touched on women-related issues.
The look of rap
From its origins in the gang dominion of Bronx and the dancehalls of downtown ghettos, rap music soon found its way into the mainstream music scene. Soon, not only African-Americans were dancing to rap music. Rap music evolved into lyrical reflection of urban life. Rastafari-clad youth wore oversized shirts and jackets paired with low-riding oversized jeans that exposed their underwear. Heavy chain accessories also became part of the rapper look.
Rap music, while considered by some to be a fad that would eventually lose its appeal, is really a form of musical art that has become a way of expression. Modern mouth percussion, vocal improvisation and stripped down melody, these elements of rap music make it a unique musical experience.
By: Sayid Aksa
About the Author:
Sayid Aksa is the author of http://musicmars.com
You can watch best rap music videos and other cool music videos from various genres on his site.
Filed under Blog by 
March 26, 2009
DJ Music is the most common form of entertainment!
It is really difficult to enjoy a party without music. Whichever party it may be, music is essential. In fact while framing a budget for a party, one should first frame a budget for DJ Music. Be it a wedding party, a cocktail party, a business party, an office party or a mere kitty party, if you can arrange for DJ Music that would probably be the most exciting part of the party.
DJ Music has become very popular these days. These days you can find exciting DJ Music in your school program or your college feast. DJ Music is also quite common in a bar. These days you will not be able to find a corporate party without DJ Music. DJ;s are available in different price, for different events.
No more can you find those live performances of the big bands in a wedding reception. People now hire DJ by default when it comes to parties and events. So you can very well understand that to peruse a career as a DJ is quite interesting.
Your parents may not want you to be a Disc Jockey and play DJ Music, but if you have a passion for music, it is great career for you. DJ’ing with a crazy crowd is fun. Moreover there are a lot of advantages in this career.
Advantages of a DJ
Even if you opt for DJ’ing, you can still continue with a full time job. Usually DJ’s work during the night. So, it won’t be difficult for you to continue with your DJ career and another full time job together. Moreover if you have a passion for music, DJ’ing during the night will be an entertainment for you.
You can earn very well from a DJ job. The reputed DJ’s earns very high amount every month.
If you are a music lover and doing full time DJ’ing, to play good musical tracts is not a difficult task for you either.
In this type of job, you have complete freedom. You can explore your creativity in your own way while you are DJ’ing. Apart from earning money, you can also keep improving your creative skills.
As a DJ you can also enjoy complimentary drinks and food items constantly.
Some of the reputed DJ’s even play for big parties, high school reunions socials and weddings. They always carry their own equipments and sound recordings.
By: gardnerwilkinson
About the Author:
It is really difficult to enjoy a party without music. Whichever party it may be, music is essential. In fact while framing a budget for a party, one should first frame a budget for DJ Music. Be it a wedding party, a cocktail party, a business party, an office party or a mere kitty party, if you can arrange for DJ Music that would probably be the most exciting part of the party.
DJ Music has become very popular these days. These days you can find exciting DJ Music in your school program or your college feast. DJ Music is also quite common in a bar. These days you will not be able to find a corporate party without DJ Music. DJ;s are available in different price, for different events.
No more can you find those live performances of the big bands in a wedding reception. People now hire DJ by default when it comes to parties and events. So you can very well understand that to peruse a career as a DJ is quite interesting.
Your parents may not want you to be a Disc Jockey and play DJ Music, but if you have a passion for music, it is great career for you. DJ’ing with a crazy crowd is fun. Moreover there are a lot of advantages in this career.
Advantages of a DJ
Even if you opt for DJ’ing, you can still continue with a full time job. Usually DJ’s work during the night. So, it won’t be difficult for you to continue with your DJ career and another full time job together. Moreover if you have a passion for music, DJ’ing during the night will be an entertainment for you.
You can earn very well from a DJ job. The reputed DJ’s earns very high amount every month.
If you are a music lover and doing full time DJ’ing, to play good musical tracts is not a difficult task for you either.
In this type of job, you have complete freedom. You can explore your creativity in your own way while you are DJ’ing. Apart from earning money, you can also keep improving your creative skills.
As a DJ you can also enjoy complimentary drinks and food items constantly.
Some of the reputed DJ’s even play for big parties, high school reunions socials and weddings. They always carry their own equipments and sound recordings.
By: gardnerwilkinson
About the Author:
Franchise Record Pool offers the most cost efficient DJ Music around the world. Contact us at (347)449-5129.
Filed under Blog by
March 23, 2009
House music has always been pushed forward by DJ's wanting and craving new music. Music that their peer's haven't yet heard let alone had the ability to own. Music that is upfront and rare.
As the volume of dance labels and artists increased towards the end of the last millennium, mainly due to the ability to produce very highly polished music on a simple pc, the sales quantity of each release decreased as the market did not increase with amount of new music flooding in. With this change record companies needed to address costs to reflect these lower sales. Label's looked to technology to help cut the costs of running their business. One major area where this came to fruition was promotions.
For years the DJ's choice and only option was vinyl, clubs only had vinyl turntables and in the odd instance where they did have CD turntables they were very poor. This changed with the launch of the pioneer CDJ series. DJ's were suddenly able to do everything they could on vinyl turntables and more but using CD's. Labels had previously had only one option to press a run of promotional records to send out to DJ's. The cost of manufacture and shipping to DJ's was huge. Overnight DJ's could use CD's. It's much cheaper to manufacture and half the price to ship, an added bonus was that music could be burnt straight from a pc where the track had been written and in a DJ's hands the following day being played to a packed club that evening. For labels and producers this was a fantastic way to promote new music and for the DJ this was bliss new music really quickly - fresh and exclusive! All went well with this new format until the mp3 came along. Suddenly promotional music was finding its way onto the file sharing sites like Limewire and Soulseek. DJ's who had been sent music on CD or even emailed as mp3's began sharing this music. The thought process behind people doing this went against all that had gone before as most DJ's hide their secret weapons rather than sharing with anyone at all. This had a knock on by taking the control the labels had of who had their product when and where away. Also potential revenue began being lost and to a section of the music industry where every sale counts this was frustrating and hugely detrimental.
Dance music releases usually only have a shelf life of around 8 weeks. There are obvious exceptions to this rule but 95% of releases are played in clubs and sell for this length of time and that's it. File sharing screwed this up by both the sales and also the structure of the chosen few influencing bigger DJ's not having something they can fully get behind during the promotional stage of a release. Therefore less people got to hear it, less are influenced and less potentially buy it. The industry has never really recovered from file sharing but more recently the sale of mp3's and specifically dance music mp3's has boomed and this has helped to a certain extent slow the decline and with time the scene could once again flourish. The one problem dance music has encountered with sales of mp3's is price but that is another story.
By: Dj Pezz
About the Author:
As the volume of dance labels and artists increased towards the end of the last millennium, mainly due to the ability to produce very highly polished music on a simple pc, the sales quantity of each release decreased as the market did not increase with amount of new music flooding in. With this change record companies needed to address costs to reflect these lower sales. Label's looked to technology to help cut the costs of running their business. One major area where this came to fruition was promotions.
For years the DJ's choice and only option was vinyl, clubs only had vinyl turntables and in the odd instance where they did have CD turntables they were very poor. This changed with the launch of the pioneer CDJ series. DJ's were suddenly able to do everything they could on vinyl turntables and more but using CD's. Labels had previously had only one option to press a run of promotional records to send out to DJ's. The cost of manufacture and shipping to DJ's was huge. Overnight DJ's could use CD's. It's much cheaper to manufacture and half the price to ship, an added bonus was that music could be burnt straight from a pc where the track had been written and in a DJ's hands the following day being played to a packed club that evening. For labels and producers this was a fantastic way to promote new music and for the DJ this was bliss new music really quickly - fresh and exclusive! All went well with this new format until the mp3 came along. Suddenly promotional music was finding its way onto the file sharing sites like Limewire and Soulseek. DJ's who had been sent music on CD or even emailed as mp3's began sharing this music. The thought process behind people doing this went against all that had gone before as most DJ's hide their secret weapons rather than sharing with anyone at all. This had a knock on by taking the control the labels had of who had their product when and where away. Also potential revenue began being lost and to a section of the music industry where every sale counts this was frustrating and hugely detrimental.
Dance music releases usually only have a shelf life of around 8 weeks. There are obvious exceptions to this rule but 95% of releases are played in clubs and sell for this length of time and that's it. File sharing screwed this up by both the sales and also the structure of the chosen few influencing bigger DJ's not having something they can fully get behind during the promotional stage of a release. Therefore less people got to hear it, less are influenced and less potentially buy it. The industry has never really recovered from file sharing but more recently the sale of mp3's and specifically dance music mp3's has boomed and this has helped to a certain extent slow the decline and with time the scene could once again flourish. The one problem dance music has encountered with sales of mp3's is price but that is another story.
By: Dj Pezz
About the Author:
Pezz has been a director within the 3 Beat Group for over 15 years. From the early days managing the world famous dance music store (www.threebeatrecords.co.uk), writing for Update and Muzik magazines and DJ'ing worldwide to producing tracks for 3 Beat Music and more recently helping build 3 Beat Label Management 3 Beat Digital - the mp3 downloads site and the dance label Boss Records.
Filed under Blog by
