How did blues and African rhythms influence hip hop culture?

Answer 1

The blues movement and the development of early hip hop share many similarities despite being separated by nearly a century and differing in sound and culture.Special:WysiwygBoth have emerged out of financial impoverishment, racial prejudice and the creative expressions of disenfranchised men and women. Through music and words, both styles broadcast their disheartenment within their circumstance, but all to the same end, to be momentarily liberated from their situation.

The blues is a product of influences that are heavily rooted in pre-civil war slavery and the music that developed throughout that period. Some of the blues primary influences come from work songs of black slaves in America, prison chants, spirituals, and church hymns that, more often than not, were purely an expression of collective grief from the mouths of distressing blacks. The most crucial development of the blues occurs during the 1880's - 1920's in New Orleans. Slavery had been outlawed by this time, but there was still a racially hostile environment to say the least. Jim Crow segregation laws, the rise of Ku Klux Klan terrorism, elimination of elected black public officials and the Plessey vs. Ferguson case can give an idea of the type of society and time the blues movement emerged.Special:WysiwygBlacks traveled from Mississippi to New Orleans in search of job opportunities that were potentially more promising than those of other southern states. For blacks, the status of the country alongside the everyday struggles of human hardship and heartache contributed to the main ingredient of the blues; the blues.

The very sound of "the blues" was once said to be "about sculpting meaning out of a situation that seems to defy your being able to find meaning in it."Special:WysiwygIt is the product of human response to troubling circumstances in permutation with creative expression in the form of music. This strenuous emotional energy was channeled and developed into repetitious and simplistic twelve bar arrangements, known today as "the twelve bar blues". It is built on just three chords and typically played on a banjo or acoustic guitar. The blues is not to be limited to just an arrangement style and song formula. More importantly, it is not recognized as the blues simply because of an artist's attention to technique, but he or she must convey the intangible feeling of the blues that transcends conceptual playing style.

Originally the blues told stories of painful events. As blues began to develop from its grass roots into a legitimate and structured style of music, the content may have altered, but the feeling and emotion of its sound continued to characterize it. For example, Bessie Smith was a renowned blues singer who penned the familiar tune Backwater Blues. This was inspired by an actual event, the Cumberland River flood that hit Nashville, Tennessee, on Christmas morning, 1926.Special:WysiwygThe lyrics of the song are intentionally sung slowly and repetitiously, stirring listener with the inflections of her voice.

"…When it thunders and lightnin' and the wind begins to blow

There's thousands of people ain't got no place to go…

Then I went and stood upon some high old lonesome hill.

Then looked down on the house were I used to live.

Backwater blues done call me to pack my things and go…"

To some, singing and playing music that reflects an individual's pain would almost seem masochistic. Why not sing songs that are happy and try to drown out the troubles of the day? Isn't it counterintuitive to remind yourself of the pain you are dealing with? No, this is actually understood to be musically therapeutic and "…A liberating and freeing experience to recognize that which pains you…"Special:WysiwygThis musical philosophy has since been adopted by many other genres and can be found as a primary influence in the early development of hip hop.

Hip hop has been defined as a subculture that collectively embodies four main "elements". These have been grouped together in relationship to geographic location, interests and ethnicity. These "elements" consist of DJing (using turntables and records to create and manipulate sounds), Break Dancing or b-boying, graphing (graffiti art) and MCing or "rapping" (spoken word over rhythms). The element that has been most directly influenced by the sound and philosophy of the blues is rapping.

Nearly a century after the foundation of the blues had been laid and roughly 1,300 miles away from New Orleans, the Bronx set the stage for a newly emerging sound that would parallel the blues movement in numerous ways. In the late 1970's, New York City was on the verge of financial collapse. With public schools slashing funding the first programs to go were, of course, the arts. This rendered musically inclined students helpless, as praying for private lessons was out of the question for most of the poverty stricken community of the south Bronx. With ambition and determination, these kids developed rap, a purely rhythmic and poetic form of expression which took no formal training or lessons. The ties between rap and the blues have been drawn together by music historians and observers alike. "Now that the schools don't have any music programs [in New York]…kids have no place to take music any more. In the Bronx what happened was they figured out a new form of music, that is, using poetry and rhythm - which has a lot of roots in Africa and music from the southern United States…"Special:Wysiwyg

The financially strenuous circumstances and enduring racial animosity for blacks and Latino's in the Bronx contributed to the emotional disposition and lyrics that rappers produced. The Message by Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five is a legendary rap record that was released in 1982. This very same year was a time in which the nation experienced record high interest rates and deep recession.Special:WysiwygThe lyrics in this song are an excellent example of a modern blues which reflected the hip hop community's condition.

"Broken glass everywhere

People pissing on the stairs, you know they just

Don't care

I cant take the smell, I cant take the noise

Got no money to move out, I guess I got no choice

Rats in the front room, roaches in the back

Junkies in the alley with a baseball bat

I tried to get away, but I couldn't get far

Cause the man with the tow-truck repossessed my car

Chorus:

Don't push me, cause I'm close to the edge

I'm trying not to loose my head

Its like a jungle sometimes, it makes me wonder

How I keep from going under"

The song concludes with a skit depicting Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five having a typical conversation out in the street, when a police car pulls up and arrests all of them for no apparent reason. Grandmaster flash asks "What's the problem officer?" The response of the officer was "You're the problem!"

Not only do these two genres share similarities within their literal content, but the musical elements of each are somewhat akin. The primal stages of both blues and hip hop share a minimalist sound, unaltered by modern technology. Church hymns often required only two instruments, neither of which were crafted by man, but rather, were man; the voice and the "ten string instrument" (two hands). The perpetual sound of stomping and the ring of farm tools striking hard ground provided timing for work songs and prison chants that shaped the blues. The human beat boxSpecial:Wysiwyg, arguably the fifth element of hip hop, was the foundation that set the rhythmic pace for the rapper to rhyme. A beat boxer would emulate real sounds of percussion instruments, synthesized noises, turntable scratches, and even movie and cartoon characters. Onlookers usually joined in and clapped their hands in unison with the snare sound (which typically landed on the 2 and 4 of the 4/4 time beat). Call and response was another church attribute that found its way into the blues and has continued to influence live performances ever since. From Cab Calloway's "Heidi ho" to LL Cool J beckoning audiences to "hop" after his "hip", the effect has always been the same, that is, creating a sense of unity between performer and spectator

Special:WysiwygThe Real Hip Hop Blues,eMusic Magazine, Article by John Mothland

Special:WysiwygVeterans of the Civil Rights Movement timeline. www.crmvet.org

Special:WysiwygJazz (Documentary), By Ken Burns. PBS Publication

Special:WysiwygBessie Smith's 'Backwater Blues'; The story behind the song. Popular Music (2006), 26:1:97-116 Cambridge University Press.

Special:WysiwygBranford Marsalis quote, Jazz (Documentary), By Ken Burns. PBS Publication.

Special:WysiwygDennis Bell quote, Big Fun In The Big Town (documentary) by Bram van Splunteren, 1986

Special:WysiwygTimeline of HDC in the 1980's (Article), New York City Housing Development Corporation, www.nychdc.com/about/1980.html

Special:WysiwygA phrase coined by Doug E. Fresh. The Godfathers of Noise(interview), 1984.

Answer 2

When the drumset was created during the 20's it was initially rhythms based off of African music. After that was created drummers started developing the style we know now as jazz. The soul and gospel aspect of that was created from post slavery African American communities, primarily in Harlem during the Harlem renaissance. When I-95 was made in New York it developed the projects. Due to this hip hop and rap music was created, based off of the initial Harlem jazz soul gospel, but now with a new element of party music.

Answer 3

Blues is known for bass, drums and heartfelt lyrics, all of which is found in Rock and Roll. Rock and Roll was just more upbeat and fast.

Answer 4

Since the Africa moves are sort of like break dancing