Copyright - 1992 Grolier Electronic Publishing, Inc.

rap music

      Rap music features spoken, rather than sung, lyrics and an 
      emphasis of rhythm over melody.  The product of inner-city 
      blacks, rap is a new and evolving song form with roots in African 
      field songs, black American oral traditions, and the fast rhyming 
      talk of black radio disc jockeys.

      Rap music developed at block parties in New York, where MCs 
      (rappers) recited their rhymes--boasts and exhortations to dance 
      and have fun--while DJs, using twin turntables, provided 
      accompaniment by making seamless transitions between instrumental 
      portions of dance records.  Manual cuing of records led to 
      "scratching" (moving a record back and forth beneath the needle 
      to make a percussive sound), which made possible the creation of 
      new rhythms from existing records.

      The first rap records, such as The Sugarhill Gang's "Rapper's 
      Delight" (1979), kept the party themes and used live musicians to 
      recreate the grooves of songs that had been rapped over. 
      Electronic keyboards and drum machines and, subsequently, digital 
      samplers (which can capture short portions of records in their 
      entirety and repeat them indefinitely), soon replaced live 
      musicians.

      Throughout the 1980s, several songs brought innovations to rap. 
      Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five's "The Message" (1982), a 
      narrative of ghetto life, showed that the form could be adapted 
      beyond party music. Run-D.M.C.'s cover version of the rock group 
      Aerosmith's song "Walk This Way" (1986) brought rock to rap and 
      brought rap to millions of predominantly white rock fans.  Eric 
      B. & Rakim's "I Know You Got Soul" (1987) and Rob Base & DJ E-Z 
      Rock's "It Takes Two" (1988) featured early, deft uses of 
      sampling, lifting drumbeats from recordings by James BROWN and 
      revolutionizing the sound of rap records.

      Toward the end of the 1980s, rap grew more diverse.  Young MC, 
      Tone-Loc, and DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince brought rap to 
      the pop audience with catchy, clever, humorous stories set to 
      pop-derived backing tracks. This made possible the huge 
      commercial success of Hammer (previously MC Hammer) and Vanilla 
      Ice, both of whom were criticized by some for producing 
      watered-down rap music;  bad reviews did not stop either from 
      selling several million copies of their most popular albums.  
      Critics favored artists such as Public Enemy, who conveyed 
      militant pro-black sentiments over harsh, driving backing 
      tracks.  Popular with critics and audiences alike were De La Soul 
      and Digital Underground, two groups that brought eccentricity to 
      rap.  N.W.A, Ice Cube, Ice-T, and Geto Boys told brutal, graphic 
      and often misogynous tales of street-gang life; Salt-n-Pepa and 
      Queen Latifah were among the first successful female rappers.