Hip Hop And Its Impact On American Music
Hip Hop And Its Impact On American Music
Hip-Hop and Its Impact on America
Erick Acosta
U.S History II Honors
Period 4
Mr. Pannone
May 4, 2009
Hip Hop and Its Impact on America
Hip-Hop is one of the genres most criticized by America. Many people thought that Hip-Hop would fade away soon after it was introduced in the late 70s. These people were wrong because over 25 years have passed and Hip-Hop is now very popular in American culture. Hip-Hop has grown a great deal since its beginnings in south Bronx. Now Hip-Hop and rap music can be found anywhere from CDs, television shows, advertisements, and the internet. This shows how big of an impact it has on America and American music. A brief history shows Hip-Hop’s achievements and milestones. Hip-Hop is divided into two: the DJ and the MC.
The DJ:
Hip Hop began in South Bronx during the late 1970s. It arose when block parties were common in New York City. Deejays would use a technique to isolate the percussion breaks in songs. They did this because they knew that these percussion breaks would be easier to dance to (Hip-Hop music, par 5). This technique was very much seen in Jamaica and was brought to New York by DJ Kool Herc. DJ Kool Herc from Jamaica was known as the father of Hip-Hop. There were other Deejays that contributed to the expansion of Hip-Hop. These Deejays were DJ Hollywood, who invented the term Hip-Hop, and Grand Wizard Theodore, who invented scratching. Scratching is a technique used by deejays to produce distinctive sounds by moving a vinyl record back and forth on a turntable while manipulating the cross fader on a DJ mixer.
New York was not the only city where Hip-Hop was becoming popular; Philadelphia was also contributing to its success. Philadelphia was perhaps the only city whose contributions were as great as those of New York City’s. A DJ by the name of Jazzy Jeff from west Philadelphia emerges and becomes very popular around 1985. He was known for his precision and won the 1986 New Music Seminar by defeating the DMC...