Is Hip Hop traditionally American?

[Citizen (The) Doctor]

Seemed like an appropriate question to ask on Inauguration Day...

[Waterfall]

Uh...yes?

I mean, you could make the argument that it's got its roots in Jamaica or whatever, I guess, but c'mon. Where else did hip hop become Hip Hop but the USA??

[Antonio the Sixth]

What other country could it be "traditional" of?

[Citizen (The) Doctor]

I guess I should provide context:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/reliable-source/wp/2017/01/19/kanye-west-not-traditionally-american-enough-to-perform-at-trump-inauguration-says-organizer/?utm_term=.f27d5980ab22

[Antonio the Sixth]

I guess I should provide context:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/reliable-source/wp/2017/01/19/kanye-west-not-traditionally-american-enough-to-perform-at-trump-inauguration-says-organizer/?utm_term=.f27d5980ab22

Oh Christ.

[Waterfall]

I guess I should provide context:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/reliable-source/wp/2017/01/19/kanye-west-not-traditionally-american-enough-to-perform-at-trump-inauguration-says-organizer/?utm_term=.f27d5980ab22

Hah, "context" indeed. OK, so the key word here isn't "American" but "traditionally." No, Kanye West does not make traditional American music. I would never in a million years associate his music with soaring eagles, stars and stripes, purple mountains majesty from sea to shining sea.

The idea we're looking for here is "Americana." Inauguration ceremonies are usually steeped in Americana. Maybe they always are, like an unspoken rule. And they should be! Nothing could be more appropriate.

So is hip hop part of Americana? No it is not. This is not an argument that hip hop sucks or isn't a valid form of music or that the people who make it are less valuable than other people who make music. (People can make those arguments, but they're separate arguments.) Baroque cello music isn't Americana either, but there are some incredible American cellists who perform it!

Every last person involved in this news item is too old for this "I'm mad about not being picked for the team I didn't want to be on in the first place" nonsense.

[kcguy]

So what qualifies as "traditionally American"?

I'm sure Lawrence Welk would.  Would the Andrews Sisters?  Elvis?  The Beach Boys?  KC and the Sunshine Band?  Prince?  Nirvana?  The Black-Eyed Peas?

It would be interesting hearing where people would draw the line.

---

Also, Trump has an adviser named Barrack?  That seems a little awkward.

[angus]

Voted no.

I have no idea what brought on the question, but I think that rock, C&W, jazz, and blues are the traditionally American forms.  Everything else is just borrowing bits from those traditions.

[Frodo]

It is as American as basketball. 

[Lexii, harbinger of chaos and sexual anarchy]

Voted no.

I have no idea what brought on the question, but I think that rock, C&W, jazz, and blues are the traditionally American forms.  Everything else is just borrowing bits from those traditions.

Rock and jazz borrowed a lot from blues (and could evem be called offshoots of this genre ),

[angus]

true, but they have been around long enough to be called traditions.  Also, the meter and progressions and structures are sufficiently different to make me think of them as distinct.

The first rap song was by an artist who called herself Debbie Harry and her band, Blondie.  The name of the song was Rapture and it came out in 1981.  She acknowledged that it was a combination of Disco, Funk, and Hip Hop, all of which are also derivations of other forms.  You could argue that it wasn't the first true rap song, because she did make references to Fab Five Freddy, who was already rapping, but it was the first to top the pop charts at the time.  

I suppose that the hip hop genre came about in the 1970s, with people like Grand Master Flash and the aforementioned Freddy, as well as Kurtis Blow, the first "rapper" to sign with a major label (mercury).  But they were all listening to Funk and Soul at block parties and just started to speak into the mic.  Hard to say where one leaves off and another ends.  It's rather like arguing over whether Buddhism or Mormonism are religions.  I suppose most scholars would say that the Buddha so distinguishes his brand from his native Hinduism that Buddhism gets to be called a religion in its own right, whereas Joseph Smith's brand of religion is really just a subset of Christianity.  (I'd argue that Mormonism, Catholocism, Evangelism, etc., are all sufficiently evolved and distinct that we really should call them all religions in their own right, with the term Christianity being an umbrella term encompassing many of the world's religions.)  Not so with hip hop, disco, etc.  They are all borrowing from other forms and could be classified using the other forms as a Complete Set created with linear combinations therefrom.

[Waterfall]

Rock and jazz borrowed a lot from blues (and could evem be called offshoots of this genre ),

Some very early jazz borrowed from blues and gospel (to say nothing of Creole music and French sea shanties!), but split from that very early on, at least as early as the bebop era following WWII. Most of what today's listeners would recognize as jazz springs from the post WWII movements of bebop (primarily East Coast) and cool jazz (primarily West Coast).

I would say the most traditional generic American music forms, in terms of "music that would be appropriate at an inauguration i.e. Americana without obviously alienating anyone" are:

• big band marches (e.g. "Stars and Stripes Forever")
• American folk (e.g. "This Land is Your Land")
• Folk rock (e.g. John Mellencamp, Bruce Springsteen)
• Detroit soul/motown/doo-wop/funk (e.g. James Brown, The Temptations)

[Suburbia]

It is as American as basketball. 

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

It's garbage either way.

[Figueira]

It is as American as basketball. 

More American than basketball, since basketball was invented by a Canadian in the US, while hip hop was "invented" by Americans in the US.

[RaphaelDLG]

Yes, assuming you're not a racist f**khead.

[FairBol]

Damn straight.  It came, pretty much, from the streets of NYC.  Hip-hop and jazz are uniquely American in nature.