musical roots...

[welfareloser]

i had some rambling thoughts the other day while at the concert of a fabulous banjo player, alison brown. she started, like nearly all banjo players, in bluegrass. now, bluegrass evolved into dixieland, which was a forerunner of jazz... so she played some dixieland, and then some straight-up jazz. good stuff.

bluegrass itself evolved from traditional irish music. she played medley that was absolutely sublime, letting you feel the evolution... an irish tune... leading into a bluegrass tune... leading into a dixieland tune... leading into a jazz tune. the banjo is a truly wonderful jazz instrument in the hands of those who know how to pick it.

so i extrapolated a bit... jazz led to motown... which led to disco... which led to rap... (don't nitpick my flowchart, now, it's only peripheral to the point to follow...)

and i got down to thinking that it would be pretty damned entertaining if snoop dogg had an mtv reality show where he took a bunch of rappers to live in ireland, hang out at the pubs, and really get to know their irish roots. and maybe even learn to play banjos (the american banjo is an evoltuion of both the open-back irish tenor 4-string banjo and a traditional african gourd instrument, and was invented by some of america's earliest black musicians...)

anyway. banjo hip-hop. that was my point. good stuff, it would be.

[whitak24]

the use of any live instruments would be a great improvement to a majority of hip-hop. so yes, i would strongly support the incorporation of the banjo into hip-hop.

[Showtime]

A lot of rap groups use musicians in the concerts. I prefer a dj unless the original production used musicians.

-j