Is “Rap” Music?
Who Decides What Is or Is NOT Music – and Why You Should Care
I teach piano to adults. They love many different kinds of piano playing from show tunes and ballads to the classics. One thing many of them say when the subject comes up is “Rap is not music.” Most are then surprised when I explain why they should change their opinion – for their own good. I explain that no single person gets to decide what IS and IS NOT music. Actually, no one even gets to decide what is GOOD music and BAD music. This is much more to this than merely playing with words. I firmly believe the idea that some expert can pick and choose which music, even which composers and which pieces of music, is worthwhile and worthy has done more damage to music than anything else I can name. I’d like to explain why I believe it to be true, as well as what this has to do with you, the amateur pianist.
The history of music demonstrates, I believe, that a single person, no matter how experienced or educated, can make decisions concerning quality for everyone else leads inevitably to the suppression of the disliked music and art in the name of the advancement of the approved music and art. The “taste-maker” (as they love to call this elitism in the world of food) is a threat to anyone who simply doesn’t like the expert’s tastes. Of course, there is such a thing as greater or lesser experience. Of course, there is more or less knowledge. Of course, there is greater or lesser technical ability. None of these can change a taste into a fact.
This reliance upon the tastes of music and art experts to determine what is supposed to be liked and what is supposed to be shunned is viewed by myself as not only silly but counterproductive to creativity. This is a bold statement, which I would hope a reader would consider.
In a similar fashion, reliance of the tastes of the masses to determine what you personally like is just as silly. Here’s why I think so; in science, facts are facts. The entire world can believe with all their hearts that the earth is flat but that doesn’t make it so. However, the field of art (music) is NOT science. If everybody believes that a certain artist and their music is “great” (whatever that means!) then that artist or music IS great. Art is NOT science and doesn’t work the same way.
Thus, you as a pianist, have the right to learn and enjoy whatever piano music, whatever music you wish. This means you need pay no attention to what any teacher, any expert, any group of other people think. You like what you like and you don’t like what you don’t like. If you love Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musicals and dislike Britney Spears, fine. If modern pop floats your musical boat but anything by Chopin makes you gag, so be it. Experts and “the masses” only have power over you if you grant them that power.
However, this also means YOU, personally, cannot in good conscience, state that “Rap is NOT music.” It IS music for millions. Are you somehow setting yourself up as the “Great Defining God of Music?” Sorry, you are the god only of your own tastes – and that’s as it should be.
In other words,
Musical Freedom for One is Musical Freedom for All
And this freedom leads to personal enrichment, creativity, and better music, music played from the heart. Tell the experts to “take a hike.” Don’t let the “taste-makers” make your tastes.
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Tags: Amateur Pianist, Art Experts, Bad Music, Ballads, Bold Statement, Creativity, Decisions, Different Kinds, Elitism, Entire World, Good Music, History Of Music, Music Composers, Rap Music, Reliance, Science Facts, Show Tunes, Suppression, Tastes, Technical Ability
February 1st, 2010 at 2:14 pm
My analysis is quite similar. The argument over whether some form of expression is “music” or not often winnows down to an attempt to suppress the expression of a particular sub-group within society. Why argue at all, unless the result of the argument can be applied further as a justification to act in a certain way?
Is not the whole question of “is rap a form of music” not a way to establish, perhaps, that is is NOT music? Could that not therefore legitimize keeping rap off the shelves at the store and perhaps even off iTunes? In this way you could keep a culture from expressing themselves! This has been done before, how many things have been called devil music over the years?
I know there are plenty of people in society today that would LOVE to see “those people” knocked down a peg – especially the highly successful gangster rappers. I can’t stand to listen to them, I resent the thugocracy they glorify, and I firmly believe that emulating their behavior, at best, makes you look stupid. Yet on the other hand, I know these people will eventually fall out of favor (it’s already happening) and we’ll just have yet another set of weirdos on our hands leading the pack of pop culture.
I keep these thoughts in mind when judging a form of expression. Don’t fall into the trap that goes along the lines of “…when they came for jews I didn’t speak up because I was not jewish…” (summary of a speech by Niemöller). Suffice yourself to say something like this: “I have tried to understand that music and it simply does not make any sense to me.” It’s honest, it’s neutral, and when someone doesn’t like YOUR music, isn’t it what you would want them to say?
Full disclosure: I listen to some pretty off the wall stuff, like Ween and Leaether Strip. I would never have found it had the taste-makers gotten their way and only had the “pinnacle” of pop culture on the shelf in the store. Put it all out there and let ME decide what parts are good.