Rogue 9 wrote:
Actually, I can. It has no melodic line, and is therefore not music.
You have a very curious, limited, and inadvertently ethnocentric definition of what music is.
Let's examine some music forms:
The Haka of the Maori people of Australia
Bamaya, a piece of the Dagomba people of Ghana
A percussion trio piece by Nebojsa Zivkovic
Strictly speaking, none of these pieces have any melodic line. At their basic form, they are rhythm, and that is the piece that most self-proclaimed arbiters of music tend to overlook. In truth, that is pretty much one of the only universal characteristics of music around the world, aside from the necessity for both sound and silence. One may be able to derive potentially melodic lines from differences in timbre or the fundamental pitch of the instruments, but if one wishes to go that route, we should also apply it to rap. Case in point:
Insane in the Membrane by Cypress Hill. Right off the bat, the delivery is clearly not monotonal, and thus, melody could be derived. But even if do wish to go down that slippery slope of of music requiring a melodic line, what disqualifies single pitched note played multiple times in a specific rhythm from being a line? Even at that base level, rap STILL passes the test.
To further argue, we already have a musical practice that allows for the type of delivery near identical to the current rap practice that first appeared in the 19th century, called sprachgesang, or sprachstimme. It is a type of delivery that falls between singing and speaking. It wouldn't surprise me if you haven't listened critically to the delivery of many rappers, but in case you ever do, you would notice that there is a specific conviction and delivery that is not present in their usual speaking voice. It is in essence, a form of song.
Ultimately, if you wish to go down that path of disqualifying rap as music, then you might as well keep on going and disqualify the indigenous musics of many people through out the world as well. Is it valid to say that you don't like rap? Certainly, and that's fine. However, making such a broad, sweeping, and truly arbitrary ruling? Preposterous.
Music can name the un-nameable and communicate with the unknowable.
-Leonard Bernstein
