How important has turntablism been to hip hop as a whole?

3 Comments

1. Kevin D (the 20K Man) says:

   October 15, 2009 at 9:56 pm

   Its no coincidence that the decline of turntablism has led to the general decline of hip hop as a whole. It is an essential element of the art form and for me personally was the reason I got interested in the music in the first place. I was always fascinated by the DJ and break beats.
2. Chuck Norris, MD says:

   October 15, 2009 at 9:56 pm

   The art of manipulating sounds has been essential to the advancement in production technique(s).
3. Cap - (King Me.) says:

   October 15, 2009 at 9:56 pm

   I only understand (as of the last two weeks) the technical elements of turntablism. But I think it’s more or less synonymous with the sound of hip hop music.

   I’m pretty sure when you say "turntablism" or "scratching". Most people think of a scratched ad-lib like "What does it all mean?" or "Worst Comes To Worst, My people come first" or DJ Babu’s "Blind Alley" Beat Juggle - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_uXSe8qulw

   Plus, every producer worth their salt has always said turntablism or the "Art of the DJ" has been synonymous with hip hop production. That’s why I’ve always been fascinated by the way premier scratches soundbytes into his choruses. Without understanding turntablism, there’s pretty much no musical basis to hip hop. Unless, you consider beatboxing in that respect, although beatboxing is just the vocal recreation of breakbeats, (That which first exposed itself to hip hop on Vinyl via turntablism - even though the term wasn’t coined till the mid 90’s)

   There’s always things like breaks, low end etc. But those are elements of other music that have been moulded to create hip hop. Turntablism is one of the few musical (Note I said musical not "melodic" for tools who can’t differentiate between the two) concepts that hip hop can call its own. Just as people associated Saxaphone Solo’s, snapped fingers and Dizzy Gillespies puffed cheeks with Jazz, turntablism is synoymous with hip hop.