Percussion has always been a primary foundation to most
forms of music, and while various cultures have developed their own instruments
to produce unique sounds, one of the most skilled instruments is something that
humans had all along—the mouth (yeah, it sounds lame, but that’s the truth).
Beat boxing has been a popular substitute for drums,
especially in street performances in hip-hop, and has developed over the years
to adapt to digital styles that have come with innovations in physical instruments.
Most people figure the artform to be the product of some street corner some at point in the 20 Century, but variations of the practice date back to India
and China several thousand years ago. Obviously, there’s no relation to hip-hop
here, but it’s important to know the origin.
Beat boxing found it’s home in hip-hop in
the early 80s to match the development of drum machines which came to be the
central tool alongside turntables in crafting hip-hop instrumentals. Pioneers
like Doug E. Fresh, Rahzel, Biz Markie and others perfected the form to where,
at times, it was a near match to digital percussion, and set a global platform
that would later be carried on by emcees like Matisyahu and Kenny Muhammad.
International contests are held each year in various circles, and the community
as a whole has grown to become a genre in itself, mimicking aspects of not only
hip-hop, but drum and bass, electronic, dub step and even tribal-based music.
The end result is that as beat-making equipment such as Akai’s
MPC series or computer software continue to diversify and become more
versatile, so do devoted beat boxers, exploring techniques of the vocal chords
and intonations, and matching the progress of myriad genres with a skill more
deserving of applause than that of any machine.
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