Elson Trinidad (elson@westworld.com)
Wed, 06 Oct 1999 13:27:45 -0700
NRahav@ixl.com wrote:
>
> We have to be careful about pinning down this music into categories. A tempo
> does not a category make, and vice versa.
It really depends...Remember this is dance music we're talking about, so we have
to accept that certain genres of dance music is segregated by tempo
ranges...jungle can't be slower than 150bpm; trip-hop can't be faster than 95 or
so bpm, house doesn't work below 120 or so, etc). Yes, you can break the rules,
and it's great too, but don't be disappointed when you find out that your act of
defiance incidentally gave birth to a new genre...obviously more 'traditional'
forms of music aren't that dictated by tempo - (a _funk_ tune can still be funk
at either 80 bpm or 140 bpm; same applies to rock or jazz, etc).
Of course there is more than just tempo...big beat, etc is similar to a house
tempo, but does not usually the "boof ts boof ts boof ts boof" of house music.
Like I said this is all dance music, it's mostly created electronically, so
tempos usually are the same throughout the tune; and DJs play them on a
dancefloor (and the pitch control can only go so high or so low)...those factors
are generally part of why dance music has so much emphasis on the tempo.
There will always be classification; we classify cars, birds, trees, clouds,
food. Nothing wrong with classifying as long as there's no implication of
superiority or inferiority involved (i.e. how some people
wrongly classify races or ethnicities or social status...)
- 30 -
:. elson trinidad, los angeles, california, usa
:. elson@westworld.com
:. www.westworld.com/~elson
"funny how frustration breeds desire" - meja
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