Music Sampling In The 1940's

Music Sampling
Music sampling is a clever way for artist to produce songs that demonstrates their admiration of other artists by integrating part of their music into their own. Music sampling is not new, sampling started in the 1940s when composers and artists would use someone else’s music to create their own piece of music without asking the original artist for permission or giving the proper credit. Due to music sampling, in today’s society we have a variety of music genres. Sampling reconnects many listeners to past events and will allow future artists to be to develop new forms to express themselves by using preexisting ideas to create a new sound. For many years artist have been sampling music. Although many may question the definition
of sampling music. When dealing with music, sampling is taking a certain portion of another artists music and using it in a different song. Sampling could be taking some of another artist sound recording or lyrics. In today’s society majority of the music being played is sampled music from previous generations. Usually when a new artist samples old music it regenerates the song that they took the sample from. Sampling can also involve creative manipulations, such as changing the speed or pitch of the original sample. The genre Hip-Hop is one of today’s popular genres which is made from sampling music.
Music sampling began in the 1940’s and has been used ‘til this day. The introduction of music sampling and hip-hop was a turning point in history leading into a powerful cultural and musical movement. Most of the music that is used for sampling came from Jazz music. . It wasn’t until the 1970s and early ‘80s that music sampling really “blow up” with hip-hop. Vinyl records and tape loops were used to sample music . The sampling was done by DJs who had turntables. For more than fifty years music sampling has evolved, beginning with classical composers and is now moving through the hip-hop industry. Hip hop and rap has relied on the practice of sampling ever since, but you 'll find examples of sampling in other genres occasionally. But legal issues have largely stifled its widespread
use. In today’s society technology has extremely enhanced, although sampling is common it is connected to many legal issues, laws, and restrictions. Many may assume or say that music sampling is stealing because it’s not original and the artist uses someone else’s piece without the consent of the original artist. People also disagree with music sampling because most artist does not give the proper recognition to the original artists. According to lawyer Michelle Fabio, “even the smallest shred of another’s work can be infringement.” This means that no matter how much of the piece you took a sample of if you did not get permission from the original artist or composer you are in violation of the law or right. A lot of people believe that music is suppose to be original and made your own. An artists music suppose to illustrate originality and creativity. They also believe that music sampling is the easy way out instead of taking the time to actually sit and develop a relatively creative piece without the use of someone else’s work or ideas. Money also plays a big role in the music industry involving sampling, which makes it harder fora lot of artists to be unique and use the samples they would like to. How to make money off of every single sample should not be the focus but more on how to create guidelines for sampling. Furthermore, help staying connected to the music and artist in the past. I don’t see anything wrong with sampling music. I believe music sampling is unique and cool. The fact that an artist can take a piece of music from somewhere else and combine it with their own to make a hot record is simply amazing. Music sampling adds a lot of value to songs. Sampling resurrects older artists careers. As Noah Shachman argues, “all kinds of artists have always borrowed and built on each others’ work, … these corporations have outlawed an art form.” Music sampling depicts a combination of new and old while staying authentic and artistic. It also reconnects a lot of listeners to events in the past, it may also bring back special memories, which is highly important when trying to bring in a wide variety of listeners and customers. “Sampling adds a new dimension to the cloudy issue of borrowing within pop music, since the actual recordings of other artists can be used.” Young adults like myself like to hear the popular music of today and sometimes even old school music, sampling is the perfect way to combine the two! It’s a new vibe with an old school feel to it. Personally I enjoy listening to old school records from the late 80s early 90s , they tell good stories. Most hip-hop artist are telling a story in their music. I believe artist uses pieces from the past to get older listeners to understand the story that is being told in the song. Of course the younger generation would understand but would the older generation get a sense of understanding if the artist did not use pieces from the past? Not at all, in today’s society most older adults believe all artist talk about nowadays is sex, money, and drugs especially if the record sounds unfamiliar to them. For example, when Kendrick Lamar came out with the song “Swimming Pools” my mother heard the chorus and automatically did not like the song because she couldn’t relate, but once Kendrick Lamar came out with the song “Poetic Justice” she actually took the time out to listen to it because he used a sample from Janet Jackson song “Anytime, Any place” which is a song she listened to in her younger days. My mom actually listened to the lyrics and began to like the song. Sometimes it takes just a little piece from the past for people to engage in the music of today. Music sampling would be a lot less controversial if it was regulated.
It can be regulated by developing a legalized contract and discussing copyright permission from the owners, etc. Although artist don’t intentionally mean to use samples and try to pass them off as their own, copyright owners still saw it as a problem and sued whomever it was that sampled the music. If music sampling was regulated properly there would be less commotion in the music industry. Regulating music sampling would be a big help because it would be fixed to where both the artists (the original artist& the sampled artist) would get paid for the piece of music that sells in stores. Therefore both artist would get paid an equal amount of money and the original artist would receive proper recognition and compensation for the original
piece. In conclusion music sampling still remains a controversial issue. There are many different views and feelings going on about music sampling, but until it is regulated there will always be a problem. To some it is an creative tool and to others it is stealing.

Works Cited

Fabio, Michelle. “Beasties, The Godfather of Funky Soul and Pretty Women: When Does "Sampling" Other Artists ' Music Equal Copyright Infringement?” legalzoom.com
Legal Zoom, 27 Feb. 2013 Web.

McGrath, Jane. “How Music Sampling Works” entertainment.howstuffworks.com
Sponsoring Institution, 6 Feb. 2013 Web.

Snowden, Don. “Sampling: A Creative Tool or License to Steal? : The Controversy” articles.latimes.com
Los Angeles Times,12 Feb. 2013 Web.