Funk & Wagnalls Standard Encyclopaedia

Funk is a music genre that originated in African American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African Americans in the mid-20th century. It de-emphasizes melody and chord progressions and focuses on a strong rhythmic groove of a bassline played by an electric bassist and a drum part played by a percussionist, often at slower tempos than other popular music. Funk typically consists of a complex percussive groove with rhythm instruments playing interlocking grooves that create a "hypnotic" and "danceable" feel. Funk uses the same richly colored extended chords found in bebop jazz, such as minor chords with added sevenths and elevenths, or dominant seventh chords with altered ninths and thirteenths.

Funk originated in the mid-1960s, with James Brown's development of a signature groove that emphasized the downbeat—with a heavy emphasis on the first beat of every measure ("The One"), and the application of swung 16th notes and syncopation on all basslines, drum patterns, and guitar riffsSlutsky, Allan, Chuck Silverman (1997). ''The Funkmasters-the Great James Brown Rhythm Sections''. —and rock and psychedelia-influenced musicians Sly and the Family Stone and Jimi Hendrix, fostering improvisation in funk.Explore:
Funk
" Rhythmne. Retrieved 2020-09-16. Other musical groups, including Kool and the Gang, Earth, Wind & Fire, Chic, B.T. Express, Loose Ends, Shalamar, The S.O.S. Band, Slave, The Whispers, Cameo, and the Bar-Kays began to adopt and develop Brown's innovations during the 1970s and adding R&B essences to the genre from the early 1970s, while others like Parliament-Funkadelic and Ohio Players followed Hendrix's path.

Funk derivatives include avant-funk, an avant-garde strain of funk; boogie, a hybrid of electronic music and funk; funk metal, a mix of funk and metal; G-funk, a mix of gangsta rap and funk; Timba, a form of funky Cuban dance music; and funk jam. It is also the main influence of Washington go-go, a funk sub-genre. Funk samples and breakbeats have been used extensively in hip hop and electronic dance music.

Etymology

The word ''funk'' initially referred (and still refers) to a strong odor. It is originally derived from Latin "fumigare" (which means "to smoke") via Old French ''"fungiere"'' and, in this sense, it was first documented in English in 1620. In 1784 "funky" meaning "musty" was first documented, which, in turn, led to a sense of "earthy" that was taken up around 1900 in early jazz slang for something "deeply or strongly felt". Even though in white culture, the term "funk" can have negative connotations of odor or being in a bad mood ("in a funk"), in African communities, the term "funk", while still linked to body odor, had the positive sense that a musician's hard-working, honest effort led to sweat, and from their "physical exertion" came an "exquisite" and "superlative" performance.Thompson, Gordon E. ''Black Music, Black Poetry: Blues and Jazz's Impact on African American Versification''. Routledge, Apr. 15, 2016. p. 80.

In early jam sessions, musicians would encourage one another to " get down" by telling one another, "Now, put some ''stank'' on it!". At least as early as 1907, jazz songs carried titles such as ''Funky''. The first example is an unrecorded number by Buddy Bolden, remembered as either " Funky Butt" or "Buddy Bolden's Blues" with improvised lyrics that were, according to Donald M. Marquis, either "comical and light" or "crude and downright obscene" but, in one way or another, referring to the sweaty atmosphere at dances where Bolden's band played.Who Started Funk Music
, ''Real Music Forum'' As late as the 1950s and early 1960s, when "funk" and "funky" were used increasingly in the context of jazz music, the terms still were considered indelicate and inappropriate for use in polite company. According to one source, New Orleans-born drummer Earl Palmer "was the first to use the word 'funky' to explain to other musicians that their music should be made more syncopated and danceable."Obituary
''The Guardian'' The style later evolved into a rather hard-driving, insistent rhythm, implying a more ''carnal quality''. This early form of the music set the pattern for later musicians. The music was identified as slow, sexy, loose, riff-oriented and danceable.

The meaning of "funk" continues to captivate the genre of black music, feeling, and knowledge. Recent scholarship in black studies has taken the term "funk" in its many iterations to consider the range of black movement and culture. In particular, L.H. Stallings's ''Funk the Erotic: Transaesthetics and Black Sexual Cultures'' explores these multiple meanings of "funk" as a way to theorize sexuality, culture, and western hegemony within the many locations of "funk": "street parties, drama/theater, strippers and strip clubs, pornography, and self-published fiction."

Characteristics

Rhythm and tempo

Like soul, funk is based on dance music, so it has a strong "rhythmic role".Learn Guitar: From Beginner to Pro. Book Sales, 2017. p. 254 The sound of funk is as much based on the "spaces between the notes" as the notes that are played; as such, rests between notes are important. While there are rhythmic similarities between funk and disco, funk has a "central dance beat that's slower, sexier and more syncopated than disco", and funk rhythm section musicians add more "subtextures", complexity and "personality" onto the main beat than a programmed synth-based disco ensemble.

Before funk, most pop music was based on sequences of eighth notes, because the fast tempos made further subdivisions of the beat infeasible. The innovation of funk was that by using slower tempos (surely influenced by the revival of blues at early 60s), funk "created space for further rhythmic subdivision, so a bar of 4/4 could now accommodate possible 16 note placements." Specifically, by having the guitar and drums play in "motoring" sixteenth-note rhythms, it created the opportunity for the other instruments to play "more syncopated, broken-up style", which facilitated a move to more "liberated" basslines. Together, these "interlocking parts" created a "hypnotic" and "danceable feel".

A great deal of funk is rhythmically based on a two- celled onbeat/offbeat structure, which originated in sub-Saharan African music traditions. New Orleans appropriated the bifurcated structure from the Afro-Cuban mambo and conga in the late 1940s, and made it its own.Palmer, Robert (1979: 14), ''A Tale of Two Cities: Memphis Rock and New Orleans Roll''. Brooklyn. New Orleans funk, as it was called, gained international acclaim largely because James Brown's rhythm section used it to great effect.

Harmony

Funk uses the same richly colored extended chords found in bebop jazz, such as minor chords with added sevenths and elevenths, or dominant seventh chords with altered ninths. Some examples of chords used in funk are minor eleventh chords (e.g., F minor 11th); dominant seventh with added sharp ninth and a suspended fourth (e.g., C7 (#9) sus 4); dominant ninth chords (e.g., F9); and minor sixth chords (e.g., C minor 6). The six-ninth chord is used in funk (e.g., F 6/9); it is a major chord with an added sixth and ninth. In funk, minor seventh chords are more common than minor triads because minor triads were found to be too thin-sounding. Some of the best known and most skillful soloists in funk have jazz backgrounds. Trombonist Fred Wesley and saxophonist Pee Wee Ellis and Maceo Parker are among the most notable musicians in the funk music genre, having worked with James Brown, George Clinton and Prince.

Unlike bebop jazz, with its complex, rapid-fire chord changes, funk virtually abandoned chord changes, creating static single chord vamps (often alternating a minor seventh chord and a related dominant seventh chord, such as A minor to D7) with melodo-harmonic movement and a complex, driving rhythmic feel. Even though some funk songs are mainly one-chord vamps, the rhythm section musicians may embellish this chord by moving it up or down a semitone or a tone to create chromatic passing chords. For example, "Play that funky music" (by Wild Cherry) mainly uses an E ninth chord, but it also uses F#9 and F9.

The chords used in funk songs typically imply a Dorian or Mixolydian mode, as opposed to the major or natural minor tonalities of most popular music. Melodic content was derived by mixing these modes with the blues scale. In the 1970s, jazz music drew upon funk to create a new subgenre of jazz-funk, which can be heard in recordings by Miles Davis ('' Live-Evil'', ''On the Corner''), and Herbie Hancock (''Head Hunters'').

Improvisation

Funk continues the African musical tradition of improvisation, in that in a funk band, the group would typically "feel" when to change, by "jamming" and "grooving", even in the studio recording stage, which might only be based on the skeleton framework for each song. Funk uses "collective improvisation", in which musicians at rehearsals would have what was metaphorically a musical "conversation", an approach which extended to the onstage performances.

Instruments

Bass

Funk creates an intense groove by using strong guitar riffs and basslines played on electric bass. Like Motown recordings, funk songs use basslines as the centerpiece of songs. Indeed, funk has been called the style in which the bassline is most prominent in the songs, with the bass playing the "hook" of the song.Boomer, Tim; Berry, Mick. ''The Bassist's Bible: How to Play Every Bass Style from Afro-Cuban to Zydeco''. See Sharp Press, Jul. 1, 2009. p. 25 Early funk basslines used syncopation (typically syncopated eighth notes), but with the addition of more of a "driving feel" than in New Orleans funk, and they used blues scale notes along with the major third above the root. Later funk basslines use sixteenth note syncopation, blues scales, and repetitive patterns, often with leaps of an octave or a larger interval.

Funk basslines emphasize repetitive patterns, locked-in grooves, continuous playing, and slap and popping bass. Slapping and popping uses a mixture of thumb-slapped low notes (also called "thumped") and finger "popped" (or plucked) high notes, allowing the bass to have a drum-like rhythmic role, which became a distinctive element of funk. Notable slap and funky players include Bernard Edwards (Chic), Robert "Kool" Bell, Mark Adams ( Slave), Johnny Flippin (Fatback) and Bootsy Collins.Overthrow, David. ''Complete Electric Bass Method: Mastering Electric Bass''. Alfred Music While slap and funky is important, some influential bassists who play funk, such as Rocco Prestia (from Tower of Power), did not use the approach, and instead used a typical fingerstyle method based on James Jamerson's Motown playing style. Larry Graham from Sly and the Family Stone is an influential bassist.Dickens, Bill "the Buddha"; Rock, Bobby. ''Funk Bass and Beyond''. Alfred Music Publishing, 2003

Funk bass has an "earthy, percussive kind of feel", in part due to the use of muted, rhythmic ghost notes (also called "dead notes"). Some funk bass players use electronic effects units to alter the tone of their instrument, such as "envelope filters" (an auto-wah effect that creates a "gooey, slurpy, quacky, and syrupy" sound) and imitate keyboard synthesizer bass tones (e.g., the Mutron envelope filter) and overdriven fuzz bass effects, which are used to create the "classic fuzz tone that sounds like old school Funk records". Other effects that are used include the flanger and bass chorus. Collins also used a Mu-Tron Octave Divider, an octave pedal that, like the Octavia pedal popularized by Hendrix, can double a note an octave above and below to create a "futuristic and fat low-end sound".

Drums

Funk drumming creates a groove by emphasizing the drummer's "feel and emotion", which including "occasional tempo fluctuations", the use of swing feel in some songs (e.g., "Cissy Strut" by The Meters and "I'll Take You There" by The Staple Singers, which have a half-swung feel), and less use of fills (as they can lessen the groove). Drum fills are "few and economical", to ensure that the drumming stays "in the pocket", with a steady tempo and groove. These playing techniques are supplemented by a set-up for the drum kit that often includes muffled bass drums and toms and tightly tuned snare drums. Double bass drumming sounds are often done by funk drummers with a single pedal, an approach which "accents the second note... nddeadens the drumhead's resonance", which gives a short, muffled bass drum sound.

James Brown used two drummers such as Clyde Stubblefield and John 'Jabo' Starks in recording and soul showLacy, Travis K., ""Funk is its own reward" : an analysis of selected lyrics in popular funk music of the 1970s" (2008). ETD Collection for AUC Robert W. Woodruff Library. Paper 22. p. 53 By using two drummers, the JB band was able to maintain a "solid syncopated" rhythmic sound, which contributed to the band's distinctive "Funky Drummer" rhythm.

In Tower of Power drummer David Garibaldi's playing, there are many "ghost notes" and rim shots. A key part of the funk drumming style is using the hi-hat, with opening and closing the hi-hats during playing (to create "splash" accent effects) being an important approach. Two-handed sixteenth notes on the hi-hats, sometimes with a degree of swing feel, is used in funk.

Jim Payne states that funk drumming uses a "wide-open" approach to improvisation around rhythmic ideas from Latin music, ostinatos, that are repeated "with only slight variations", an approach which he says causes the "mesmerizing" nature of funk.Payne, Jim. ''Complete Funk Drumming Book''. Mel Bay Publications, Feb. 9, 2011. p. 7-8 Payne states that funk can be thought of as "rock played in a more syncopated manner", particularly with the bass drum, which plays syncopated "eighth note" and "sixteenth note" patterns that were innovated by drummer Clive Williams (with Joe Tex); George Brown (with Kool & the Gang) and James "Diamond" Williams (with The Ohio Players). As with rock, the snare backbeats on beats two and four are still used in most funk (albeit with additional soft ghost notes).

Electric guitar

In funk, guitarists often mix playing chords of a short duration (nicknamed "stabs") with faster rhythms and riffs. Guitarists playing rhythmic parts often play sixteenth notes, including with percussive "ghost notes". Chord extensions are favored, such as ninth chords. Typically, funk uses "two interlocking lectricguitar parts", with a rhythm guitarist and a "tenor guitarist" who plays single notes. The two guitarists trade off their lines to create a "call-and-response, intertwined pocket." If a band only has one guitarist, this effect may be recreated by overdubbing in the studio, or, in a live show, by having a single guitarist play both parts, to the degree that this is possible.

In funk bands, guitarists typically play in a percussive style, using a style of picking called the ''"chank"'' or ''"chicken scratch"'', in which the guitar strings are pressed lightly against the fingerboard and then quickly released just enough to get a muted "scratching" sound that is produced by rapid rhythmic strumming of the opposite hand near the bridge. Earliest examples of that technic used on rhythm and blues is listened on Johnny Otis song "Willie and the Hand Jive" in 1957, with the future James Brown band guitar player Jimmy Nolen