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Funk is a
music genre A music genre is a conventional category that identifies some pieces of music as belonging to a shared tradition or set of conventions. It is to be distinguished from '' musical form'' and musical style, although in practice these terms are som ...
that originated in
African American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American ...
communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a
rhythm Rhythm (from Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed ...
ic, 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 A melody (from Greek μελῳδία, ''melōidía'', "singing, chanting"), also tune, voice or line, is a linear succession of musical tones that the listener perceives as a single entity. In its most literal sense, a melody is a combina ...
and
chord progressions In a musical composition, a chord progression or harmonic progression (informally chord changes, used as a plural) is a succession of chords. Chord progressions are the foundation of harmony in Western musical tradition from the common practice ...
and focuses on a strong rhythmic groove of a bassline played by an
electric bass The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...
ist and a drum part played by a
percussionist A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Excl ...
, often at slower tempos than other popular music. Funk typically consists of a complex percussive groove with
rhythm instruments A rhythm section is a group of musicians within a music ensemble or band that provides the underlying rhythm, harmony and pulse of the accompaniment, providing a rhythmic and harmonic reference and "beat" for the rest of the band. The rhythm sec ...
playing interlocking grooves that create a "hypnotic" and "danceable" feel. Funk uses the same richly colored
extended chord In music, extended chords are certain chords (built from thirds) or triads with notes ''extended'', or added, beyond the seventh. Ninth, eleventh, and thirteenth chords are extended chords. The thirteenth is the farthest extension diatonic ...
s found in
bebop Bebop or bop is a style of jazz developed in the early-to-mid-1940s in the United States. The style features compositions characterized by a fast tempo, complex chord progressions with rapid chord changes and numerous changes of key, instrum ...
jazz, such as
minor chord In music theory, a minor chord is a chord that has a root, a minor third, and a perfect fifth. When a chord comprises only these three notes, it is called a minor triad. For example, the minor triad built on C, called a C minor triad, has pitch ...
s with added sevenths and elevenths, or
dominant seventh In music theory, a dominant seventh chord, or major minor seventh chord, is a seventh chord, usually built on the fifth degree of the major scale, and composed of a root, major third, perfect fifth, and minor seventh. Thus it is a major triad t ...
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 ' (styled in all caps) is an American music magazine devoted to "jazz, blues and beyond", the last word indicating its expansion beyond the jazz realm which it covered exclusively in previous years. The publication was established in 1934 in Chi ...
—with a heavy emphasis on the first beat of every measure ("The One"), and the application of swung
16th note Figure 1. A 16th note with stem facing up, a 16th note with stem facing down, and a 16th rest. Figure 2. Four 16th notes beamed together. In music, a 1/16, sixteenth note (American) or semiquaver (British) is a note played for half the dura ...
s and
syncopation In music, syncopation is a variety of rhythms played together to make a piece of music, making part or all of a tune or piece of music off-beat. More simply, syncopation is "a disturbance or interruption of the regular flow of rhythm": a "plac ...
on all basslines, drum patterns, and guitar riffsSlutsky, Allan, Chuck Silverman (1997). ''The Funkmasters-the Great James Brown Rhythm Sections''. —and rock and
psychedelia Psychedelia refers to the psychedelic subculture of the 1960s and the psychedelic experience. This includes psychedelic art, psychedelic music and style of dress during that era. This was primarily generated by people who used psychedelic dr ...
-influenced musicians
Sly and the Family Stone Sly and the Family Stone was an American band from San Francisco. Active from 1966 to 1983, it was pivotal in the development of funk, soul, rock, and psychedelic music. Its core line-up was led by singer-songwriter, record producer, and multi ...
and Jimi Hendrix, fostering
improvisation Improvisation is the activity of making or doing something not planned beforehand, using whatever can be found. Improvisation in the performing arts is a very spontaneous performance without specific or scripted preparation. The skills of impr ...
in funk.Explore:
Funk
" Rhythmne. Retrieved 2020-09-16. Other musical groups, including
Kool and the Gang Kool & the Gang is an American R&B/ soul/funk band formed in Jersey City, New Jersey, in 1964 by brothers Robert "Kool" Bell and Ronald Bell, with Dennis "Dee Tee" Thomas, Robert "Spike" Mickens, Charles Smith, George Brown, and Ricky West. ...
,
Earth, Wind & Fire Earth, Wind & Fire (EW&F or EWF) is an American band whose music spans the genres of jazz, R&B, soul, funk, disco, pop, big band, Latin, and Afro pop. They are among the best-selling bands of all time, with sales of over 90 million r ...
, Chic, B.T. Express, Loose Ends,
Shalamar Shalamar () is an American R&B and soul music vocal group active since the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s. Shalamar's classic line-up on the SOLAR label consisted of Howard Hewett, Jody Watley, and Jeffrey Daniel, together with dancer ...
, The S.O.S. Band,
Slave Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...
,
The Whispers The Whispers is an American group from Los Angeles, California, who have scored hit records since the late 1960s. They are best known for their two number one R&B singles, " And the Beat Goes On" in 1980 and " Rock Steady" in 1987. The Whispe ...
, 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 Parliament-Funkadelic (abbreviated as P-Funk) is an American musical collective, music collective of rotating musicians headed by George Clinton (funk musician), George Clinton, primarily consisting of the funk bands Parliament (band), Parlia ...
and
Ohio Players Ohio Players is an American funk band, most popular in the 1970s. They are best known for their songs "Fire" and "Love Rollercoaster", and for their erotic album covers that featured nude or nearly nude women. Many of the women were models feat ...
followed Hendrix's path. Funk derivatives include
avant-funk Avant-funk (also called mutant disco in the early 1980s) is a music style in which artists combine funk and disco rhythms with an avant-garde or art rock mentality. Its most prominent era occurred in the late 1970s and 1980s among post-punk and ...
, an
avant-garde The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...
strain of funk;
boogie Boogie is a repetitive, swung note or shuffle rhythm,Burrows, Terry (1995). ''Play Country Guitar'', p.42. Dorling Kindersley Limited, London. . "groove" or pattern used in blues which was originally played on the piano in boogie-woogie mu ...
, a hybrid of electronic music and funk;
funk metal Funk metal (also known as thrash-funk or punk-funk) is a subgenre of funk rock and alternative metal that infuses heavy metal music (often thrash metal) with elements of funk and punk rock. Funk metal was part of the alternative metal moveme ...
, a mix of funk and metal; G-funk, a mix of gangsta rap and funk;
Timba Timba is a Cuban genre of music based on Cuban '' son'' with '' salsa'', American Funk/R&B and the strong influence of Afro-Cuban folkloric music. Timba rhythm sections differ from their salsa counterparts, because timba emphasizes the bass d ...
, a form of funky Cuban dance music; and funk jam. It is also the main influence of Washington
go-go Go-go is a subgenre of funk music with an emphasis on specific rhythmic patterns, and live audience call and response. Go-go was originated by African-American musicians in the Washington, D.C. area during the mid-60s to late-70s. Go-go has lim ...
, a funk sub-genre. Funk samples and
breakbeat Breakbeat is a broad type of electronic music that tends to use drum breaks sampled from early recordings of funk, jazz, and R&B. Breakbeats have been used in styles such as hip hop, jungle, drum and bass, big beat, breakbeat hardcore, and ...
s 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 Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power ...
"fumigare" (which means "to smoke") via
Old French Old French (, , ; Modern French: ) was the language spoken in most of the northern half of France from approximately the 8th to the 14th centuries. Rather than a unified language, Old French was a linkage of Romance dialects, mutually intelligi ...
''"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 session A jam session is a relatively informal musical event, process, or activity where musicians, typically instrumentalists, play improvised solos and vamp over tunes, drones, songs, and chord progressions. To "jam" is to improvise music without ext ...
s, musicians would encourage one another to "
get down Get down is a stance, posture or movement in many traditional African cultures and throughout the African diaspora. It involves bending at the waist and knees, bringing the body low to the ground in moments of ecstasy or intensity. Bending at the ...
" by telling one another, "Now, put some ''stank'' on it!". At least as early as 1907,
jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a majo ...
songs carried titles such as ''Funky''. The first example is an unrecorded number by
Buddy Bolden Charles Joseph "Buddy" Bolden (September 6, 1877 – November 4, 1931) was an African American cornetist who was regarded by contemporaries as a key figure in the development of a New Orleans style of ragtime music, or "jass", which later ...
, 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 Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...
, the terms still were considered indelicate and inappropriate for use in polite company. According to one source,
New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
Earl Palmer Earl Cyril Palmer (October 25, 1924 – September 19, 2008) was an American drummer. Considered one of the inventors of rock and roll, he is a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Palmer was one of the most prolific studio musicians of all ...
"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 Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper A newspaper is a periodical publication containing written information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background. Newspapers can cover a wide ...
'' 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 A riff is a repeated chord progression or refrain in music (also known as an ostinato figure in classical music); it is a pattern, or melody, often played by the rhythm section instruments or solo instrument, that forms the basis or accompanim ...
-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 Dance music is music composed specifically to facilitate or accompany dancing. It can be either a whole musical piece or part of a larger musical arrangement. In terms of performance, the major categories are live dance music and recorded danc ...
, 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 Pop music is a genre of popular music that originated in its modern form during the mid-1950s in the United States and the United Kingdom. The terms ''popular music'' and ''pop music'' are often used interchangeably, although the former describ ...
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 In many parts of sub-Saharan Africa, the use of music is not limited to entertainment: it serves a purpose to the local community and helps in the conduct of daily routines. Traditional African music supplies appropriate music and dance for work ...
. 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 chord In music, extended chords are certain chords (built from thirds) or triads with notes ''extended'', or added, beyond the seventh. Ninth, eleventh, and thirteenth chords are extended chords. The thirteenth is the farthest extension diatonic ...
s found in
bebop Bebop or bop is a style of jazz developed in the early-to-mid-1940s in the United States. The style features compositions characterized by a fast tempo, complex chord progressions with rapid chord changes and numerous changes of key, instrum ...
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 Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a majo ...
backgrounds. Trombonist
Fred Wesley Fred Wesley (born July 4, 1943) is an American trombonist who worked with James Brown in the 1960s and 1970s and Parliament-Funkadelic in the second half of the 1970s. Biography Wesley was born the son of a high school teacher and big band le ...
and saxophonist
Pee Wee Ellis Alfred James Ellis (April 21, 1941 – September 23, 2021), known as Pee Wee Ellis due to his diminutive stature, was an American saxophonist, composer, and arranger. With a background in jazz, he was a member of James Brown's band in the 1 ...
and
Maceo Parker Maceo Parker (; born February 14, 1943) is an American funk and soul jazz saxophonist, best known for his work with James Brown in the 1960s, Parliament-Funkadelic in the 1970s and Prince in the 2000s. Parker was a prominent soloist on many o ...
are among the most notable musicians in the funk music genre, having worked with James Brown, George Clinton and
Prince A prince is a Monarch, male ruler (ranked below a king, grand prince, and grand duke) or a male member of a monarch's or former monarch's family. ''Prince'' is also a title of nobility (often highest), often hereditary title, hereditary, in s ...
. 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 "Play That Funky Music" is a song written by Rob Parissi and recorded by the band Wild Cherry. The single was the first released by the Cleveland-based Sweet City record label in April 1976 and distributed by Epic Records. The performers on th ...
" (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 Dorian may refer to: Ancient Greece * Dorians, one of the main ethnic divisions of ancient Greeks * Doric Greek, or Dorian, the dialect spoken by the Dorians Art and entertainment Films * ''Dorian'' (film), the Canadian title of the 2004 film ' ...
or
Mixolydian mode Mixolydian mode may refer to one of three things: the name applied to one of the ancient Greek ''harmoniai'' or ''tonoi'', based on a particular octave species or scale; one of the medieval church modes; or a modern musical mode or diatonic sca ...
, 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 Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spiritual (music), spirituals, work songs, field hollers, Ring shout, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narra ...
. In the 1970s, jazz music drew upon funk to create a new subgenre of
jazz-funk Jazz-funk is a subgenre of jazz music characterized by a strong back beat ( groove), electrified sounds, and an early prevalence of analog synthesizers. The integration of funk, soul, and R&B music and styles into jazz resulted in the cre ...
, which can be heard in recordings by
Miles Davis Miles Dewey Davis III (May 26, 1926September 28, 1991) was an American trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. He is among the most influential and acclaimed figures in the history of jazz and 20th-century music. Davis adopted a variety of musi ...
('' Live-Evil'', '' On the Corner''), and
Herbie Hancock Herbert Jeffrey Hancock (born April 12, 1940) is an American jazz pianist, keyboardist, bandleader, and composer. Hancock started his career with trumpeter Donald Byrd's group. He shortly thereafter joined the Miles Davis Quintet, where he hel ...
(''
Head Hunters ''Head Hunters'' is the twelfth studio album by American pianist and composer Herbie Hancock, released October 26, 1973, on Columbia Records. Recording sessions for the album took place in the evening at Wally Heider Studios and Different Fur ...
'').


Improvisation

Funk continues the African musical tradition of
improvisation Improvisation is the activity of making or doing something not planned beforehand, using whatever can be found. Improvisation in the performing arts is a very spontaneous performance without specific or scripted preparation. The skills of impr ...
, 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 The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...
. Like
Motown Motown Records is an American record label owned by the Universal Music Group. It was founded by Berry Gordy Jr. as Tamla Records on June 7, 1958, and incorporated as Motown Record Corporation on April 14, 1960. Its name, a portmanteau of ''mot ...
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 Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spiritual (music), spirituals, work songs, field hollers, Ring shout, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narra ...
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 Bernard Edwards (October 31, 1952 – April 18, 1996) was an American bass player and record producer, known primarily for his work in disco music with guitarist Nile Rodgers, with whom he co-founded Chic. In 2017, Edwards was selected as the ...
( Chic),
Robert "Kool" Bell Robert Earl "Kool" Bell (born October 8, 1950), also known by his Muslim name Muhammad Bayyan, is an American musician, singer & songwriter. He is one of the founding members of the American R&B, soul, funk and disco band Kool & the Gang ...
, Mark Adams (
Slave Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...
), Johnny Flippin ( Fatback) and
Bootsy Collins William Earl "Bootsy" Collins (born October 26, 1951) is an American bass guitarist and singer. Rising to prominence with James Brown in the early 1970s, and later with Parliament-Funkadelic, Collins established himself as one of the leading ...
.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 Tower of Power is an American R&B and funk based band and horn section, originating in Oakland, California, that has been performing since 1968. There have been a number of lead vocalists, the best-known being Lenny Williams, who fronted the ...
), did not use the approach, and instead used a typical fingerstyle method based on
James Jamerson James Lee Jamerson (January 29, 1936 – August 2, 1983) was an American bass player. He was the uncredited bassist on most of the Motown Records hits in the 1960s and early 1970s (Motown did not list session musician credits on their releases ...
's
Motown Motown Records is an American record label owned by the Universal Music Group. It was founded by Berry Gordy Jr. as Tamla Records on June 7, 1958, and incorporated as Motown Record Corporation on April 14, 1960. Its name, a portmanteau of ''mot ...
playing style.
Larry Graham Larry Graham Jr. (born August 14, 1946) is an American bassist and baritone singer, both with the psychedelic soul/ funk band Sly and the Family Stone and as the founder and frontman of Graham Central Station. In 1980, he released the singl ...
from
Sly and the Family Stone Sly and the Family Stone was an American band from San Francisco. Active from 1966 to 1983, it was pivotal in the development of funk, soul, rock, and psychedelic music. Its core line-up was led by singer-songwriter, record producer, and multi ...
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 note In music, a ghost note is a musical note with a rhythmic value, but no discernible pitch when played. In musical notation, this is represented by an "X" for a note head instead of an oval, or parentheses around the note head. It should not be c ...
s (also called "dead notes"). Some funk bass players use electronic
effects unit An effects unit or effects pedal is an electronic device that alters the sound of a musical instrument or other audio source through audio signal processing. Common effects include distortion/overdrive, often used with electric guitar in e ...
s 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 ''Musitronics'', often shortened to Mu-tron, was a manufacturer of electronic musical effects active in the 1970s. Founded by Mike Beigel and Aaron Newman, the company's products provided filtering and processing effects and were derived from s ...
envelope filter) and overdriven
fuzz bass Fuzz bass is a style of playing the electric bass or modifying its signal that produces a buzzy, distorted, overdriven sound, as the name implies. Overdriving a bass signal significantly changes the timbre, adds higher overtones (harmonics) ...
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 James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix (born Johnny Allen Hendrix; November 27, 1942September 18, 1970) was an American guitarist, singer and songwriter. Although his mainstream career spanned only four years, he is widely regarded as one of the most ...
, 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 The Staple Singers were an American gospel, soul, and R&B singing group. Roebuck "Pops" Staples (December 28, 1914 – December 19, 2000), the patriarch of the family, formed the group with his children Cleotha (April 11, 1934 – February 21, ...
, 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 drum The bass drum is a large drum that produces a note of low definite or indefinite pitch. The instrument is typically cylindrical, with the drum's diameter much greater than the drum's depth, with a struck head at both ends of the cylinder. T ...
s and toms and tightly tuned snare drums.
Double bass drumming The bass drum is a large drum that produces a note of low definite or indefinite pitch. The instrument is typically cylindrical, with the drum's diameter much greater than the drum's depth, with a struck head at both ends of the cylinder. T ...
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 Tower of Power is an American R&B and funk based band and horn section, originating in Oakland, California, that has been performing since 1968. There have been a number of lead vocalists, the best-known being Lenny Williams, who fronted the ...
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,
ostinato In music, an ostinato (; derived from Italian word for ''stubborn'', compare English ''obstinate'') is a motif or phrase that persistently repeats in the same musical voice, frequently in the same pitch. Well-known ostinato-based pieces include ...
s, 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 Yusuf Hazziez (born Joseph Arrington Jr.; August 8, 1935 – August 13, 1982), known professionally as Joe Tex, was an American singer and musician who gained success in the 1960s and 1970s with his brand of Southern soul, which mixed the style ...
); George Brown (with
Kool & the Gang Kool & the Gang is an American R&B/soul/ funk band formed in Jersey City, New Jersey, in 1964 by brothers Robert "Kool" Bell and Ronald Bell, with Dennis "Dee Tee" Thomas, Robert "Spike" Mickens, Charles Smith, George Brown, and Ricky West ...
) and James "Diamond" Williams (with
The Ohio Players ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things that are already or about to be mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in ...
). As with rock, the snare
backbeat In music and music theory, the beat is the basic unit of time, the pulse (regularly repeating event), of the ''mensural level'' (or ''beat level''). The beat is often defined as the rhythm listeners would tap their toes to when listening to a p ...
s 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 guitar In music performances, rhythm guitar is a technique and role that performs a combination of two functions: to provide all or part of the rhythmic pulse in conjunction with other instruments from the rhythm section (e.g., drum kit, bass guita ...
ist and a "tenor guitarist" who plays single notes. The two guitarists trade off their lines to create a "
call-and-response Call and response is a form of interaction between a speaker and an audience in which the speaker's statements ("calls") are punctuated by responses from the listeners. This form is also used in music, where it falls under the general category of ...
, intertwined pocket." If a band only has one guitarist, this effect may be recreated by
overdubbing Overdubbing (also known as layering) is a technique used in audio recording in which audio tracks that have been pre-recorded are then played back and monitored, while simultaneously recording new, doubled, or augmented tracks onto one or more av ...
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 The fingerboard (also known as a fretboard on fretted instruments) is an important component of most stringed instruments. It is a thin, long strip of material, usually wood, that is laminated to the front of the neck of an instrument. The st ...
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 A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or rail) without blocking the way underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, which is usually somethi ...
. Earliest examples of that technic used on rhythm and blues is listened on
Johnny Otis Johnny Otis (born Ioannis Alexandres Veliotes; December 28, 1921 – January 17, 2012) was an American singer, musician, composer, bandleader, record producer, and talent scout. He was a seminal influence on American R&B and rock and roll. He ...
song " Willie and the Hand Jive" in 1957, with the future James Brown band guitar player Jimmy Nolen. The technique can be broken down into three approaches: the "chika", the "chank" and the "choke". With the "chika" comes a muted sound of strings being hit against the fingerboard; "chank" is a staccato attack done by releasing the chord with the fretting hand after strumming it; and "choking" generally uses all the strings being strummed and heavily muted. The result of these factors was a rhythm guitar sound that seemed to float somewhere between the low-end thump of the
electric bass The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...
and the cutting tone of the
snare SNARE proteins – " SNAP REceptor" – are a large protein family consisting of at least 24 members in yeasts, more than 60 members in mammalian cells, and some numbers in plants. The primary role of SNARE proteins is to mediate vesicle ...
and
hi-hat A hi-hat (hihat, high-hat, etc.) is a combination of two cymbals and a pedal, all mounted on a metal stand. It is a part of the standard drum kit used by drummers in many styles of music including rock, pop, jazz, and blues. Hi-hats consist ...
s, with a rhythmically melodic feel that fell deep in the pocket. Guitarist Jimmy Nolen, longtime guitarist for James Brown, developed this technique. On Brown's " Give It Up or Turnit a Loose" (1969), however, Jimmy Nolen's guitar part has a bare bones tonal structure. The pattern of attack-points is the emphasis, not the pattern of pitches. The guitar is used the way that an African drum, or idiophone would be used. Nolen created a "clean, trebly tone" by using "hollow-body
jazz guitar Jazz guitar may refer to either a type of electric guitar or a guitar playing style in jazz, using electric amplification to increase the volume of acoustic guitars. In the early 1930s, jazz musicians sought to amplify their sound to be he ...
s with single-coil P-90 pickups" plugged into a
Fender Twin The Fender Twin and Twin Reverb are guitar amplifiers made by Fender Musical Instruments Corporation. The Twin was introduced in 1952, two years before Fender began selling Stratocaster electric guitars. The amps are known for their characteristi ...
Reverb amp with the mid turned down low and the treble turned up high. Funk guitarists playing rhythm guitar generally avoid
distortion In signal processing, distortion is the alteration of the original shape (or other characteristic) of a signal. In communications and electronics it means the alteration of the waveform of an information-bearing signal, such as an audio s ...
effects and amp overdrive to get a clean sound, and given the importance of a crisp, high sound,
Fender Stratocaster The Fender Stratocaster, colloquially known as the Strat, is a model of electric guitar designed from 1952 into 1954 by Leo Fender, Bill Carson, George Fullerton, and Freddie Tavares. The Fender Musical Instruments Corporation has continuous ...
s and Telecasters were widely used for their cutting treble tone. The mids are often cut by guitarists to help the guitar sound different from the
horn section A horn section is a group of musicians playing horns. In an orchestra or concert band, it refers to the musicians who play the "French" horn, and in a British-style brass band it is the tenor horn players. In many popular music genres, the ...
, keyboards and other instruments. Given the focus on providing a rhythmic groove, and the lack of emphasis on instrumental guitar melodies and
guitar solo A guitar solo is a melodic passage, instrumental section, or entire piece of music, pre-written (or improvised) to be played on a classical guitar, electric guitar or an acoustic guitar. In 20th and 21st century traditional music and popular ...
s, sustain is not sought out by funk rhythm guitarists. Funk rhythm guitarists use
compressor A compressor is a mechanical device that increases the pressure of a gas by reducing its volume. An air compressor is a specific type of gas compressor. Compressors are similar to pumps: both increase the pressure on a fluid and both can trans ...
volume-control effects to enhance the sound of muted notes, which boosts the "clucking" sound and adds "percussive excitement to funk rhythms" (an approach used by
Nile Rodgers Nile Gregory Rodgers Jr. (born September 19, 1952) is an American musician, record producer and composer. The co-founder of Chic, Rodgers has written, produced, and performed on records that have sold more than 500 million albums and 75 million ...
). Guitarist
Eddie Hazel Edward Earl Hazel (April 10, 1950 – December 23, 1992) was an American guitarist and singer in early funk music who played lead guitar with Parliament-Funkadelic. Hazel was a posthumous inductee to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, inducted in 1 ...
from
Funkadelic Funkadelic was an American funk rock band formed in Plainfield, New Jersey in 1968 and active until 1982. The band and its sister act Parliament, both led by George Clinton, pioneered the funk music culture of the 1970s.John, Bush. Funkade ...
is notable for his solo improvisation (particularly for the solo on "
Maggot Brain ''Maggot Brain'' is the third studio album by the American funk rock band Funkadelic, released by Westbound Records in July 1971. It was produced by band leader George Clinton and recorded at United Sound Systems in Detroit during late 197 ...
") and guitar riffs, the tone of which was shaped by a
Maestro FZ-1 Fuzz-Tone Gibson's Maestro FZ-1 Fuzz-Tone was the first widely marketed fuzz distortion guitar and bass effect. Introduced in 1962, it achieved widespread popularity in 1965 after the Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards prominent use of the FZ-1 on the ...
pedal. Hazel, along with guitarist
Ernie Isley Ernest Isley (born March 7, 1952) is an American musician, best known as a member of the musical ensemble The Isley Brothers, and also the splinter group Isley-Jasper-Isley. Biography Ernie was born in Cincinnati, where his older brothers for ...
of
the Isley Brothers The Isley Brothers ( ) are an American musical group originally from Cincinnati, Ohio, that began as a vocal trio consisting of brothers O'Kelly Isley Jr., Rudolph Isley and Ronald Isley in the 1950s. With a career spanning over seven decade ...
, was influenced by Jimi Hendrix's improvised, wah-wah infused solos. Ernie Isley was tutored at an early age by Hendrix, when Hendrix was a part of the Isley Brothers backing band and temporarily lived in the Isleys' household. Funk guitarists use the wah-wah sound effect along with muting the notes to create a percussive sound for their guitar riffs. The phaser effect is often used in funk and R&B guitar playing for its filter sweeping sound effect, an example being the
Isley Brothers Isley is an English surname. The name can also be used as an anglicized variant for the German surnames Eisele and Eisler. Notable people with the surname include: * The Isley Brothers, American musical group ** Ernie Isley (born 1952), American ...
' song " Who's That Lady". Michael Hampton, another P-Funk guitarist, was able to play Hazel's virtuosic solo on "Maggot Brain", using a solo approach that added in string bends and Hendrix-style
feedback Feedback occurs when outputs of a system are routed back as inputs as part of a chain of cause-and-effect that forms a circuit or loop. The system can then be said to ''feed back'' into itself. The notion of cause-and-effect has to be handled ...
.


Keyboards

A range of keyboard instruments are used in funk. Acoustic piano is used in funk, including in "September" by
Earth Wind & Fire Earth, Wind & Fire (EW&F or EWF) is an American band whose music spans the genres of jazz, R&B, soul, funk, disco, pop, big band, Latin, and Afro pop. They are among the best-selling bands of all time, with sales of over 90 million ...
and " Will It Go Round in Circles" by
Billy Preston William Everett Preston (September 2, 1946 – June 6, 2006) was an American keyboardist, singer and songwriter whose work encompassed R&B, rock, soul, funk, and gospel. Preston was a top session keyboardist in the 1960s, during which he b ...
. The electric piano is used on songs such as
Herbie Hancock Herbert Jeffrey Hancock (born April 12, 1940) is an American jazz pianist, keyboardist, bandleader, and composer. Hancock started his career with trumpeter Donald Byrd's group. He shortly thereafter joined the Miles Davis Quintet, where he hel ...
's "Chameleon" (a
Fender Rhodes The Rhodes piano (also known as the Fender Rhodes piano) is an electric piano invented by Harold Rhodes, which became popular in the 1970s. Like a conventional piano, the Rhodes generates sound with keys and hammers, but instead of strings, th ...
) and "Mercy, Mercy, Mercy" by
Joe Zawinul Josef Erich Zawinul ( '; 7 July 1932 – 11 September 2007) was an Austrian jazz and jazz fusion keyboardist and composer. First coming to prominence with saxophonist Cannonball Adderley, Zawinul went on to play with Miles Davis and to b ...
(a
Wurlitzer The Rudolph Wurlitzer Company, usually referred to as simply Wurlitzer, is an American company started in Cincinnati in 1853 by German immigrant (Franz) Rudolph Wurlitzer. The company initially imported stringed, woodwind and brass instruments ...
). The clavinet is used for its percussive tone, and it can be heard in songs such as
Stevie Wonder Stevland Hardaway Morris ( Judkins; May 13, 1950), known professionally as Stevie Wonder, is an American singer-songwriter, who is credited as a pioneer and influence by musicians across a range of genres that include rhythm and blues, pop, sou ...
's "
Superstition A superstition is any belief or practice considered by non-practitioners to be irrational or supernatural, attributed to fate or magic, perceived supernatural influence, or fear of that which is unknown. It is commonly applied to beliefs an ...
" and " Higher Ground" and Bill Withers' " Use Me". The
Hammond B-3 organ The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond and John M. Hanert and first manufactured in 1935. Multiple models have been produced, most of which use sliding drawbars to vary sounds. Until 1975, Hammond organs generated ...
is used in funk, in songs such as "Cissy Strut" by The Meters and "Love the One You're With" (with Aretha Franklin singing and Billy Preston on keyboards).
Bernie Worrell George Bernard Worrell, Jr. (April 19, 1944 – June 24, 2016) was an American keyboardist and record producer best known as a founding member of Parliament-Funkadelic and for his work with Talking Heads. He is a member of the Rock and Rol ...
's range of keyboards from his recordings with Parliament Funkadelic demonstrate the wide range of keyboards used in funk, as they include the Hammond organ ("Funky Woman", "Hit It and Quit It", "Wars of Armageddon"); RMI electric piano ("I Wanna Know If It's Good to You?", " Free Your Mind", "Loose Booty"); acoustic piano ("Funky Dollar Bill", "Jimmy's Got a Little Bit of Bitch in Him"); clavinet ("Joyful Process", "Up for the Down Stroke", "Red Hot Mama");
Minimoog The Minimoog is an analog synthesizer first manufactured by Moog Music between 1970 and 1981. Designed as a more affordable, portable version of the modular Moog synthesizer, it was the first synthesizer sold in retail stores. It was first popul ...
synthesizer ("Atmosphere", " Flash Light", "Aqua Boogie", "Knee Deep", "Let's Take It to the Stage"); and ARP string ensemble synth (" Chocolate City", " Give Up the Funk (Tear the Roof off the Sucker)", "Undisco Kidd"). Synthesizers were used in funk both to add to the deep sound of the electric bass, or even to replace the electric bass altogether in some songs.Lacy, 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. 51 Funk synthesizer bass, most often a
Minimoog The Minimoog is an analog synthesizer first manufactured by Moog Music between 1970 and 1981. Designed as a more affordable, portable version of the modular Moog synthesizer, it was the first synthesizer sold in retail stores. It was first popul ...
, was used because it could create layered sounds and new electronic tones that were not feasible on electric bass.


Vocals and lyrics

In the 1970s, funk used many of the same vocal styles that were used in African-American music in the 1960s, including singing influences from blues, gospel, jazz and doo-wop. Like these other African-American styles, funk used " lls, shouts, hollers, moans, humming, and melodic riffs", along with styles such as
Call and Response Call and response is a form of interaction between a speaker and an audience in which the speaker's statements ("calls") are punctuated by responses from the listeners. This form is also used in music, where it falls under the general category of ...
and narration of stories (like the African oral tradition approach). The call and response in funk can be between the lead singer and the band members who act as backup vocalists.Lacy, 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. 75 As funk emerged from soul, the vocals in funk share soul's approach; however, funk vocals tend to be "more punctuated, energetic, rhythmically percussive and less embellished" with ornaments, and the vocal lines tend to resemble horn parts and have "pushed" rhythms. Funk bands such as
Earth, Wind & Fire Earth, Wind & Fire (EW&F or EWF) is an American band whose music spans the genres of jazz, R&B, soul, funk, disco, pop, big band, Latin, and Afro pop. They are among the best-selling bands of all time, with sales of over 90 million r ...
have harmony vocal parts. Songs like " Super Bad" by James Brown included "double-voice" along with "yells, shouts and screams". Funk singers used a "black aesthetic" to perform that made use of "colorful and lively exchange of gestures, facial expressions, body posture, and vocal phrases" to create an engaging performance. The lyrics in funk music addressed issues faced by the African American community in the United States during the 1970s, which arose due to the move away from an industrial, working-class economy to an information economy, which harmed the Black working class. Funk songs by The Ohio Players, Earth, Wind & Fire, and James Brown raised issues faced by lower-income Blacks in their song lyrics, such as poor "economic conditions and themes of poor inner-city life in the black communities". The Funkadelic song " One Nation Under A Groove" (1978) is about the challenges that Blacks overcame during the 1960s civil rights movement, and it includes an exhortation for Blacks in the 1970s to capitalize on the new "social and political opportunities" that had become available in the 1970s. The
Isley Brothers Isley is an English surname. The name can also be used as an anglicized variant for the German surnames Eisele and Eisler. Notable people with the surname include: * The Isley Brothers, American musical group ** Ernie Isley (born 1952), American ...
song "Fight the Power" (1975) has a political message. Parliament's song "Chocolate City" (1975) metaphorically refers to Washington D.C. and other US cities that have a mainly Black population, and it draws attention to the potential power that Black voters wield and suggests that a Black President be considered in the future. The political themes of funk songs and the aiming of the messages to a Black audience echoed the new image of Blacks that was created in
Blaxploitation Blaxploitation is an ethnic subgenre of the exploitation film that emerged in the United States during the early 1970s. The term, a portmanteau of the words "black" and "exploitation", was coined in August 1972 by Junius Griffin, the president ...
films, which depicted "African-American men and women standing their ground and fighting for what was right".Lacy, 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. 36 Both funk and Blaxploitation films addressed issues faced by Blacks and told stories from a Black perspective. Another link between 1970s funk and Blaxploitation films is that many of these films used funk soundtracks (e.g.,
Curtis Mayfield Curtis Lee Mayfield (June 3, 1942 – December 26, 1999) was an American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and record producer, and one of the most influential musicians behind soul and politically conscious African-American music.
for '' Superfly''; James Brown and Fred Wesley for '' Black Caesar'' and War for ''
Youngblood Youngblood, Youngbloods or Young Blood may refer to: Film and television * ''Young Blood'' (1926 film), a German silent drama film * ''Young Blood'' (1932 film), an American western film * ''Young Blood'' (1943 film), a Swedish drama film * ...
''). Funk songs included metaphorical language that was understood best by listeners who were "familiar with the black aesthetic and lackvernacular".Lacy, 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. 66 For example, funk songs included expressions such as "shake your money maker", "funk yourself right out" and "move your boogie body". Another example is the use of "bad" in the song "Super Bad" (1970), which black listeners knew meant "good" or "great". In the 1970s, to get around radio obscenity restrictions, funk artists would use words that sounded like non-allowed words and
double entendre A double entendre (plural double entendres) is a figure of speech or a particular way of wording that is devised to have a double meaning, of which one is typically obvious, whereas the other often conveys a message that would be too socially a ...
s to get around these restrictions. For example,
The Ohio Players ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things that are already or about to be mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in ...
had a song entitled "Fopp" which referred to "Fopp me right, don't you fopp me wrong/We'll be foppin' all night long...". Some funk songs used made-up words which suggested that they were "writing lyrics in a constant haze of marijuana smoke", such as Parliament's " Aqua Boogie (A Psychoalphadiscobetabioaquadoloop)", which includes words such as "bioaquadooloop". The mainstream white listener base was often not able to understand funk's lyrical messages, which contributed to funk's lack of popular music chart success with white audiences during the 1970s.


Other instruments

Horn section A horn section is a group of musicians playing horns. In an orchestra or concert band, it refers to the musicians who play the "French" horn, and in a British-style brass band it is the tenor horn players. In many popular music genres, the ...
arrangements with groups of brass instruments are often used in funk songs. Funk horn sections could include saxophone (often tenor sax), trumpet, trombone, and for larger horn sections, such as quintets and sextets, a baritone sax. Horn sections played "rhythmic and syncopated" parts, often with "offbeat phrases" that emphasize "rhythmic displacement". Funk song introductions are an important place for horn arrangements. Funk horn sections performed in a "rhythmic percussive style" that mimicked the approach used by funk rhythm guitarists.Lacy, 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. 48 Horn sections would "punctuate" the lyrics by playing in the spaces between vocals, using "short staccato rhythmic blast . Notable funk horn players included Alfred "PeeWee" Ellis, trombonist
Fred Wesley Fred Wesley (born July 4, 1943) is an American trombonist who worked with James Brown in the 1960s and 1970s and Parliament-Funkadelic in the second half of the 1970s. Biography Wesley was born the son of a high school teacher and big band le ...
, and alto sax player
Maceo Parker Maceo Parker (; born February 14, 1943) is an American funk and soul jazz saxophonist, best known for his work with James Brown in the 1960s, Parliament-Funkadelic in the 1970s and Prince in the 2000s. Parker was a prominent soloist on many o ...
. Notable funk horn sections including the "Phoenix Horns" (with Earth, Wind & Fire), the "Horny Horns" (with Parliament), the "Memphis Horns" (with
Isaac Hayes Isaac Lee Hayes Jr. (August 20, 1942 – August 10, 2008) was an American singer, actor, songwriter, and composer. He was one of the creative forces behind the Southern soul music label Stax Records, where he served both as an in-house songw ...
), and "MFSB" (with
Curtis Mayfield Curtis Lee Mayfield (June 3, 1942 – December 26, 1999) was an American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and record producer, and one of the most influential musicians behind soul and politically conscious African-American music.
). The instruments in funk horn sections varied. If there were two brass instruments, it could be trumpet and tenor sax, trumpet and trombone, or two saxes. If there were three brass players, it could be trumpet, sax and trombone or a trumpet and two saxes. A quartet of brass instruments would often be a pair of an instrument type and two other instruments. Quintets would typically take a pair of brass instruments (saxes or trumpets), and add different high and low brass instruments. With six instruments, a brass section would typically be two pairs of brass instruments plus a trombone and baritone sax holding down the bottom end. Notable songs with funk horn sections include: * '' Cold Sweat'' (James Brown & the Famous Flames), 1967 * ''Superstition'' (Stevie Wonder), 1972 * ''Funky Stuff'' (Kool & The Gang), 1973 * ''What Is Hip?'' (Tower of Power), 1973 * '' Pick Up the Pieces'' (Average White Band) * '' Up For The Down Stroke'' (Parliament), 1974 * ''Hair'' (Graham Central Station), 1974 * '' Too Hot to Stop'' (The Bar-Kays), 1976 * '' Getaway'' (Earth, Wind & Fire), 1976 In bands or shows where hiring a horn section is not feasible, a keyboardist can play the horn section parts on a synthesizer with "keyboard brass patches", however, choosing an authentic-sounding synthesizer and brass patch is important. In the 2010s, with micro-MIDI synths, it may even be possible to have another instrumentalist play the keyboard brass parts, thus enabling the keyboardist to continue to comp throughout the song.


Costumes and style

Funk bands in the 1970s adopted Afro-American fashion and style, including " Bell-bottom pants, platform shoes, hoop earring Afros airstyles leather vests,... beaded necklaces",
dashiki The dashiki is a colorful garment that covers the top half of the body, worn mostly in West Africa. It is also known as a Kitenge in East Africa and is a common item of clothing in Tanzania and Kenya. It has formal and informal versions and vari ...
shirts, jumpsuits and boots. In contrast to earlier bands such as
The Temptations The Temptations are an American vocal group from Detroit, Michigan, who released a series of successful singles and albums with Motown Records during the 1960s and 1970s. The group's work with producer Norman Whitfield, beginning with the Top ...
, which wore "matching suits" and "neat haircuts" to appeal to white mainstream audiences, funk bands adopted an "African spirit" in their outfits and style. George Clinton and Parliament are known for their imaginative costumes and "freedom of dress", which included bedsheets acting as robes and capes.


History

Funk was formed through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African Americans in the mid-20th century. Musicologist Anne Danielsen wrote that funk might be placed in the lineage of rhythm and blues, jazz, and soul. Sociologist Darby E. Southgate wrote that funk is "an amalgam of gospel, soul, jazz fusion, rhythm and blues, and black rock." The distinctive characteristics of
African-American music African-American music is an umbrella term covering a diverse range of music and musical genres largely developed by African Americans and their culture. Their origins are in musical forms that first came to be due to the condition of slaver ...
al expression are rooted in
sub-Saharan African music traditions In many parts of sub-Saharan Africa, the use of music is not limited to entertainment: it serves a purpose to the local community and helps in the conduct of daily routines. Traditional African music supplies appropriate music and dance for work ...
, and find their earliest expression in spirituals, work chants/songs, praise shouts, gospel, blues, and "body rhythms" ( hambone, patting juba, and
ring shout A shout or ring shout is an ecstatic, transcendent religious ritual, first practiced by African slaves in the West Indies and the United States, in which worshipers move in a circle while shuffling and stomping their feet and clapping their hands. ...
clapping and stomping patterns). Like other styles of African-American musical expression including jazz, soul music and R&B, funk music accompanied many protest movements during and after the
Civil Rights Movement The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional Racial segregation in the United States, racial segregation, Racial discrimination ...
. Funk allowed everyday experiences to be expressed to challenge daily struggles and hardships fought by lower and working class communities.


New Orleans

Gerhard Kubik Gerhard Kubik (born 10 December 1934) is an Austrian music ethnologist from Vienna. He studied ethnology, musicology and African languages at the University of Vienna. He published his doctoral dissertation in 1971 and achieved habilitation in 1 ...
notes that with the exception of
New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
polyrhythm Polyrhythm is the simultaneous use of two or more rhythms that are not readily perceived as deriving from one another, or as simple manifestations of the same meter. The rhythmic layers may be the basis of an entire piece of music ( cross-rhyt ...
s, and there was a "very specific absence of asymmetric time-line patterns ( key patterns) in virtually all early twentieth century African-American music ... only in some New Orleans genres does a hint of simple time line patterns occasionally appear in the form of transient so-called 'stomp' patterns or stop-time chorus. These do not function in the same way as African time lines." In the late 1940s this changed somewhat when the two-celled time line structure was brought into New Orleans blues. New Orleans musicians were especially receptive to
Afro-Cuban Afro-Cubans or Black Cubans are Cubans of West African ancestry. The term ''Afro-Cuban'' can also refer to historical or cultural elements in Cuba thought to emanate from this community and the combining of native African and other cultural ...
influences precisely at the time when R&B was first forming.
Dave Bartholomew David Louis Bartholomew (December 24, 1918 – June 23, 2019) was an American musician, bandleader, composer, arranger, and record producer. He was prominent in the music of New Orleans throughout the second half of the 20th century. Originally ...
and Professor Longhair (Henry Roeland Byrd) incorporated Afro-Cuban instruments, as well as the clave pattern and related two-celled figures in songs such as "Carnival Day" (Bartholomew 1949) and "Mardi Gras In New Orleans" (Longhair 1949).
Robert Palmer Robert Allen Palmer (19 January 1949 – 26 September 2003) was an English singer and songwriter. He was known for his powerful, soulful voice and wikt:sartorial, sartorial elegance, and his stylistic explorations, combining Soul music, so ...
reports that, in the 1940s, Professor Longhair listened to and played with musicians from the islands and "fell under the spell of Perez Prado's mambo records." Professor Longhair's particular style was known locally as ''rumba-boogie''. One of Longhair's great contributions was his particular approach of adopting two-celled, clave-based patterns into New Orleans rhythm and blues (R&B). Longhair's rhythmic approach became a basic template of funk. According to Dr. John (Malcolm John "Mac" Rebennack Jr.), the Professor "put funk into music ... Longhair's thing had a direct bearing I'd say on a large portion of the funk music that evolved in New Orleans." In his "Mardi Gras in New Orleans", the pianist employs the 2-3 clave onbeat/offbeat motif in a rumba-boogie "
guajeo A guajeo (Anglicized pronunciation: ''wa-hey-yo'') is a typical Cuban ostinato melody, most often consisting of arpeggiated chords in syncopated patterns. Some musicians only use the term ''guajeo'' for ostinato patterns played specifically by ...
". The syncopated, but straight subdivision feel of Cuban music (as opposed to swung subdivisions) took root in New Orleans R&B during this time. Alexander Stewart states: "Eventually, musicians from outside of New Orleans began to learn some of the rhythmic practices
f the Crescent City F, or f, is the sixth letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''ef'' (pronounced ), and the plural is ''efs''. Hist ...
Most important of these were James Brown and the drummers and arrangers he employed. Brown's early repertoire had used mostly shuffle rhythms, and some of his most successful songs were 12/8 ballads (e.g. 'Please, Please, Please' (1956), 'Bewildered' (1961), 'I Don't Mind' (1961)). Brown's change to a funkier brand of soul required 4/4 metre and a different style of drumming." Stewart makes the point: "The singular style of rhythm & blues that emerged from New Orleans in the years after World played an important role in the development of funk. In a related development, the underlying rhythms of American popular music underwent a basic, yet generally unacknowledged transition from triplet or shuffle feel to even or straight eighth notes."Stewart (2000: 293).


1960s


James Brown

James Brown credited
Little Richard Richard Wayne Penniman (December 5, 1932 – May 9, 2020), known professionally as Little Richard, was an American musician, singer, and songwriter. He was an influential figure in popular music and culture for seven decades. Described as the " ...
's 1950s R&B road band,
The Upsetters The Upsetters was the name given to the house band for Jamaican reggae producer Lee "Scratch" Perry. The name of the band comes from Perry's nickname of Upsetter, after his song "I Am the Upsetter", a musical dismissal of his former boss Cox ...
from New Orleans, as "the first to put the funk into the rhythm" of
rock and roll Rock and roll (often written as rock & roll, rock 'n' roll, or rock 'n roll) is a genre of popular music that evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s. It originated from African-American music such as jazz, rhythm an ...
. Following his temporary exit from secular music to become an evangelist in 1957, some of Little Richard's band members joined Brown and
the Famous Flames The Famous Flames were an American Rhythm and blues, Soul vocal group founded in Toccoa, Georgia, in 1953 by Bobby Byrd. James Brown first began his career as a member of the Famous Flames, emerging as the lead singer by the time of their firs ...
, beginning a long string of hits for them in 1958. By the mid-1960s, James Brown had developed his signature groove that emphasized the
downbeat ' (styled in all caps) is an American music magazine devoted to "jazz, blues and beyond", the last word indicating its expansion beyond the jazz realm which it covered exclusively in previous years. The publication was established in 1934 in Chi ...
—with heavy emphasis on the first beat of every measure to etch his distinctive sound, rather than the
backbeat In music and music theory, the beat is the basic unit of time, the pulse (regularly repeating event), of the ''mensural level'' (or ''beat level''). The beat is often defined as the rhythm listeners would tap their toes to when listening to a p ...
that typified African-American music. Brown often cued his band with the command "On the one!," changing the percussion emphasis/accent from the one-''two''-three-''four'' backbeat of traditional soul music to the ''one''-two-three-four downbeat – but with an even-note
syncopated In music, syncopation is a variety of rhythms played together to make a piece of music, making part or all of a tune or piece of music off-beat. More simply, syncopation is "a disturbance or interruption of the regular flow of rhythm": a "plac ...
guitar rhythm (on quarter notes two and four) featuring a hard-driving, repetitive brassy swing. This one-three beat launched the shift in Brown's signature music style, starting with his 1964 hit single, "
Out of Sight ''Out of Sight'' is a 1998 American crime comedy film directed by Steven Soderbergh and written by Scott Frank, adapted from Elmore Leonard's 1996 novel of the same name. The first of several collaborations between Soderbergh and actor Geor ...
" and his 1965 hits, " Papa's Got a Brand New Bag" and "
I Got You (I Feel Good) "I Got You (I Feel Good)" is a song by American singer James Brown. First recorded for the album '' Out of Sight'' and then released in an alternate take as a single in 1965, it was his highest-charting song and is arguably his best-known reco ...
". Brown's style of funk was based on interlocking, contrapuntal parts: syncopated basslines, 16th beat drum patterns, and syncopated guitar riffs. The main guitar ostinatos for "Ain't it Funky" (c. late 1960s) are an example of Brown's refinement of New Orleans funk— an irresistibly danceable riff, stripped down to its rhythmic essence. On "Ain't it Funky" the tonal structure is barebones. Brown's innovations led to him and his band becoming the seminal funk act; they also pushed the funk music style further to the forefront with releases such as " Cold Sweat" (1967), " Mother Popcorn" (1969) and " Get Up (I Feel Like Being A) Sex Machine" (1970), discarding even the twelve-bar blues featured in his earlier music. Instead, Brown's music was overlaid with "catchy, anthemic vocals" based on "extensive vamps" in which he also used his voice as "a percussive instrument with frequent rhythmic grunts and with rhythm-section patterns ... esembling
West African West Africa or Western Africa is the westernmost region of Africa. The United Nations defines Western Africa as the 16 countries of Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Mali, ...
polyrhythms" – a tradition evident in African-American work songs and chants.Collins, W. (January 29, 2002)
James Brown.
''St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture''. Retrieved January 12, 2007. Throughout his career, Brown's frenzied vocals, frequently punctuated with screams and grunts, channeled the "ecstatic ambiance of the black church" in a secular context. After 1965, Brown's bandleader and arranger was
Alfred "Pee Wee" Ellis Alfred James Ellis (April 21, 1941 – September 23, 2021), known as Pee Wee Ellis due to his diminutive stature, was an American saxophonist, composer, and arranger. With a background in jazz, he was a member of James Brown's band in the 1 ...
. Ellis credits Clyde Stubblefield's adoption of New Orleans drumming techniques, as the basis of modern funk: "If, in a studio, you said 'play it funky' that could imply almost anything. But 'give me a New Orleans beat' – you got exactly what you wanted. And Clyde Stubblefield was just the epitome of this funky drumming." Stewart states that the popular feel was passed along from "New Orleans—through James Brown's music, to the popular music of the 1970s." Concerning the various funk motifs, Stewart states that this model "...is different from a time line (such as clave and tresillo) in that it is not an exact pattern, but more of a loose organizing principle." In a 1990 interview, Brown offered his reason for switching the rhythm of his music: "I changed from the upbeat to the downbeat ... Simple as that, really."Pareles, J. (December 26, 2006)
James Brown, the "Godfather of Soul" dies at 73.
''The New York Times''. Retrieved January 31, 2007. According to
Maceo Parker Maceo Parker (; born February 14, 1943) is an American funk and soul jazz saxophonist, best known for his work with James Brown in the 1960s, Parliament-Funkadelic in the 1970s and Prince in the 2000s. Parker was a prominent soloist on many o ...
, Brown's former saxophonist, playing on the downbeat was at first hard for him and took some getting used to. Reflecting back to his early days with Brown's band, Parker reported that he had difficulty playing "on the one" during solo performances, since he was used to hearing and playing with the accent on the second beat.Gross, T. (1989)
Musician Maceo Parker (Fresh Air WHYY-FM audio interview).
National Public Radio. Retrieved January 22, 2007.


Parliament-Funkadelic

A new group of musicians began to further develop the "funk rock" approach. Innovations were prominently made by George Clinton, with his bands
Parliament In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: representing the electorate, making laws, and overseeing the government via hearings and inquiries. ...
and
Funkadelic Funkadelic was an American funk rock band formed in Plainfield, New Jersey in 1968 and active until 1982. The band and its sister act Parliament, both led by George Clinton, pioneered the funk music culture of the 1970s.John, Bush. Funkade ...
. Together, they produced a new kind of funk sound heavily influenced by
jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a majo ...
and
psychedelic rock Psychedelic rock is a rock music Music genre, genre that is inspired, influenced, or representative of psychedelia, psychedelic culture, which is centered on perception-altering hallucinogenic drugs. The music incorporated new electronic sound ...
. The two groups shared members and are often referred to collectively as "Parliament-Funkadelic". The breakout popularity of Parliament-Funkadelic gave rise to the term "
P-Funk Parliament-Funkadelic (abbreviated as P-Funk) is an American music collective of rotating musicians headed by George Clinton, primarily consisting of the funk bands Parliament and Funkadelic, both active since the 1960s. Their distinctive ...
", which referred to the music by George Clinton's bands, and defined a new subgenre. Clinton played a principal role in several other bands, including Parlet, the Horny Horns, and the Brides of Funkenstein, all part of the P-Funk conglomerate. "P-funk" also came to mean something in its quintessence, of superior quality, or '' sui generis''. Following the work of Jimi Hendrix in the late 1960s, artists such as Sly and the Family Stone combined the psychedelic rock of Hendrix with funk, borrowing
wah pedal A wah-wah pedal, or simply wah pedal, is a type of electric guitar effects pedal that alters the tone and frequencies of the guitar signal to create a distinctive sound, mimicking the human voice saying the onomatopoeic name "wah-wah". The pe ...
s, fuzz boxes,
echo chamber Echo chamber of the Dresden University of Technology Hamilton Mausoleum has a long-lasting unplanned echo An echo chamber is a hollow enclosure used to produce reverberation, usually for recording purposes. For example, the producers of a ...
s, and vocal distorters from the former, as well as
blues rock Blues rock is a fusion music genre that combines elements of blues and rock music. It is mostly an electric ensemble-style music with instrumentation similar to electric blues and rock (electric guitar, electric bass guitar, and drums, sometimes w ...
and
jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a majo ...
. In the following years, groups such as Clinton's Parliament-Funkadelic continued this sensibility, employing synthesizers and rock-oriented guitar work.


Late 1960s – early 1970s

Other musical groups picked up on the rhythms and vocal style developed by James Brown and his band, and the funk style began to grow.
Dyke and the Blazers Dyke and the Blazers was an American funk band led by Arlester Christian. The band was formed in 1965, and recorded up until Christian's death in 1971. Among their most successful records were the original version of " Funky Broadway" (1966) and ...
, based in
Phoenix, Arizona Phoenix ( ; nv, Hoozdo; es, Fénix or , yuf-x-wal, Banyà:nyuwá) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Arizona, with 1,608,139 residents as of 2020. It is the fifth-most populous city in the United States, and the o ...
, released " Funky Broadway" in 1967, perhaps the first record of the
soul music Soul music is a popular music genre that originated in the African American community throughout the United States in the late 1950s and early 1960s. It has its roots in African-American gospel music and rhythm and blues. Soul music became pop ...
era to have the word "funky" in the title. In 1969
Jimmy McGriff James Harrell McGriff (April 3, 1936 – May 24, 2008) was an American hard bop and soul-jazz organist and organ trio bandleader. Biography Early years and influences Born in Germantown, Pennsylvania, United States, McGriff started playing pi ...
released '' Electric Funk'', featuring his distinctive organ over a blazing horn section. Meanwhile, on the West Coast,
Charles Wright & the Watts 103rd Street Rhythm Band Charles Wright & the Watts 103rd Street Rhythm Band is an American soul and funk band. Formed in the early 1960s, they had the most visibility from 1967 to 1973 when the band had 9 singles reach Billboard's pop and/or rhythm and blues charts, ...
was releasing funk tracks beginning with its first album in 1967, culminating in the classic single "Express Yourself" in 1971. Also from the West Coast area, more specifically
Oakland, California Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast of the United States, West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third ...
, came the band
Tower of Power Tower of Power is an American R&B and funk based band and horn section, originating in Oakland, California, that has been performing since 1968. There have been a number of lead vocalists, the best-known being Lenny Williams, who fronted the ...
(TOP), which formed in 1968. Their debut album '' East Bay Grease'', released 1970, is considered an important milestone in funk. Throughout the 1970s, TOP had many hits, and the band helped to make funk music a successful genre, with a broader audience. In 1970,
Sly & the Family Stone Sly and the Family Stone was an American band from San Francisco. Active from 1966 to 1983, it was pivotal in the development of funk, soul, rock, and psychedelic music. Its core line-up was led by singer-songwriter, record producer, and mult ...
's "
Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin) "Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)" is a 1969 song recorded by Sly and the Family Stone. The song, released as a double A-side single with " Everybody Is a Star", reached number one on the soul single charts for five weeks, and reached num ...
" reached #1 on the charts, as did "
Family Affair ''Family Affair'' is an American sitcom starring Brian Keith and Sebastian Cabot that aired on CBS from September 12, 1966, to March 4, 1971. The series explored the trials of well-to-do engineer and bachelor Bill Davis (Keith) as he attempt ...
" in 1971. Notably, these afforded the group and the genre crossover success and greater recognition, yet such success escaped comparatively talented and moderately popular funk band peers. The Meters defined funk in
New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
Cissy Strut" in 1969. Another group who defined funk around this time were
the Isley Brothers The Isley Brothers ( ) are an American musical group originally from Cincinnati, Ohio, that began as a vocal trio consisting of brothers O'Kelly Isley Jr., Rudolph Isley and Ronald Isley in the 1950s. With a career spanning over seven decade ...
, whose funky 1969 #1 R&B hit, "
It's Your Thing "It's Your Thing" is a funk single by The Isley Brothers. Released in 1969, the anthem was an artistic response to Motown chief Berry Gordy's demanding hold on his artists after the Isleys left the label in late 1968. The lyrics of the chorus, ...
", signaled a breakthrough in African-American music, bridging the gaps of the jazzy sounds of Brown, the
psychedelic rock Psychedelic rock is a rock music Music genre, genre that is inspired, influenced, or representative of psychedelia, psychedelic culture, which is centered on perception-altering hallucinogenic drugs. The music incorporated new electronic sound ...
of Jimi Hendrix, and the upbeat soul of Sly & the Family Stone and
Mother's Finest Mother's Finest is an American rock band founded in Atlanta, Georgia, by the vocal duo of Joyce "Baby Jean" Kennedy and Glenn "Doc" Murdock in 1970 when the pair met up with guitarist Gary "Moses Mo" Moore and bassist Jerry "Wyzard" Seay. Thei ...
.
The Temptations The Temptations are an American vocal group from Detroit, Michigan, who released a series of successful singles and albums with Motown Records during the 1960s and 1970s. The group's work with producer Norman Whitfield, beginning with the Top ...
, who had previously helped to define the "
Motown Motown Records is an American record label owned by the Universal Music Group. It was founded by Berry Gordy Jr. as Tamla Records on June 7, 1958, and incorporated as Motown Record Corporation on April 14, 1960. Its name, a portmanteau of ''mot ...
Sound" – a distinct blend of pop-soul – adopted this new
psychedelic Psychedelics are a subclass of hallucinogenic drugs whose primary effect is to trigger non-ordinary states of consciousness (known as psychedelic experiences or "trips").Pollan, Michael (2018). ''How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science ...
sound towards the end of the 1960s as well. Their producer,
Norman Whitfield Norman Jesse Whitfield (May 12, 1940 – September 16, 2008) was an American songwriter and producer, who worked with Berry Gordy's Motown labels during the 1960s. allmusic Biography/ref> He has been credited as one of the creators of the Moto ...
, became an innovator in the field of psychedelic soul, creating hits with a newer, funkier sound for many
Motown Motown Records is an American record label owned by the Universal Music Group. It was founded by Berry Gordy Jr. as Tamla Records on June 7, 1958, and incorporated as Motown Record Corporation on April 14, 1960. Its name, a portmanteau of ''mot ...
acts, including " War" by
Edwin Starr Charles Edwin Hatcher (January 21, 1942 – April 2, 2003), known by his stage name Edwin Starr, was an American singer and songwriter. Starr was famous for his Norman Whitfield-produced Motown singles of the 1970s, most notably the number-one ...
, " Smiling Faces Sometimes" by
the Undisputed Truth The Undisputed Truth was an American Motown recording act, assembled by record producer Norman Whitfield as a means for being able to experiment with his psychedelic soul production techniques. Joe "Pep" Harris served as main lead singer, with ...
and " Papa Was A Rollin' Stone" by the Temptations. Motown producers Frank Wilson (" Keep On Truckin'") and Hal Davis (" Dancing Machine") followed suit.
Stevie Wonder Stevland Hardaway Morris ( Judkins; May 13, 1950), known professionally as Stevie Wonder, is an American singer-songwriter, who is credited as a pioneer and influence by musicians across a range of genres that include rhythm and blues, pop, sou ...
and
Marvin Gaye Marvin Pentz Gay Jr., who also spelled his surname as Gaye (April 2, 1939 – April 1, 1984), was an American singer and songwriter. He helped to shape the sound of Motown (music style), Motown in the 1960s, first as an in-house session player ...
also adopted funk beats for some of their biggest hits in the 1970s, such as "
Superstition A superstition is any belief or practice considered by non-practitioners to be irrational or supernatural, attributed to fate or magic, perceived supernatural influence, or fear of that which is unknown. It is commonly applied to beliefs an ...
" and " You Haven't Done Nothin'", and " I Want You" and " Got To Give It Up", respectively.


1970s

The 1970s were the era of highest mainstream visibility for funk music. In addition to Parliament Funkadelic, artists like
Sly and the Family Stone Sly and the Family Stone was an American band from San Francisco. Active from 1966 to 1983, it was pivotal in the development of funk, soul, rock, and psychedelic music. Its core line-up was led by singer-songwriter, record producer, and multi ...
, Rufus & Chaka Khan, Bootsy's Rubber Band, the
Isley Brothers Isley is an English surname. The name can also be used as an anglicized variant for the German surnames Eisele and Eisler. Notable people with the surname include: * The Isley Brothers, American musical group ** Ernie Isley (born 1952), American ...
,
Ohio Players Ohio Players is an American funk band, most popular in the 1970s. They are best known for their songs "Fire" and "Love Rollercoaster", and for their erotic album covers that featured nude or nearly nude women. Many of the women were models feat ...
,
Con Funk Shun Con Funk Shun (formerly known as Project Soul) is an American R&B and funk band whose popularity began in the mid-1970s and ran through the 1980s. They were influenced by funk legend James Brown and Sly and the Family Stone. Signed to Mercur ...
,
Kool and the Gang Kool & the Gang is an American R&B/ soul/funk band formed in Jersey City, New Jersey, in 1964 by brothers Robert "Kool" Bell and Ronald Bell, with Dennis "Dee Tee" Thomas, Robert "Spike" Mickens, Charles Smith, George Brown, and Ricky West. ...
,
the Bar-Kays The Bar-Kays are an American funk band formed in 1964. The band had dozens of charting singles from the 1960s to the 1980s, including "Soul Finger" (US ''Billboard'' Hot 100 number 17, R&B number 3) in 1967, "Son of Shaft" (R&B number 10) in ...
,
Commodores Commodores are an American funk and soul band, which were at their peak in the late 1970s through the mid 1980s. The members of the group met as mostly freshmen at Tuskegee Institute (now Tuskegee University) in 1968, and signed with Motown in ...
,
Roy Ayers Roy Ayers (born September 10, 1940) is an American funk, soul, and jazz composer, vibraphone player, and music producer. Ayers began his career as a post-bop jazz artist, releasing several albums with Atlantic Records, before his tenure at Po ...
,
Curtis Mayfield Curtis Lee Mayfield (June 3, 1942 – December 26, 1999) was an American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and record producer, and one of the most influential musicians behind soul and politically conscious African-American music.
, and
Stevie Wonder Stevland Hardaway Morris ( Judkins; May 13, 1950), known professionally as Stevie Wonder, is an American singer-songwriter, who is credited as a pioneer and influence by musicians across a range of genres that include rhythm and blues, pop, sou ...
, among others, were successful in getting radio play. Disco music owed a great deal to funk. Many early disco songs and performers came directly from funk-oriented backgrounds. Some disco music hits, such as all of
Barry White Barry Eugene Carter (September 12, 1944 – July 4, 2003), better known by his stage name Barry White, was an American singer and songwriter. A two-time Grammy Award winner known for his bass voice and romantic image, his greatest success came ...
's hits, "
Kung Fu Fighting "Kung Fu Fighting" is a disco song by Jamaican vocalist Carl Douglas, written by Douglas and produced by British-Indian musician Biddu. It was released in 1974 as the first single from his debut album, ''Kung Fu Fighting and Other Great Lov ...
" by
Biddu Biddu Appaiah (born 8 February 1944) is a British-Indian singer-songwriter, composer, and music producer who composed and produced many worldwide hit records during a career spanning five decades. Considered one of the pioneers of disco, Euro ...
and
Carl Douglas Carlton George Douglas (born 10 May 1942) is a Jamaican recording artist based in the UK who is best known for the 1974 disco single " Kung Fu Fighting". Early life Carlton George Douglas was born in Kingston, Colony of Jamaica. He later li ...
,
Donna Summer LaDonna Adrian Gaines (December 31, 1948May 17, 2012), known professionally as Donna Summer, was an American singer and songwriter. She gained prominence during the disco era of the 1970s and became known as the "Honorific nicknames in popular m ...
's " Love To Love You Baby",
Diana Ross Diana Ross (born March 26, 1944) is an American singer and actress. She rose to fame as the lead singer of the vocal group the Supremes, who became Motown's most successful act during the 1960s and one of the world's best-selling girl groups o ...
' " Love Hangover",
KC and the Sunshine Band KC and the Sunshine Band is an American disco and funk band that was founded in 1973 in Hialeah, Florida. Their best-known songs include the hits " That's the Way (I Like It)", "(Shake, Shake, Shake) Shake Your Booty", " I'm Your Boogie Man ...
's " I'm Your Boogie Man", "
I'm Every Woman "I'm Every Woman" is a song by American singer Chaka Khan, released as her debut solo single from her first album, '' Chaka'' (1978). It was Khan's first hit outside her recordings with the funk band Rufus. "I'm Every Woman" was produced by Ar ...
" by Chaka Khan (also known as the Queen of Funk), and Chic's "Le Freak" conspicuously include riffs and rhythms derived from funk. In 1976,
Rose Royce Rose Royce is an American soul and R&B group. They are best known for several hit singles during the 1970s including " Car Wash", " I Wanna Get Next to You", " I'm Going Down", "Wishing on a Star", and "Love Don't Live Here Anymore". Career T ...
scored a number-one hit with a purely dance-funk record, "
Car Wash A car wash, carwash, or auto wash is a facility used to clean the exterior, and in some cases the interior of motor vehicles. Car washes can be self-service, full-service (with attendants who wash the vehicle), or fully automated (possi ...
". Even with the arrival of disco, funk became increasingly popular well into the early 1980s. Funk music was also exported to Africa, and it melded with African singing and rhythms to form
Afrobeat Afrobeat is a Nigerian music genre that involves the combination of West African musical styles (such as traditional Yoruba music and highlife) and American funk, jazz, and soul influences, with a focus on chanted vocals, complex intersecti ...
. Nigerian musician
Fela Kuti Fela Aníkúlápó Kuti (born Olufela Olusegun Oludotun Ransome-Kuti; 15 October 1938 – 2 August 1997), also known as Abami Eda, was a Nigerian musician, bandleader, composer, political activist, and Pan-Africanist. He is regarded as the pi ...
, who was heavily influenced by James Brown's music, is credited with creating the style and terming it "Afrobeat".


Jazz funk

Jazz-funk is a subgenre of
jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a majo ...
music characterized by a strong back beat ( groove), electrified sounds and an early prevalence of analog synthesizers. The integration of funk,
soul In many religious and philosophical traditions, there is a belief that a soul is "the immaterial aspect or essence of a human being". Etymology The Modern English noun '':wikt:soul, soul'' is derived from Old English ''sāwol, sāwel''. The ea ...
, and R&B music and styles into jazz resulted in the creation of a genre whose spectrum is quite wide and ranges from strong
jazz improvisation Jazz improvisation is the spontaneous invention of melodic solo lines or accompaniment parts in a performance of jazz music. It is one of the defining elements of jazz. Improvisation is composing on the spot, when a singer or instrumentalist inv ...
to soul, funk or disco with jazz arrangements, jazz
riff A riff is a repeated chord progression or refrain in music (also known as an ostinato figure in classical music); it is a pattern, or melody, often played by the rhythm section instruments or solo instrument, that forms the basis or accompanim ...
s, and jazz solos, and sometimes soul vocals. Jazz-funk is primarily an American genre, where it was popular throughout the 1970s and the early 1980s, but it also achieved noted appeal on the club-circuit in England during the mid-1970s. Similar genres include
soul jazz Soul jazz or funky jazz is a subgenre of jazz that incorporates strong influences from hard bop, blues, soul, gospel and rhythm and blues. Soul jazz is often characterized by organ trios featuring the Hammond organ and small combos including t ...
and
jazz fusion Jazz fusion (also known as fusion and progressive jazz) is a music genre that developed in the late 1960s when musicians combined jazz harmony and improvisation with rock music, funk, and rhythm and blues. Electric guitars, amplifiers, and key ...
, but neither entirely overlap with jazz-funk. Notably jazz-funk is less vocal, more arranged and featured more improvisation than soul jazz, and retains a strong feel of groove and R&B versus some of the jazz fusion production.


''Headhunters''

In the 1970s, at the same time that jazz musicians began to explore blending jazz with rock to create
jazz fusion Jazz fusion (also known as fusion and progressive jazz) is a music genre that developed in the late 1960s when musicians combined jazz harmony and improvisation with rock music, funk, and rhythm and blues. Electric guitars, amplifiers, and key ...
, major jazz performers began to experiment with funk. Jazz-funk recordings typically used
electric bass The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...
and
electric piano An electric piano is a musical instrument which produces sounds when a performer presses the keys of a piano-style musical keyboard. Pressing keys causes mechanical hammers to strike metal strings, metal reeds or wire tines, leading to vibrations ...
in the rhythm section, in place of the double bass and acoustic piano that were typically used in jazz up until that point. Pianist and
bandleader A bandleader is the leader of a music group such as a rock or pop band or jazz quartet. The term is most commonly used with a group that plays popular music as a small combo or a big band, such as one which plays jazz, blues, rhythm and blues o ...
Herbie Hancock Herbert Jeffrey Hancock (born April 12, 1940) is an American jazz pianist, keyboardist, bandleader, and composer. Hancock started his career with trumpeter Donald Byrd's group. He shortly thereafter joined the Miles Davis Quintet, where he hel ...
was the first of many big jazz artists who embraced funk during the decade. Hancock's Headhunters band (1973) played the jazz-funk style. The Headhunters' lineup and instrumentation, retaining only
wind Wind is the natural movement of air or other gases relative to a planet's surface. Winds occur on a range of scales, from thunderstorm flows lasting tens of minutes, to local breezes generated by heating of land surfaces and lasting a few ...
player
Bennie Maupin Bennie Maupin (born August 29, 1940) is an American jazz multireedist who performs on various saxophones, flute, and bass clarinet. Maupin was born in Detroit, Michigan, United States. He is known for his participation in Herbie Hancock's Mwand ...
from Hancock's previous sextet, reflected his new musical direction. He used percussionist
Bill Summers Bill Summers may refer to: *Bill Summers (car builder) (1935–2011), American car builder and longtime speed record holder *Bill Summers (musician) (born 1948), American jazz percussionist * Bill Summers (umpire) (1895–1966), American umpire *'' ...
in addition to a drummer. Summers blended African, Afro-Cuban, and Afro-Brazilian instruments and rhythms into Hancock's jazzy funk sound.


''On the Corner''

'' On the Corner'' (1972) was jazz trumpeter-composer
Miles Davis Miles Dewey Davis III (May 26, 1926September 28, 1991) was an American trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. He is among the most influential and acclaimed figures in the history of jazz and 20th-century music. Davis adopted a variety of musi ...
's seminal foray into jazz-funk. Like his previous works though, ''On the Corner'' was experimental. Davis stated that ''On the Corner'' was an attempt at reconnecting with the young
black Black is a color which results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without hue, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness. Black and white ha ...
audience which had largely forsaken jazz for rock and funk. While there is a discernible funk influence in the
timbre In music, timbre ( ), also known as tone color or tone quality (from psychoacoustics), is the perceived sound quality of a musical note, sound or tone. Timbre distinguishes different types of sound production, such as choir voices and music ...
s of the instruments employed, other tonal and rhythmic textures, such as the Indian
tanpura The tanpura (), also referred to as tambura and tanpuri, is a long-necked plucked string instrument, originating in India, found in various forms in Indian music. It does not play melody, but rather supports and sustains the melody of ...
and
tabla A tabla, bn, তবলা, prs, طبلا, gu, તબલા, hi, तबला, kn, ತಬಲಾ, ml, തബല, mr, तबला, ne, तबला, or, ତବଲା, ps, طبله, pa, ਤਬਲਾ, ta, தபலா, te, తబల� ...
s, and Cuban
conga The conga, also known as tumbadora, is a tall, narrow, single-headed drum from Cuba. Congas are staved like barrels and classified into three types: quinto (lead drum, highest), tres dos or tres golpes (middle), and tumba or salidor (lowest ...
s and bongos, create a multi-layered soundscape. From a musical standpoint, the album was a culmination of sorts of the
recording studio A recording studio is a specialized facility for sound recording, mixing, and audio production of instrumental or vocal musical performances, spoken words, and other sounds. They range in size from a small in-home project studio large en ...
-based ''
musique concrète Musique concrète (; ): " problem for any translator of an academic work in French is that the language is relatively abstract and theoretical compared to English; one might even say that the mode of thinking itself tends to be more schematic, wit ...
'' approach that Davis and producer
Teo Macero Attilio Joseph "Teo" Macero (October 30, 1925 – February 19, 2008) was an American jazz saxophonist, composer, and record producer. He was a producer at Columbia Records for twenty years. Macero produced Miles Davis' '' Bitches Brew'', and ...
(who had studied with
Otto Luening Otto Clarence Luening (June 15, 1900 – September 2, 1996) was a German-American composer and conductor, and an early pioneer of tape music and electronic music. Luening was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin to German parents, Eugene, a conducto ...
at
Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manha ...
's Computer Music Center) had begun to explore in the late 1960s. Both sides of the record featured heavy funk drum and bass grooves, with the melodic parts snipped from hours of jams and mixed in the studio. Also cited as musical influences on the album by Davis were the contemporary composer
Karlheinz Stockhausen Karlheinz Stockhausen (; 22 August 1928 – 5 December 2007) was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th and early 21st centuries. He is known for his groundb ...
.


1980s synth-funk

In the 1980s, largely as a reaction against what was seen as the over-indulgence of disco, many of the core elements that formed the foundation of the P-Funk formula began to be usurped by electronic instruments, drum machines and
synthesizer A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis ...
s. Horn sections of saxophones and trumpets were replaced by
synth A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis an ...
keyboards, and the horns that remained were given simplified lines, and few horn solos were given to soloists. The classic electric keyboards of funk, like the
Hammond B3 Hammond may refer to: People * Hammond Innes (1913–1998), English novelist * Hammond (surname) * Justice Hammond (disambiguation) Places Antarctica * Hammond Glacier, Antarctica Australia * Hammond, South Australia, a small settlement in ...
organ, the Hohner Clavinet and/or the
Fender Rhodes piano The Rhodes piano (also known as the Fender Rhodes piano) is an electric piano invented by Harold Rhodes, which became popular in the 1970s. Like a conventional piano, the Rhodes generates sound with keys and hammers, but instead of strings, t ...
began to be replaced by the new
digital synthesizer A digital synthesizer is a synthesizer that uses digital signal processing (DSP) techniques to make musical sounds. This in contrast to older analog synthesizers, which produce music using analog electronics, and samplers, which play back digita ...
s such as the
Prophet-5 The Prophet-5 is an analog synthesizer manufactured by the American company Sequential. It was designed by Dave Smith and John Bowen in 1977, who used microprocessors, then a new technology, to create the first polyphonic synthesizer with full ...
,
Oberheim OB-X The Oberheim OB-X was the first of Oberheim's OB-series polyphonic analog subtractive synthesizers. First commercially available in June 1979, the OB-X was introduced to compete with the Sequential Circuits Prophet-5, which had been succes ...
, and
Yamaha DX7 The Yamaha DX7 is a synthesizer manufactured by the Yamaha Corporation from 1983 to 1989. It was the first successful digital synthesizer and is one of the best-selling synthesizers in history, selling more than 200,000 units. In the early 198 ...
. Electronic drum machines such as the
Roland TR-808 The Roland TR-808 Rhythm Composer, commonly known as the 808, is a drum machine manufactured by the Roland Corporation between 1980 and 1983. It was one of the first drum machines to allow users to program rhythms instead of using preset patte ...
,
Linn LM-1 The Linn LM-1 Drum Computer is a drum machine manufactured by Linn Electronics and released in 1980. It was the first drum machine to use samples of acoustic drums, and one of the first programmable drum machines. Its designer, the American e ...
, and
Oberheim DMX The DMX is a programmable digital drum machine manufactured by Oberheim. It was introduced in 1980 at a list price of and remained in the company's product line until the mid-1980s. The Oberheim DMX was the second digital drum machine ever to ...
began to replace the "
funky drummer "Funky Drummer" is a single released by James Brown in 1970. Its drum break, improvised by Clyde Stubblefield, is one of the most frequently sampled music recordings. Recording and composition "Funky Drummer" was recorded on November 20, 1 ...
s" of the past, and the
slap Slap or slapping may refer to: * Slapping (strike), a method of striking with the palm of the hand * Slapping (music), a musical technique used with stringed instruments * Slap tonguing, a musical technique used on wind instruments * ''Slap'' ...
and pop style of bass playing were often replaced by synth keyboard basslines. Lyrics of funk songs began to change from suggestive
double entendre A double entendre (plural double entendres) is a figure of speech or a particular way of wording that is devised to have a double meaning, of which one is typically obvious, whereas the other often conveys a message that would be too socially a ...
s to more graphic and sexually explicit content. Influenced by
Kraftwerk Kraftwerk (, "power station") is a German band formed in Düsseldorf in 1970 by Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider. Widely considered innovators and pioneers of electronic music, Kraftwerk were among the first successful acts to popularize t ...
, the Afroamerican rap DJ
Afrika Bambaataa Lance Taylor (born on April 17, 1957), also known as Afrika Bambaataa (), is an American DJ, rapper, and producer from the South Bronx, New York. He is notable for releasing a series of genre-defining electro tracks in the 1980s that influence ...
developed electro-funk, a minimalist machine-driven style of funk with his single "
Planet Rock Planet Rock may refer to: * "Planet Rock" (song), a 1982 song by Afrika Bambaataa and the Soulsonic Force ** '' Planet Rock: The Album'', a 1986 album containing the song * Planet Rock (radio station) Planet Rock may refer to: * "Planet Rock" ...
" in 1982.Planet Rock – The Album (Liner notes). Afrika Bambaataa & the Soul Sonic Force. Tommy Boy Records. 1986. TBLP 1007. Also known simply as electro, this style of funk was driven by synthesizers and the electronic rhythm of the TR-808 drum machine. The single " Renegades of Funk" followed in 1983. Michael Jackson was influenced electro funk also. In 1980, techno funk musician used the TR-808 programmable drum machine, while Kraftwerk's sound influenced later electro-funk artists such as
Mantronix Mantronix was an influential 1980s hip hop and electro funk music group from New York City. The band was formed by DJ Kurtis Mantronik (Kurtis el Khaleel) and rapper MC Tee (Touré Embden). The group is primarily remembered for its pioneeri ...
.
Rick James James Ambrose Johnson Jr. (February 1, 1948 – August 6, 2004), better known by his stage name Rick James, was an American singer-songwriter, musician and record producer. Born and raised in Buffalo, New York, James began his musical career in ...
was the first funk musician of the 1980s to assume the funk mantle dominated by P-Funk in the 1970s. His 1981 album '' Street Songs'', with the singles "Give It to Me Baby" and "
Super Freak "Super Freak" is a 1981 single produced and performed by American singer Rick James. The song, co-written by James and Alonzo Miller, was first released on James' fifth album, '' Street Songs'' (1981) and became one of James' signature songs. "F ...
", resulted in James becoming a star, and paved the way for the future direction of explicitness in funk. Beginning in the late 1970s,
Prince A prince is a Monarch, male ruler (ranked below a king, grand prince, and grand duke) or a male member of a monarch's or former monarch's family. ''Prince'' is also a title of nobility (often highest), often hereditary title, hereditary, in s ...
used a stripped-down, dynamic instrumentation similar to James. However, Prince went on to have as much of an impact on the sound of funk as any one artist since Brown; he combined eroticism, technology, an increasing musical complexity, and an outrageous image and stage show to ultimately create music as ambitious and imaginative as P-Funk. Prince formed the Time, originally conceived as an opening act for him and based on his "
Minneapolis sound The Minneapolis sound is a subgenre of funk rock with elements of new wave and synth-pop, that was pioneered by Minneapolis, Minnesota-based musician Prince in the late 1970s. Its popularity was given a boost throughout the 1980s thanks to Princ ...
", a hybrid mixture of funk, R&B, rock,
pop Pop or POP may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Music * Pop music, a musical genre Artists * POP, a Japanese idol group now known as Gang Parade * Pop!, a UK pop group * Pop! featuring Angie Hart, an Australian band Albums * ''Pop'' (G ...
& new wave. Eventually, the band went on to define their own style of stripped-down funk based on tight musicianship and sexual themes. Similar to Prince, other bands emerged during the P-Funk era and began to incorporate uninhibited sexuality, dance-oriented themes,
synthesizer A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis ...
s and other electronic technologies to continue to craft funk hits. These included Cameo, Zapp, the
Gap Band The Gap Band was an American R&B and funk band that rose to fame during the 1970s and 1980s. The band consisted of three brothers: Charlie, Ronnie, and Robert Wilson, along with other members; it was named after streets (Greenwood, Archer, and ...
, the Bar-Kays, and the
Dazz Band The Dazz Band is an American R&B/funk band most popular in the early 1980s. Emerging from Cleveland, Ohio, the group's biggest hit songs include "Let It Whip" (1982), "Joystick" (1983), and "Let It All Blow" (1984). The name of the band is a p ...
, who all found their biggest hits in the early 1980s. By the latter half of the 1980s, pure funk had lost its commercial impact; however, pop artists from
Michael Jackson Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American singer, songwriter, dancer, and philanthropist. Dubbed the "King of Pop", he is regarded as one of the most significant cultural figures of the 20th century. Over a ...
to Culture Club often used funk beats.


Late 1980s to 2000s nu-funk

While funk was driven away from radio by slick commercial hip hop,
contemporary R&B Contemporary R&B (or simply R&B) is a popular music Music genre, genre that combines rhythm and blues with elements of Pop music, pop, Soul music, soul, funk, Hip hop music, hip hop, and electronic music. The genre features a distinctive Recor ...
and
new jack swing New jack swing, new jack, or swingbeat is a fusion genre of the rhythms and production techniques of hip hop and dance-pop, and the urban contemporary sound of R&B. Spearheaded by producers Teddy Riley and Bernard Belle, new jack swing was ...
, its influence continued to spread. Artists like Steve Arrington and Cameo still received major airplay and had huge global followings. Rock bands began adopting elements of funk into their sound, creating new combinations of "
funk rock Funk rock is a fusion genre that mixes elements of funk and rock. James Brown and others declared that Little Richard and his mid-1950s road band, The Upsetters, were the first to put the funk in the rock and roll beat, with a biographer sta ...
" and "
funk metal Funk metal (also known as thrash-funk or punk-funk) is a subgenre of funk rock and alternative metal that infuses heavy metal music (often thrash metal) with elements of funk and punk rock. Funk metal was part of the alternative metal moveme ...
".
Extreme Extreme may refer to: Science and mathematics Mathematics *Extreme point, a point in a convex set which does not lie in any open line segment joining two points in the set *Maxima and minima, extremes on a mathematical function Science *Extremop ...
,
Red Hot Chili Peppers Red Hot Chili Peppers are an American rock band formed in Los Angeles in 1983, comprising vocalist Anthony Kiedis, bassist Flea, drummer Chad Smith, and guitarist John Frusciante. Their music incorporates elements of alternative rock, f ...
,
Living Colour Living Colour is an American rock band from New York City, formed in 1984. The band currently consists of guitarist Vernon Reid, lead vocalist Corey Glover, drummer Will Calhoun and bassist Doug Wimbish (who replaced Muzz Skillings in 1992 ...
,
Jane's Addiction Jane's Addiction is an American rock band from Los Angeles, formed in 1985. The band consists of vocalist Perry Farrell, guitarist Dave Navarro, drummer Stephen Perkins and bassist Eric Avery. Jane's Addiction was one of the first bands fr ...
,
Prince A prince is a Monarch, male ruler (ranked below a king, grand prince, and grand duke) or a male member of a monarch's or former monarch's family. ''Prince'' is also a title of nobility (often highest), often hereditary title, hereditary, in s ...
, Primus, Urban Dance Squad,
Fishbone Fishbone is an American rock band formed in Los Angeles in 1979, that plays a fusion of ska, punk, funk, metal, reggae, and soul. AllMusic has described the group as "one of the most distinctive and eclectic alternative rock bands of the l ...
,
Faith No More Faith No More is an American Rock music, rock band from San Francisco, California, formed in 1979. Before settling on the current name in July 1983, the band performed under the names Sharp Young Men and later Faith No Man. Bassist Billy Gould, k ...
,
Rage Against the Machine Rage Against the Machine (often abbreviated as RATM or shortened to simply Rage) is an American rock band from Los Angeles, California. Formed in 1991, the group consists of vocalist Zack de la Rocha, bassist and backing vocalist Tim Commer ...
,
Infectious Grooves Infectious Grooves is an American funk metal supergroup led by vocalist Mike Muir and initially a side project from his group Suicidal Tendencies. The current lineup also includes guitarists Dean Pleasants and Jim Martin; bassist Robert Tru ...
, and
Incubus An incubus is a demon in male form in folklore that seeks to have sexual intercourse with sleeping women; the corresponding spirit in female form is called a succubus. In medieval Europe, union with an incubus was supposed by some to result in t ...
spread the approach and styles garnered from funk pioneers to new audiences in the mid-to-late 1980s and the 1990s. These bands later inspired the underground mid-1990s funkcore movement and current funk-inspired artists like Outkast, Malina Moye,
Van Hunt Van Hunt (born March 8, 1970) is an American singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and record producer. He released his debut album, '' Van Hunt'', in 2004, and a follow-up, ''On the Jungle Floor'', in 2006, both on Capitol Records. He won th ...
, and
Gnarls Barkley Gnarls Barkley are an American soul duo, composed of singer-songwriter CeeLo Green and producer Danger Mouse. They released their debut studio album, ''St. Elsewhere'', in 2006. It contained their hit single "Crazy", which peaked at number two on ...
. In the 1990s, artists like Me'shell Ndegeocello, Brooklyn Funk Essentials and the (predominantly UK-based) acid jazz movement including artists and bands such as
Jamiroquai Jamiroquai () are an English funk and acid jazz band from London. Formed in 1992, they are fronted by vocalist Jay Kay, and were prominent in the London-based funk and acid jazz movement of the 1990s. They built on their acid jazz sound in t ...
, Incognito, Galliano,
Omar ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb ( ar, عمر بن الخطاب, also spelled Omar, ) was the second Rashidun caliph, ruling from August 634 until his assassination in 644. He succeeded Abu Bakr () as the second caliph of the Rashidun Caliphate o ...
, Los Tetas and the
Brand New Heavies The Brand New Heavies is an acid jazz and funk group formed in 1985 in Ealing in west London. Centered around songwriters/multi-instrumentalists Simon Bartholomew and Andrew Levy, the core members of the group since its founding, Brand New He ...
carried on with strong elements of funk. However, they never came close to reaching the commercial success of funk in its heyday—with the exception of Jamiroquai, whose album ''
Travelling Without Moving ''Travelling Without Moving'' is the third studio album by English funk and acid jazz band Jamiroquai, released on 28 August 1996 in Japan, then on 9 September 1996 in the United Kingdom under Sony Soho Square. Front-man Jay Kay intended fo ...
'' sold about 11.5 million units worldwide and remains the best-selling funk album in history. Meanwhile, in Australia and New Zealand, bands playing the pub circuit, such as Supergroove, Skunkhour and the Truth, preserved a more instrumental form of funk. Since the late 1980s hip hop artists have regularly sampled old funk tunes. James Brown is said to be the most sampled artist in the history of hip hop, while
P-Funk Parliament-Funkadelic (abbreviated as P-Funk) is an American music collective of rotating musicians headed by George Clinton, primarily consisting of the funk bands Parliament and Funkadelic, both active since the 1960s. Their distinctive ...
is the second most sampled artist; samples of old
Parliament In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: representing the electorate, making laws, and overseeing the government via hearings and inquiries. ...
and
Funkadelic Funkadelic was an American funk rock band formed in Plainfield, New Jersey in 1968 and active until 1982. The band and its sister act Parliament, both led by George Clinton, pioneered the funk music culture of the 1970s.John, Bush. Funkade ...
songs formed the basis of West Coast
G-funk G-funk, short for gangsta funk, is a sub-genre of gangsta rap that emerged from the West Coast scene in the late 1980s. The genre is heavily influenced by 1970s psychedelic funk (P-funk) sound of artists such as Parliament-Funkadelic. Characte ...
. Original beats that feature funk-styled bass or rhythm guitar riffs are also not uncommon. Dr. Dre (considered the progenitor of the G-funk genre) has freely acknowledged to being heavily influenced by George Clinton's psychedelia: "Back in the 70s that's all people were doing: getting high, wearing
Afro The afro is a hair type created by natural growth of Afro-textured hair, kinky hair, or specifically styled with chemical curling products by individuals with naturally Hair#Curly hair, curly or Hair#Classification systems, straight hair.Gar ...
s, bell-bottoms and listening to Parliament-Funkadelic. That's why I called my album ''
The Chronic ''The Chronic'' is the debut studio album by the American hip hop producer and rapper Dr. Dre. It was released on December 15, 1992, by his record label Death Row Records and distributed by Interscope Records. Recording sessions took place ...
'' and based my music and the concepts like I did: because his shit was a big influence on my music. Very big". Digital Underground was a large contributor to the rebirth of funk in the 1990s by educating their listeners with knowledge about the history of funk and its artists. George Clinton branded Digital Underground as " Sons of the P", as their second full-length release is also titled. DU's first release, Sex Packets, was full of funk samples, with the most widely known " The Humpty Dance" sampling Parliament's "Let's Play House". A very strong funk album of DU's was their 1996 release '' Future Rhythm''. Much of contemporary club dance music, drum and bass in particular has heavily sampled funk drum breaks. Funk is a major element of certain artists identified with the
jam band A jam band is a musical group whose concerts (and live albums) are characterized by lengthy improvisational " jams." These include extended musical improvisation over rhythmic grooves and chord patterns, and long sets of music which often ...
scene of the late 1990s and 2000s. In the late 1990s, the band
Phish Phish is an American rock band formed in Burlington, Vermont, in 1983. The band is known for musical improvisation, extended Jam session#Rock, jams, blending of Music genre, genres, and a dedicated Fandom, fan base. The band consists of guitari ...
developed a live sound called "cow funk" (aka "space funk"), which consisted of extended danceable deep bass grooves, and often emphasized heavy "wah" pedal and other psychedelic effects from the guitar player and layered Clavinet from the keyboard player.
Phish Phish is an American rock band formed in Burlington, Vermont, in 1983. The band is known for musical improvisation, extended Jam session#Rock, jams, blending of Music genre, genres, and a dedicated Fandom, fan base. The band consists of guitari ...
began playing funkier jams in their sets around 1996, and 1998's '' The Story of the Ghost'' was heavily influenced by funk. While Phish's funk was traditional in the sense that it often accented beat 1 of the 4/4 time signature, it was also highly exploratory and involved building jams towards energetic peaks before transitioning into highly composed progressive rock and roll.
Medeski Martin & Wood Medeski Martin & Wood (or MMW) is an American jazz fusion band formed in 1991, consisting of John Medeski on keyboards, Billy Martin on drums, and Chris Wood on bass. The band is influenced by musical traditions including funk and hip hop and ...
,
Robert Randolph & the Family Band Robert Randolph and the Family Band is an American gospel band led by pedal steel guitarist Robert Randolph (Robert Jermaine Randolph, born August 8, 1977, Irvington, New Jersey). NPR has described the band as one with an "irresistible rock 'n ...
,
Galactic Galactic is an American jam band from New Orleans, Louisiana. Origins and background Formed in 1994 as an octet (under the name Galactic Prophylactic) and including singer Chris Lane and guitarist Rob Gowen, the group was soon pared down to a ...
, Widespread Panic, Jam Underground, Diazpora, Soulive, and Karl Denson's Tiny Universe all drew heavily from the funk tradition.
Lettuce Lettuce (''Lactuca sativa'') is an annual plant of the family Asteraceae. It is most often grown as a leaf vegetable, but sometimes for its stem and seeds. Lettuce is most often used for salads, although it is also seen in other kinds of foo ...
, a band of
Berklee College of Music Berklee College of Music is a private music college in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. Known for the study of jazz and modern American music, it also offers college-level cou ...
graduates, was formed in the late 1990s as a pure-funk emergence was being felt through the jam band scene. Many members of the band including keyboardist Neal Evans went on to other projects such as Soulive or the Sam Kininger Band.
Dumpstaphunk Dumpstaphunk is a funk and jam band from New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. Origins and background The quintet's current lineup features Ivan Neville on vocals, B3 and Clav, the double bass attack and soulful voices of Tony Hall and Nick ...
builds upon the New Orleans tradition of funk, with their gritty, low-ended grooves and soulful four-part vocals. Formed in 2003 to perform at the
New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival (commonly called Jazz Fest or Jazzfest) is an annual celebration of local music and culture held at the Fair Grounds Race Course in New Orleans, New Orleans, Louisiana. Jazz Fest attracts thousands of vi ...
, the band features keyboardist
Ivan Neville Ivan Neville (born August 19, 1959) is an American multi-instrumentalist musician, singer, and songwriter. He is the son of Aaron Neville and nephew to members of The Neville Brothers. Career He has released four solo albums and had a Top 30 ...
and guitarist Ian Neville of the famous Neville family, with two bass players and female funk drummer Nikki Glaspie (formerly of
Beyoncé Knowles Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter ( ; born September 4, 1981) is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. Beyoncé's boundary-pushing artistry and vocals have made her the most influential female musician of the 21st century, according to ...
's world touring band, as well as the Sam Kininger Band), who joined the group in 2011. Since the mid-1990s the nu-funk or funk revivalist scene, centered on the deep funk collectors scene, is producing new material influenced by the sounds of rare funk 45s. Labels include Desco, Soul Fire, Daptone, Timmion, Neapolitan, Bananarama, Kay-Dee, and Tramp. These labels often release on 45 rpm records. Although specializing in music for rare funk DJs, there has been some crossover into the mainstream music industry, such as Sharon Jones' 2005 appearance on ''
Late Night with Conan O'Brien ''Late Night with Conan O'Brien'' is an American late-night talk show hosted by Conan O'Brien. NBC aired 2,725 episodes from September 13, 1993, to February 20, 2009. The show featured varied comedic material, celebrity interviews, and musi ...
''. Those who mix acid jazz,
acid house Acid house (also simply known as just "acid") is a subgenre of house music developed around the mid-1980s by DJs from Chicago. The style is defined primarily by the squelching sounds and basslines of the Roland TB-303 electronic bass synthes ...
,
trip hop Trip hop (sometimes used synonymously with " downtempo") is a musical genre that originated in the early 1990s in the United Kingdom, especially Bristol. It has been described as a psychedelic fusion of hip hop and electronica with slow temp ...
, and other genres with funk include Tom Tom Club, Brainticket,
Groove Armada Groove Armada are an English electronic music duo, composed of Andy Cato and Tom Findlay. They achieved chart success with their singles " At the River", " I See You Baby" and " Superstylin'". The duo have released nine studio albums, four of ...
, et al. Funk has also been incorporated into
modern R&B Contemporary R&B (or simply R&B) is a popular music genre that combines rhythm and blues with elements of pop, soul, funk, hip hop, and electronic music. The genre features a distinctive record production style, drum machine-backed rhyt ...
music by many female singers such as Beyoncé with her 2003 hit "
Crazy in Love "Crazy in Love" is a song recorded by American singer Beyoncé, featuring a rap verse and ad-libs from her future husband Jay-Z from her debut solo studio album '' Dangerously in Love'' (2003). The song was released as her official debut singl ...
" (which samples
the Chi-Lites The Chi-Lites (, ) are an American R&B/soul vocal quartet from Chicago, Illinois, United States. Forming at Chicago's Hyde Park High School in 1959, The group's original lineup consisted of singers Robert Lester, Eugene Record, Creadel Jone ...
' "Are You My Woman"),
Mariah Carey Mariah Carey (; born March 27, 1969) is an American singer, songwriter, actress, and record producer. Referred to as the " Songbird Supreme", she is noted for her five-octave vocal range, melismatic singing style and signature use of the ...
in 2005 with " Get Your Number" (which samples " Just an Illusion" by British band
Imagination Imagination is the production or simulation of novel objects, sensations, and ideas in the mind without any immediate input of the senses. Stefan Szczelkun characterises it as the forming of experiences in one's mind, which can be re-creations o ...
), Jennifer Lopez in 2005 with "
Get Right Christopher Alesund (born 29 May 1990), better known as GeT_RiGhT, is a Swedish '' Counter-Strike'' player who is currently a streamer for Dignitas. During his time as a member of Ninjas in Pyjamas, he was considered one of the best ''Counter-S ...
" (which samples
Maceo Parker Maceo Parker (; born February 14, 1943) is an American funk and soul jazz saxophonist, best known for his work with James Brown in the 1960s, Parliament-Funkadelic in the 1970s and Prince in the 2000s. Parker was a prominent soloist on many o ...
's " Soul Power '74" horn sound),
Amerie Amerie Mi Marie Nicholson ( Rogers; born January 12, 1980) is an American singer. Born in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, she gained an appreciation of the classical arts from her mother Mi Suk Rogers and of music from her father Charles Rogers, and ...
with her song " 1 Thing" (which samples the Meters' "Oh, Calcutta!"), and also
Tamar Braxton Tamar Estine Braxton (born March 17, 1977) is an American singer and television personality. Braxton began her career in 1990 as a founding member of The Braxtons, an R&B singing group formed with her sisters. The Braxtons released their debut a ...
in 2013 with " The One" (which samples " Juicy Fruit" by
Mtume Mtume (pronounced ''em-tu-may'') was an American funk and soul group that rose to prominence during the early 1980s and had several R&B hits during its career. Its founder, former percussionist James Mtume, previously played and toured with M ...
). In 2005, Defiance Douglass, a vocalist, musician, producer & songwriter (commonly known as "The Dark Soul of Funk/Rock"), formed Exiles of the Nation (also known as EOTN) in Atlanta, Georgia, with a new brand of art/psychedelic Funk/Rock titled "ExileMusik", which incorporates elements of other genres as well. Beginning in 2006, Exiles of the Nation have released 19 albums, the latest being 2022's "The Obstacle Curse". Defiance Douglass/Exiles of the Nation are also a part of the P-Funk collective. Their 2nd album released in 2008, "Escape From Trap City", is usually regarded as their most infamous. Their 2021 album, "Liquidation", also made the Top 10 of several "Best of 2021 Funk Albums" lists.


2010s funktronica

During the 2000s and early 2010s, some punk funk bands such as Out Hud and Mongolian MonkFish performed in the
indie rock Indie rock is a Music subgenre, subgenre of rock music that originated in the United States, United Kingdom and New Zealand from the 1970s to the 1980s. Originally used to describe independent record labels, the term became associated with the mu ...
scene. Indie band
Rilo Kiley Rilo Kiley ( ) was an American indie rock band based in Los Angeles, California. Formed in 1998, the band consisted of Jenny Lewis, Blake Sennett, Pierre de Reeder, and Dave Rock. The group released their debut album '' Take-Offs and Landings ...
, in keeping with their tendency to explore a variety of rockish styles, incorporated funk into their song " The Moneymaker" on the album '' Under the Blacklight''. Prince, with his later albums, gave a rebirth to the funk sound with songs like "The Everlasting Now", " Musicology", "Ol' Skool Company", and " Black Sweat".
Particle In the physical sciences, a particle (or corpuscule in older texts) is a small localized object which can be described by several physical or chemical properties, such as volume, density, or mass. They vary greatly in size or quantity, fro ...
, for instance, is part of a scene which combined the elements of digital music made with computers, synthesizers, and samples with analog instruments, sounds, and improvisational and compositional elements of funk.


Derivatives

From the early 1970s onwards, funk has developed various subgenres. While George Clinton and the Parliament were making a harder variation of funk, bands such as
Kool and the Gang Kool & the Gang is an American R&B/ soul/funk band formed in Jersey City, New Jersey, in 1964 by brothers Robert "Kool" Bell and Ronald Bell, with Dennis "Dee Tee" Thomas, Robert "Spike" Mickens, Charles Smith, George Brown, and Ricky West. ...
,
Ohio Players Ohio Players is an American funk band, most popular in the 1970s. They are best known for their songs "Fire" and "Love Rollercoaster", and for their erotic album covers that featured nude or nearly nude women. Many of the women were models feat ...
and
Earth, Wind and Fire Earth, Wind & Fire (EW&F or EWF) is an American band whose music spans the genres of jazz, R&B, soul, funk, disco, pop, big band, Latin, and Afro pop. They are among the best-selling bands of all time, with sales of over 90 million r ...
were making disco-influenced funk music.


Funk rock

Funk rock (also written as ''funk-rock'' or ''funk/rock'') fuses funk and rock elements. Its earliest incarnation was heard in the late '60s through the mid-'70s by musicians such as Jimi Hendrix,
Frank Zappa Frank Vincent Zappa (December 21, 1940 – December 4, 1993) was an American musician, composer, and bandleader. His work is characterized by nonconformity, free-form improvisation, sound experiments, musical virtuosity and satire of A ...
,
Gary Wright Gary Malcolm Wright (born April 26, 1943) is an American musician and composer best known for his 1976 hit songs " Dream Weaver" and " Love Is Alive", and for his role in helping establish the synthesizer as a leading instrument in rock and po ...
,
David Bowie David Robert Jones (8 January 194710 January 2016), known professionally as David Bowie ( ), was an English singer-songwriter and actor. A leading figure in the music industry, he is regarded as one of the most influential musicians of the ...
,
Mother's Finest Mother's Finest is an American rock band founded in Atlanta, Georgia, by the vocal duo of Joyce "Baby Jean" Kennedy and Glenn "Doc" Murdock in 1970 when the pair met up with guitarist Gary "Moses Mo" Moore and bassist Jerry "Wyzard" Seay. Thei ...
, and
Funkadelic Funkadelic was an American funk rock band formed in Plainfield, New Jersey in 1968 and active until 1982. The band and its sister act Parliament, both led by George Clinton, pioneered the funk music culture of the 1970s.John, Bush. Funkade ...
on their earlier albums. Many instruments may be incorporated into funk rock, but the overall sound is defined by a definitive
bass Bass or Basses may refer to: Fish * Bass (fish), various saltwater and freshwater species Music * Bass (sound), describing low-frequency sound or one of several instruments in the bass range: ** Bass (instrument), including: ** Acoustic bass gu ...
or drum beat and
electric guitar An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar (however combinations of the two - a semi-acoustic guitar and an electric acoustic gu ...
s. The bass and drum rhythms are influenced by funk music but with more intensity, while the guitar can be funk-or-rock-influenced, usually with
distortion In signal processing, distortion is the alteration of the original shape (or other characteristic) of a signal. In communications and electronics it means the alteration of the waveform of an information-bearing signal, such as an audio s ...
.
Prince A prince is a Monarch, male ruler (ranked below a king, grand prince, and grand duke) or a male member of a monarch's or former monarch's family. ''Prince'' is also a title of nobility (often highest), often hereditary title, hereditary, in s ...
, Jesse Johnson,
Red Hot Chili Peppers Red Hot Chili Peppers are an American rock band formed in Los Angeles in 1983, comprising vocalist Anthony Kiedis, bassist Flea, drummer Chad Smith, and guitarist John Frusciante. Their music incorporates elements of alternative rock, f ...
and
Fishbone Fishbone is an American rock band formed in Los Angeles in 1979, that plays a fusion of ska, punk, funk, metal, reggae, and soul. AllMusic has described the group as "one of the most distinctive and eclectic alternative rock bands of the l ...
are major artists in funk rock.


Avant-funk

The term "avant-funk" has been used to describe acts who combined funk with
art rock Art rock is a subgenre of rock music that generally reflects a challenging or avant-garde approach to rock, or which makes use of modernist, experimental, or unconventional elements. Art rock aspires to elevate rock from entertainment to an art ...
's concerns. Simon Frith described the style as an application of
progressive rock Progressive rock (shortened as prog rock or simply prog; sometimes conflated with art rock) is a broad genre of rock music that developed in the United Kingdom and United States through the mid- to late 1960s, peaking in the early 1970s. Init ...
mentality to rhythm rather than melody and harmony.
Simon Reynolds Simon Reynolds (born 19 June 1963) is an English music journalist and author who began his professional career on the staff of ''Melody Maker'' in the mid-1980s. He has since gone on to freelance and publish a number of full-length books on musi ...
characterized avant-funk as a kind of
psychedelia Psychedelia refers to the psychedelic subculture of the 1960s and the psychedelic experience. This includes psychedelic art, psychedelic music and style of dress during that era. This was primarily generated by people who used psychedelic dr ...
in which "oblivion was to be attained not through rising above the body, rather through immersion in the physical, self loss through animalism." Acts in the genre include German
krautrock Krautrock (also called , German for ) is a broad genre of experimental rock that developed in West Germany in the late 1960s and early 1970s among artists who blended elements of psychedelic rock, avant-garde composition, and electronic music, a ...
band Can, American funk artists
Sly Stone Sylvester Stewart (born March 15, 1943), better known by his stage name Sly Stone, is an American musician, songwriter, and record producer who is most famous for his role as frontman for Sly and the Family Stone, playing a critical role in the ...
and George Clinton, and a wave of early 1980s UK and US artists (including
Public Image Ltd Public Image Ltd (abbreviated and stylized as PiL) are an English post-punk band (and incorporated limited company) formed by singer John Lydon (previously known as the singer of Sex Pistols), guitarist Keith Levene, bassist Jah Wobble, and ...
,
Talking Heads Talking Heads were an American rock band formed in 1975 in New York City and active until 1991.Talkin ...
,
the Pop Group The Pop Group are an English rock band formed in Bristol in 1977 by vocalist Mark Stewart, guitarist John Waddington, bassist Simon Underwood, guitarist/saxophonist Gareth Sager, and drummer Bruce Smith. Their work in the late 1970s cross ...
,
Gang of Four The Gang of Four () was a Maoist political faction composed of four Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials. They came to prominence during the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976) and were later charged with a series of treasonous crimes. The ...
,
Bauhaus The Staatliches Bauhaus (), commonly known as the Bauhaus (), was a German art school operational from 1919 to 1933 that combined crafts and the fine arts.Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 4th edn., 2 ...
, Cabaret Voltaire, Defunkt,
A Certain Ratio A Certain Ratio (abbreviated as ACR) are an English post-punk band formed in 1977 in Flixton, Greater Manchester by Peter Terrell (guitar, electronics) and Simon Topping (vocals, trumpet), with additional members Jez Kerr (bass, vocals), Martin ...
, and 23 Skidoo) who embraced black dance music styles such as disco and funk. The artists of the late 1970s New York no wave scene also explored avant-funk, influenced by figures such as
Ornette Coleman Randolph Denard Ornette Coleman (March 9, 1930 – June 11, 2015) was an American jazz saxophonist, violinist, trumpeter, and composer known as a principal founder of the free jazz genre, a term derived from his 1960 album '' Free Jazz: A Col ...
. Reynolds noted these artists' preoccupations with issues such as
alienation Alienation may refer to: * Alienation (property law), the legal transfer of title of ownership to another party * ''Alienation'' (video game), a 2016 PlayStation 4 video game * "Alienation" (speech), an inaugural address by Jimmy Reid as Rector ...
,
repression Repression may refer to: * Memory inhibition, the ability to filter irrelevant memories from attempts to recall * Political repression, the oppression or persecution of an individual or group for political reasons * Psychological repression, the p ...
and technocracy of Western
modernity Modernity, a topic in the humanities and social sciences, is both a historical period (the modern era) and the ensemble of particular socio-cultural norms, attitudes and practices that arose in the wake of the Renaissancein the "Age of Reas ...
.


Go-go

Go-go originated in the Washington, D.C. area with which it remains associated, along with other spots in the Mid-Atlantic. Inspired by singers such as
Chuck Brown Charles Louis Brown (August 22, 1936 – May 16, 2012) was an American guitarist, bandleader and singer known as " The Godfather of Go-Go". Go-go is a subgenre of funk music developed around the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area in the mid-1 ...
, the "Godfather of Go-go", it is a blend of funk,
rhythm and blues Rhythm and blues, frequently abbreviated as R&B or R'n'B, is a Music genre, genre of popular music that originated in African-American communities in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed p ...
, and early hip hop, with a focus on lo-fi percussion instruments and in-person jamming in place of dance tracks. As such, it is primarily a dance music with an emphasis on live audience
call and response Call and response is a form of interaction between a speaker and an audience in which the speaker's statements ("calls") are punctuated by responses from the listeners. This form is also used in music, where it falls under the general category of ...
. Go-go rhythms are also incorporated into street percussion.


Boogie

Boogie is an electronic music mainly influenced by funk and post-disco. The minimalist approach of boogie, consisting of synthesizers and keyboards, helped to establish electro and house music. Boogie, unlike electro, emphasizes the slapping techniques of bass guitar but also bass synthesizers. Artists include Vicky "D", Komiko,
Peech Boys The Peech Boys, also known as the New York Citi Peech Boys or NYC Peech Boys, were a band that comprised Bernard Fowler, Steven Brown, Robert Kasper, Darryl Short, Larry Levan and Michael de Benedictus. The group formed at the Paradise Garage, ...
, Kashif, and later Evelyn King.


Electro funk

Electro funk is a hybrid of electronic music and funk. It essentially follows the same form as funk, and retains funk's characteristics, but is made entirely (or partially) with a use of electronic instruments such as the TR-808.
Vocoder A vocoder (, a portmanteau of ''voice'' and ''encoder'') is a category of speech coding that analyzes and synthesizes the human voice signal for audio data compression, multiplexing, voice encryption or voice transformation. The vocoder was ...
s or
talkbox A talk box (also spelled talkbox and talk-box) is an effects unit that allows musicians to modify the sound of a musical instrument by shaping the frequency content of the sound and to apply speech sounds (in the same way as singing) onto the sou ...
es were commonly implemented to transform the vocals. The pioneering electro band Zapp commonly used such instruments in their music.
Bootsy Collins William Earl "Bootsy" Collins (born October 26, 1951) is an American bass guitarist and singer. Rising to prominence with James Brown in the early 1970s, and later with Parliament-Funkadelic, Collins established himself as one of the leading ...
also began to incorporate a more electronic sound on later solo albums. Other artists include
Herbie Hancock Herbert Jeffrey Hancock (born April 12, 1940) is an American jazz pianist, keyboardist, bandleader, and composer. Hancock started his career with trumpeter Donald Byrd's group. He shortly thereafter joined the Miles Davis Quintet, where he hel ...
,
Afrika Bambaataa Lance Taylor (born on April 17, 1957), also known as Afrika Bambaataa (), is an American DJ, rapper, and producer from the South Bronx, New York. He is notable for releasing a series of genre-defining electro tracks in the 1980s that influence ...
,
Egyptian Lover Gregory James Broussard (born August 31, 1963), better known by his stage name Egyptian Lover, is an American musician, vocalist, producer and DJ, and was a part of the L.A. dance music, electro, and rap scene in the early 1980s. History Th ...
, Vaughan Mason & Crew, Midnight Star and Cybotron.


Funk metal

Funk metal (sometimes typeset differently such as ''funk-metal'') is a
fusion genre A music genre is a conventional category that identifies some pieces of music as belonging to a shared tradition or set of conventions. It is to be distinguished from ''musical form'' and musical style, although in practice these terms are some ...
of
music Music is generally defined as the The arts, art of arranging sound to create some combination of Musical form, form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise Musical expression, expressive content. Exact definition of music, definitions of mu ...
which emerged in the 1980s, as part of the
alternative metal Alternative metal (also known as alt-metal) is a genre of heavy metal music that combines heavy metal with influences from alternative rock and other genres not normally associated with metal. Alternative metal bands are often characterized by ...
movement. It typically incorporates elements of funk and heavy metal (often
thrash metal Thrash metal (or simply thrash) is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal music characterized by its overall aggression and often fast tempo.Kahn-Harris, Keith, ''Extreme Metal: Music and Culture on the Edge'', pp. 2–3, 9. Oxford: Berg, 2007, . ...
), and in some cases other styles, such as punk and
experimental An experiment is a procedure carried out to support or refute a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome occurs when ...
music. It features hard-driving heavy metal
guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected string ...
riffs, the pounding
bass Bass or Basses may refer to: Fish * Bass (fish), various saltwater and freshwater species Music * Bass (sound), describing low-frequency sound or one of several instruments in the bass range: ** Bass (instrument), including: ** Acoustic bass gu ...
rhythms characteristic of funk, and sometimes hip hop-style
rhyme A rhyme is a repetition of similar sounds (usually, the exact same phonemes) in the final stressed syllables and any following syllables of two or more words. Most often, this kind of perfect rhyming is consciously used for a musical or aesthetic ...
s into an
alternative rock Alternative rock (also known as alternative music, alt-rock or simply alternative) is a category of rock music that evolved from the independent music underground of the 1970s. Alternative rock acts achieved mainstream success in the 1990s w ...
approach to songwriting. A primary example is the all-African-American rock band
Living Colour Living Colour is an American rock band from New York City, formed in 1984. The band currently consists of guitarist Vernon Reid, lead vocalist Corey Glover, drummer Will Calhoun and bassist Doug Wimbish (who replaced Muzz Skillings in 1992 ...
, who have been said to be "funk-metal pioneers" by ''
Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first known for its co ...
''. During the late 1980s and early 1990s, the style was most prevalent in
California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the ...
– particularly
Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the wor ...
and
San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
.


G-funk

G-funk is a
fusion genre A music genre is a conventional category that identifies some pieces of music as belonging to a shared tradition or set of conventions. It is to be distinguished from ''musical form'' and musical style, although in practice these terms are some ...
of music which combines gangsta rap and funk. It is generally considered to have been invented by West Coast rappers and made famous by Dr. Dre. It incorporates multi-layered and melodic synthesizers, slow hypnotic grooves, a deep bass, background female vocals, the extensive sampling of P-Funk tunes, and a high-pitched portamento saw wave synthesizer lead. Unlike other earlier rap acts that also utilized funk samples (such as
EPMD EPMD is an American hip hop duo from Brentwood, New York. The duo's name is a concatenation of the members' names "E" and "PMD" or an acronym for "Erick and Parrish Making Dollars", referring to its members: emcees Erick Sermon ("E" a.k.a. ...
and
the Bomb Squad The Bomb Squad were an American hip hop production team known for its work with hip hop group Public Enemy. The Bomb Squad is noted for its dense, distinct, innovative production style, often utilizing dozens of samples on just one track. The ...
), G-funk often used fewer, unaltered samples per song.


Timba funk

Timba Timba is a Cuban genre of music based on Cuban '' son'' with '' salsa'', American Funk/R&B and the strong influence of Afro-Cuban folkloric music. Timba rhythm sections differ from their salsa counterparts, because timba emphasizes the bass d ...
is a form of funky Cuban popular dance music. By 1990, several Cuban bands had incorporated elements of funk and hip-hop into their arrangements, and expanded upon the instrumentation of the traditional conjunto with an American drum set, saxophones and a two-keyboard format. Timba bands like La Charanga Habanera or Bamboleo often have horns or other instruments playing short parts of tunes by
Earth, Wind and Fire Earth, Wind & Fire (EW&F or EWF) is an American band whose music spans the genres of jazz, R&B, soul, funk, disco, pop, big band, Latin, and Afro pop. They are among the best-selling bands of all time, with sales of over 90 million r ...
,
Kool and the Gang Kool & the Gang is an American R&B/ soul/funk band formed in Jersey City, New Jersey, in 1964 by brothers Robert "Kool" Bell and Ronald Bell, with Dennis "Dee Tee" Thomas, Robert "Spike" Mickens, Charles Smith, George Brown, and Ricky West. ...
or other U.S. funk bands. While many funk motifs exhibit a clave-based structure, they are created intuitively, without a conscious intent of aligning the various parts to a guide-pattern. Timba incorporates funk motifs into an overt and intentional clave structure.


Funk jam

Funk jam is a
fusion genre A music genre is a conventional category that identifies some pieces of music as belonging to a shared tradition or set of conventions. It is to be distinguished from ''musical form'' and musical style, although in practice these terms are some ...
of music which emerged in the 1990s. It typically incorporates elements of funk and often exploratory guitar, along with extended cross genre improvisations; often including elements of
jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a majo ...
, ambient,
electronic Electronic may refer to: *Electronics, the science of how to control electric energy in semiconductor * ''Electronics'' (magazine), a defunct American trade journal *Electronic storage, the storage of data using an electronic device *Electronic co ...
, Americana, and hip hop including improvised lyrics.
Phish Phish is an American rock band formed in Burlington, Vermont, in 1983. The band is known for musical improvisation, extended Jam session#Rock, jams, blending of Music genre, genres, and a dedicated Fandom, fan base. The band consists of guitari ...
, Soul Rebels Brass Band,
Galactic Galactic is an American jam band from New Orleans, Louisiana. Origins and background Formed in 1994 as an octet (under the name Galactic Prophylactic) and including singer Chris Lane and guitarist Rob Gowen, the group was soon pared down to a ...
, and Soulive are all examples of funk bands that play funk jam.


Social impact


Women and funk

Despite funk's popularity in modern music, few people have examined the work of funk women. Notable funk women include Chaka Khan, Labelle, Brides of Funkenstein,
Klymaxx Klymaxx is an American all-female pop Pop or POP may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Music * Pop music, a musical genre Artists * POP, a Japanese idol group now known as Gang Parade * Pop!, a UK pop group * Pop! featuring Angie Hart ...
,
Mother's Finest Mother's Finest is an American rock band founded in Atlanta, Georgia, by the vocal duo of Joyce "Baby Jean" Kennedy and Glenn "Doc" Murdock in 1970 when the pair met up with guitarist Gary "Moses Mo" Moore and bassist Jerry "Wyzard" Seay. Thei ...
,
Lyn Collins Gloria Lavern Collins (June 12, 1948 – March 13, 2005), better known as Lyn Collins, was an American soul singer best known for working with James Brown in the 1970s and for the influential 1972 funk single, " Think (About It)". A favorit ...
,
Betty Davis Betty Davis (born Betty Gray Mabry; July 26, 1944 – February 9, 2022) was an American singer, songwriter, and model. She was known for her controversial sexually-oriented lyrics and performance style, and was the second wife of trumpeter Mile ...
and
Teena Marie Mary Christine Brockert (March 5, 1956 – December 26, 2010), known professionally as Teena Marie, was an American singer-songwriter, musician, composer, arranger, and producer. She was known by her childhood nickname Tina before taking the sta ...
. As cultural critic Cheryl Keyes explains in her essay "She Was Too Black for Rock and Too Hard for Soul: (Re)discovering the Musical Career of Betty Mabry Davis," most of the scholarship around funk has focused on the cultural work of men. She states that "Betty Davis is an artist whose name has gone unheralded as a pioneer in the annals of funk and rock. Most writing on these musical genres has traditionally placed male artists like Jimi Hendrix, George Clinton (of Parliament-Funkadelic), and bassist Larry Graham as trendsetters in the shaping of a rock music sensibility." In ''The Feminist Funk Power of Betty Davis and Renée Stout'', Nikki A. Greene notes that Davis' provocative and controversial style helped her rise to popularity in the 1970s as she focused on sexually motivated, self-empowered subject matter. Furthermore, this affected the young artist's ability to draw large audiences and commercial success. Greene also notes that Davis was never made an official spokesperson or champion for the civil rights and feminist movements of the time, although more recently her work has become a symbol of sexual liberation for women of color. Davis' song "If I'm In Luck I Just Might Get Picked Up", on her self-titled debut album, sparked controversy, and was banned by the Detroit
NAACP The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is a civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E.&nb ...
. Maureen Mahan, a musicologist and anthropologist, examines Davis' impact on the music industry and the American public in her article "They Say She's Different: Race, Gender, Genre, and the Liberated Black Femininity of Betty Davis". Laina Dawes, the author of ''What Are You Doing Here: A Black Woman's Life and Liberation in Heavy Metal'', believes
respectability politics Respectability politics or the politics of respectability is a form of moralistic discourse used by some prominent figures, leaders or academics who are members of various marginalized groups to consciously set aside and undermine cultural and mo ...
is the reason artists like Davis do not get the same recognition as their male counterparts: "I blame what I call respectability politics as part of the reason the funk-rock some of the women from the '70s aren't better known. Despite the importance of their music and presence, many of the funk-rock females represented the aggressive behavior and sexuality that many people were not comfortable with." According to Francesca T. Royster, in Rickey Vincent's book ''Funk: The Music, The People, and The Rhythm of The One'', he analyzes the impact of Labelle but only in limited sections. Royster criticizes Vincent's analysis of the group, stating: "It is a shame, then, that Vincent gives such minimal attention to Labelle's performances in his study. This reflects, unfortunately, a still consistent sexism that shapes the evaluation of funk music. In ''Funk'', Vincent's analysis of Labelle is brief—sharing a single paragraph with the Pointer Sisters in his three-page sub chapter, 'Funky Women.' He writes that while '
Lady Marmalade "Lady Marmalade" is a song written by Bob Crewe and Kenny Nolan, originally for Nolan's disco group. The song is famous for the repeated refrain of " ''Voulez-vous coucher avec moi''?" in French as part of the chorus, a sexually suggestive line ...
' 'blew the lid off of the standards of sexual innuendo and skyrocketed the group's star status,' the band's 'glittery image slipped into the disco undertow and was ultimately wasted as the trio broke up in search of solo status" (Vincent, 1996, 192). Many female artists who are considered to be in the genre of funk, also share songs in the disco,
soul In many religious and philosophical traditions, there is a belief that a soul is "the immaterial aspect or essence of a human being". Etymology The Modern English noun '':wikt:soul, soul'' is derived from Old English ''sāwol, sāwel''. The ea ...
, and R&B genres; Labelle falls into this category of women who are split among genres due to a critical view of music theory and the history of sexism in the United States. In recent years, artists like
Janelle Monáe Janelle Monáe Robinson (; born December 1, 1985) is an American singer, rapper and actress. She is signed to Atlantic Records, as well as to her own imprint, the Wondaland Arts Society. Monáe has received eight Grammy Award nominations. Mon� ...
have opened the doors for more scholarship and analysis on the female impact on the funk music genre. Monáe's style bends concepts of
gender Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to femininity and masculinity and differentiating between them. Depending on the context, this may include sex-based social structures (i.e. gender roles) and gender identity. Most cultures us ...
,
sexuality Human sexuality is the way people experience and express themselves sexually. This involves biological, psychological, physical, erotic, emotional, social, or spiritual feelings and behaviors. Because it is a broad term, which has varied wi ...
, and self-expression in a manner similar to the way some male pioneers in funk broke boundaries. Her albums center around Afro-futuristic concepts, centering on elements of female and black empowerment and visions of a
dystopia A dystopia (from Ancient Greek δυσ- "bad, hard" and τόπος "place"; alternatively cacotopiaCacotopia (from κακός ''kakos'' "bad") was the term used by Jeremy Bentham in his 1818 Plan of Parliamentary Reform (Works, vol. 3, p. 493). ...
n future. In his article, "Janelle Monáe and Afro-sonic Feminist Funk", Matthew Valnes writes that Monae's involvement in the funk genre is juxtaposed with the traditional view of funk as a male-centered genre. Valnes acknowledges that funk is male-dominated, but provides insight to the societal circumstances that led to this situation. Monáe's influences include her mentor Prince, Funkadelic,
Lauryn Hill Lauryn Noelle Hill (born May 26, 1975) is an American singer, songwriter, rapper, and record producer. She is often regarded as one of the greatest rappers of all time, as well as being one of the most influential musicians of her generation. ...
, and other funk and R&B artists, but according to Emily Lordi, " ettyDavis is seldom listed among Janelle Monáe's many influences, and certainly the younger singer's high-tech concepts, virtuosic performances, and meticulously produced songs are far removed from Davis's proto-punk aesthetic. But... like Davis, she also is closely linked with a visionary male mentor (Prince). The title of Monáe's 2013 album, ''The Electric Lady'', alludes to Hendrix's ''Electric Ladyland'', but it also implicitly cites the coterie of women that inspired Hendrix himself: that group, called the Cosmic Ladies or Electric Ladies, was together led by Hendrix's lover Devon Wilson and Betty Davis."


See also

* Chanking


References


Further reading

* Danielsen, Anne (2006). ''Presence and pleasure: The funk grooves of James Brown and Parliament''. Wesleyan University Press. * * * {{Authority control 20th-century music genres African-American cultural history African-American music American styles of music Popular music 1960s in music 1970s in music 1980s in music 1970s fads and trends