Hip Hop is a culture, or what people liked to call "subculture". Hip-Hop started in he mid-70s in NYC, New York. The big "hip hop" movement started at The Bronx by DJ Kool Herc (real name Clive Campbell) which came from Jamaica and got his records with him to the US.

Herc's idea was to get the "Soundsystem" style, which was known in Jamaica and do it in a local different style, although the base for the whole Soundsystem was the same: A big street party with microphones, speakers and turntables.

There are Four Elements of Hip Hop, but the two most important, popular and relevant these days are DJing & Mcing:

1. Deejaying – The DJ with two turntables "breakin'" the old funk records and loop them. The first came from Jamaica and is Herc. For being DJ that you need a pair of turntables – which is a most. A mixer is necessary these days, but back in the 70's a lot of hip hop DJ's were deejaying without any audio mixer. The DJ is the main man for the street party or any other party. Later DJs found the "scratching" techniques and been perfecting it until this days under the term "turntablism"

2. MCing – The MC came from the same place: Jamaica. Kool Herc was actually the first known MC and DJ. But somehow it became too much and he had to get an MC, and he was doing the DJ Part. The MC duty were to shout, to "get the party going" he is the Master of Ceremonies, classic MCing started as shouts and screams to make the crown get crazy: "Blow Your Hands in the air, and wave 'em like you don't care", or "Everybody scream!" , "Say Aaaaaaahhh!". Modern MCing from this kind are for example "The roof, the roof is on fire! We don't need no water..". Later came the the type of Emceeing known to you today as "Rap" - what you can hear in rap music this days.

In these days hip hop is a mainstream music genre all over the world. For example: Glastonbury Festival opened with rapper Jay-Z, which made uproariousness after Noel Gallagher (Oasis) told hip hop isn't got no place in the festival. Also in the last few years - US rappers like Lil' Wayne and 50 Cent sold over 1 million of records in a week.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Hip Hop Culture