Breakbeat
A breakbeat is a rhythm that is used in electronic music .
Excerpts of real drum rhythms ( samples ), which mostly come from breaks in radio songs, are played as a loop . Often several recordings are chopped up into fractions of bars or into long excerpts and placed on top of one another in a different sequence ( slicing ). Especially in jungle productions, the playback speed is increased drastically and the samples are provided with numerous effects.
The breakbeat has its origins in New York in the 1970s . In a disco, Kool DJ Herc seamlessly mixed two breaks designed as drum solos. This experiment was the root of hip-hop , drum and bass and what is now known as breakbeat.
Breakbeat also describes the musical genres in which this type of rhythm is used. The term is often used implicitly as a generic term for styles such as drum and bass, jungle , hardcore , 2 step and sometimes also big beat . But it also appears explicitly as with breakcore .
The most popular breakbeats include the Amen and Funky Drummer Break, both of which have been used on thousands of tracks, especially drum and bass.
The city of London is considered a center of innovation for modern breakbeat music .
Popular sample sources for breakbeats
- Amen, Brother - The Winstons
- Apache - Incredible Bongo Band
- Funky drummer - James Brown
- Impeach the President - The Honey Drippers
- It's a New Day - Skull Snaps
- Synthetic Substitution - Melvin Bliss
- Think (About It) - Lyn Collins
- When the Levee Breaks - Led Zeppelin