Turntablism

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Under turntablism refers to the manipulation of records with a turntable , so that the sounds of the record in a completely new context be assembled. This term was coined in 1995 by DJ Babu from the Beat Junkies from Los Angeles .

History and technology

At the "Neue Musik Berlin 1930" festival, Paul Hindemith was already experimenting with records with his own recordings that he had mixed together. While this initially remained an isolated case, turntables were used as musical instruments by other musicians in the late 1940s . Artists and composers such as Marcel Duchamp , John Cage or Edgar Varèse and especially the representatives of Musique concrète experimented with turntables.

Turntablism is a further development and refinement of the techniques known in hip-hop since the invention by musicians such as Kool DJ Herc , Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five , Afrika Bambaataa and Grandwizard Theodore .

Basically, two areas of specialization have developed in turntablism:

These areas were promoted by many artists, of which the Californian formation ISP (Invisibl Skratch Piklz / members a.o .: D-Styles, DJ Qbert , Flare, MixMasterMike, Shortkut, Yogafrog) as one of the most important motors of the scene, if not even as the main driving force. They developed various techniques and had an enormous and profound influence on the “young” (scratching) scene.

The masters of beatjuggling include: B. The X-Ecutioners (Roc Raida, Rob Swift, Total Eclipse, Mista Sinista)

Important turntablism crews today are Ned Hoddings, Birdy Nam Nam, C2C, Lordz of Fitness and many more. Mainly inspired by these scratch musicians, the genre is developing more and more towards innovative musicality and the record player as a real musical instrument, which stands in contrast to the often "unmusical" and technical battle scene. More recent developments (such as the mp3 compatibility of turntables, effects devices, loop stations, etc.) make it possible to circumvent the "restrictions" of the analog turntable through the above. However, the spirits of many turntablists are divided on this: some are considered to be advocates of vinyl and the analog, others are open-minded towards digitization and yet others try to reconcile these two sides. In general it can be said that the "scratch industry" and numerous artists achieve lower profits through these innovations.

Notable records of these developments are "Scetchbook" by Ricci Rucker & Mike Boogie, " Phantazmagorea " by D-Styles , the " Birdy Nam Nam " album by the crew of the same name and " Table Manners " by Noisy Stylus as well as " Wave Twisters " by DJ Qbert.

Aside from hip-hop, turntables are mainly used in improvised and experimental music today. Well-known representatives of this direction are Otomo Yoshihide , Christian Marclay , eRikm , dieb13 , the Institute for Fine Motor Skills and Philip Jeck .

The S notation created an interface between the classical notation and turntablism. This notation makes it possible to record all movements that are made on the turntable and mixer, in order to e.g. B. to play together with other "classic" instruments.

literature

  • Kodwo Eshun : Brighter Than the Sun: Adventures in Sonic Fiction. Berlin: ID Verlag 1999. ISBN 3-89408-085-X
  • Ralf Niemczyk, Torsten Schmidt: The DJ manual. Second edition. Cologne: Kiepenheuer & Witsch 2000. (= KiWi 573). ISBN 3-462-02909-6
  • Ulf Poschardt : DJ Culture. Disc jockeys and pop culture. Revised and expanded new edition. Reinbek near Hamburg: Rowohlt Taschenbuch 1997. ISBN 3-499-60227-X
  • Christoph Hein: The turntable as a musical instrument. In: PopScriptum 7 - Music and Machine , published by the Research Center for Popular Music at the Humboldt University in Berlin. Full text
  • Felix Klopotek : How They Do It. Free jazz, improvisation and no-man's music. Ventil Verlag 2002, ISBN 3930559757
  • Sebastian Krekow: The new HipHop Lexicon. Verlag Schwarzkopf and Schwarzkopf 2004, ISBN 3896024671

See also

Web links

Commons : Turntablism  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ralph Kogelheide: Beyond a series of "sounding points". Compositional examination of sound recordings, 1900-1930 . Self-published, Hamburg 2017, ISBN 978-3-7450-4876-6 .
  2. ↑ Martin Elste : Hindemith's attempts at "gramophone record pieces" in the context of a history of ideas in mechanical music in the 20th century. In: Marion Saxer (Ed.): Playing (with) the machine. Musical media practice in the early days of phonography, self-play piano, film and radio. transcript Verlag, Bielefeld 2016, ISBN 978-3-8376-3036-7 , p. 347-366 .