Text-Rich Resource: Hip hop sampling
Intro:
Since the Late 1970’s, sampling has become the musical backbone of the music that we now know as hip hop music. Sampling is an incredibly powerful musical tool which allows producers of a variety of different musical pedigrees to create original songs based on the ideas of others. This page will discuss some basic ways in which samples are used.
Key Terms:
Sampling - the use of other music recordings to create new music recordings
Copyright - the legally protected right to distribute and reproduce content
Royalties - portions or shares of money generated by sales of and contracts related to the distribution of copyrighted content.
Intellectual property - The notion that ideas can also be owned, exchanged and sold in the same way as physical property such as cars, homes, products or land.
Precedent - something that comes before something else
Writing credits - official recognition that a particular person was involved in the writing of a musical work, i.e. that the song, or a portion of that song is part of that person’s intellectual property.
method #1 - “Verbatim” sampling
The word "verbatim" in Latin means "exactly as written." In recent years, hip-hop producers have employed a technique of sampling in which the most memorable part of one song is used in the same way to create a new song. In the example below, a Bronx drill rap beat adopts the chorus of a popular song and repurposes it for a song with completely different ethos, or feeling.
Because of copyright laws, this style of sampling is undoubtedly the most tricky to monetize, as a record label's legal teams often struggle to attain clearance for use of the samples.
See the below example which compares a 2022 New York drill rap track to its original, 2015 sample.
Method #2 - “Chopped” Sampling
Often, music producers will attempt to obscure the source of their samples. In contrast to "verbatim"-style sampling, this method of music creation pulls from fragments and/or less memorable parts of one song, elegantly weaving them into a new creation. This is primarily done for two reasons: 1) the less recognizable a sample is, the less is likelihood that a producer will run into complications due to copyrights, 2.) aesthetically, it was once seen as a crucial element of a DJ, producer or beatmaker's style to have as unique a collection of samples as possible. The more rare a sample source, the greater the sense of enigma and mystery would surround a particular producer's musical "brand."
DJ Shadow is widely considered to be a master of this type of sampling, creating entire albums that are comprised of hundreds of oddly-sourced samples. See the example below (note that the song’s main sample does not occur until later in the original).
Also see the below example in which an XXXTentacion track chops together a Stan Getz / Bill Evans Trio sample to create an original beat.
Method #3: "Public domain" Sampling
In American copyright law, when a certain amount of time passes after a piece of music is created and the author of the work dies, the music is saiid to be in the "public domain." This means that anyone is free to use it and/or copy it. These laws were originally created to strike a balance between what were considered to be the three stakeholders of content: 1.) authors, 2.) publishers, and 3.) the general population.
The sampling of works within the public domain creates far fewer complications with regard to copyright infringement. Even though a rights holder of a work may owe royalties to the original performer of the public domain sample, they would not owe them to the original composer or their estates.
See below an example of the use of a public domain sample. The original composition was written in 1915!
Method #4: "Break" or "intro" sampling
"Break" or "intro" sampling takes a relatively minor section of a song and uses it as the basis for a new song. The term "break" refers to a trend in music of the 1970's in which pop songs would include a section where all instruments dropped out except for the drums and percussion. This would usually follow a repetition of the most memorable section of the song, and precede an additional repetition of that same hook.
In contrast to a “break” or “breakdown,” the "intro" of a song is a section that precedes the main content, and is only related to the rest of the song in that it sets the stage for the subsequent material.
Hear an example of intro/break sampling below in Drake's Hotline Bling.
Method #5: "Harmonic” sampling
Often times, a section of a song will spell out its chordal patterns prior to introducing a melody or words. “Harmonic” sampling takes the chord progression for one song and uses it to make an entirely new song. While this technique is very similar to "intro" and “break” sampling, it differs in that it is oriented around creating new melodic possibilities from the harmonic content of a sample.
See below how The Weeknd takes a Japanese RnB song from the 1980's and makes an entirely new melody from the original song’s chord progression.
Method #6: “New Peformance” Sampling:
Often times, musicians who record a performance of a song but who have no writing credits on that song will receive a percentage of a song's sales as a part of their contract. When producers sample such songs, they may owe royalties to that song's performer. To get around this, many producers will reproduce "sample" of a song by hiring session musicians to record a new version of that same tune, even if it sounds almost exactly like the original.
In other instances, recording a new performance of a sample may be done for aesthetic purposes, like getting a different quality of sound that was not captured in the original.
Listen to the below example of how a PinkPantheress song re-records an Erik Satie sample using an electric piano instead of an acoustic piano.
Method #7: “Style” Sampling
Producers will often sample songs simply for the purposes of capturing a general feeling, or "vibe.” Such methods of sampling can happen in many ways, but the effect is the same -- to recreate an aesthetic upon which an entirely new statement can be made. See below for an example of how a Nicki Minaj track draws upon the electro style of an underground club hit.
While copyright laws protect authors' and publishers' intellectual property rights by defining copyrightable musical material exclusive as melody and lyrics, no laws exist that say that a musical style can claimed as intellectual property. However, a famous 2015 court case between the Marvin Gaye estate and Robin Thicke ruled that Thicke's song infringed upon Gaye's rights based on the claim that too many similarities existed between the two, despite the fact that the songs contained completely different melodies and words.