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Dancehall

Encyclopedia : D : DA : DAN : Dancehall

Music of Jamaica
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Mento Ska
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Dancehall is a type of Jamaican popular music which developed around 1979, with exponents such as Yellowman, Super Cat, Barrington Levy and others who went on to become the Roots Radics. It is also known by some as "Bashment" and in the early 1990s the term Raggamuffin was established. The style is characterized by a DJ singing and rapping or toasting over raw and danceable music riddims [sic]. The rhythm in dancehall is much faster than in reggae, with drum machines replacing acoustic sets. In the early years of dancehall, some found its lyrics crude and bawdy ("slack"), though it became very popular among the youths of Jamaica. Like its reggae predecessor it eventually made inroads onto the world music scene.

This deejay-led, largely synthesized speechifying with musical accompaniment departed from traditional conceptions of Jamaican popular musical entertainment. Dub poet Mutabaruka maintained, "if 1970s reggae was red, green and gold, then in the next decade it was gold chains". It was far removed from its gentle roots and culture, and there was furious debate as to whether it ought to be considered some sort of extension of reggae music.(http://niceup.com/history/bbc/dancehall.html)

In the late 1990s, many practitioners returned to the Rastafari movement and changed their lyrical focus to "consciousness", a reflection of the spiritual underpinnings of Rastafarianism. Various varieties of dancehall achieved some crossover success outside of Jamaica during the mid- to late-1990s. In 2001, pop star Shaggy went 6 times platinum with his album Hotshot. The next year, he received various nominations from the American Music Awards and the Grammy Awards, and he has won two World Music Awards. Also some Dancehall-tunes (voiced riddims) became popular during the summer of 2003, especially Sean Paul's Get Busy. In the same year renowned dancehall superstar, Red Rat, collaborated with Burning Vision Entertainment, to make the popular video for ['1 Foot In'].

Dancehall owes its name to the space in which recorded popular Jamaican music was consumed and produced by the DJ. Dancehall is not just recorded speech with musical accompaniment therefore, but a space as well as an institution or culture in which music, dance and community vibes merge.

Dancehall can be understood as having two major highpoints between 1989-1994 and 1999-2004. In these periods artists like Buju Banton, Bounti Killa, Spragga Benz, Beenie Man, Capleton, Elephant Man, Shaggy, Sean Paul and Sizzla emerged. Songs like Dawn Penn's "No, No, No", Cutty Ranks "Ah Who Se Me Dun", and Chaka Demus and Pliers' "Murder She Wrote" became some of the first dancehall megahits in the U.S. and abroad in the early 90's. Today dancehall is perpetuated on the tongues of lyricists such as Sean Paul, Bounty Killer, Vybz Kartel, Sizzla Kalonji, Beenie Man, Elephant Man, Buju Banton, Yellowman and many more.

Dancehall developed in Jamaica as a result of varying political and socio-economic factors. Reggae as a style of music was heavily influenced by the ideologies of Rastafari and was also spirited by the socialist movements in the island at the time. Dancehall, the scion of reggae, was birthed in the late seventies and early eighties. This is when many had become disenchanted with the socialist movement and the harsh economic realities that it brought to bear on the island. It is during this time that neo-liberalist ideologies and materialism started to factor into the lives of many Jamaicans, and into the new entertainment form.

Dancehall lyrics have been criticized by pockets of Jamaican society with little or no state endorsement. It has also faced the slaughter of intellectual criticism in the media, particularly by the likes of popular Jamaican journalists, like Ian Boyne. Dancehall has also come to face scathing criticism from the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender community, as they claim that it perpetuates violence against [GLBT] people in Jamaica (where such people are often referred to in dancehall lyrics as "chi-chi man"), most notably through its lyrics in songs by such DJs as Beenie Man and Buju Banton.

Dancehall is just short of being a movement, but does have the characteristics of a cosmology as it is a culture and a lens through which people see the world. This cosmology and cultural phenomenon carries with it a linguistic component. Terms such as "bun" in the Dancehall, which is an abbreviation of "burn," do not carry with them a very literal understanding as it may in European cultures. Hence, phrases like "bun sodomites" will not mean, to literally burn sodomites, but function more as a line of descent: it is an exaggeration used to indicate serious disapproval.

Dancehall has energised Jamaican popular music because it has spawned dance moves that help to make parties and stage performances more energetic. Many dance moves seen on hip hop videos are actually variations of dancehall moves such as the butterfly, the bogle, the blaze blaze, the pon the river, pon the bank, and the dutty wine.

Dancehall is more than a place it is a culture and a space. Culture is the way of life of a group of people. This includes what they wear, how they govern themselves, their religious belief and other rituals. Dancehall is an integral part of the Jamaican life. Dancehall as a culture and concept has a much longer history than that. Dancehall is also the space where dances are held and where sound systems and artists performed long before the technological innovations of the dancehall music we hear today. Moreover, like hip-hop, dancehall refers not only to a music and a space, but to a whole culture that encompasses music, language, dance, dress, and world views. Even as it is transformed it transforms personal and communal spaces. Most importantly the limits and potential of such performance spaces as Dancehall are revealed in the way they are negotiated within the urban and temporary spaces to create change in composition and ones not accordance with nature.

Bibliography

Reggae | Reggae genres
Mento - Rocksteady - Ska
Dub - Dub poetry - Dee jaying or Toasting - Dancehall - Ragga or Raggamuffin - Reggaeton - Roots reggae - Two Tone
Other topics
Haile Selassie - Jamaica - Marcus Garvey - Rastafari movement - Skinheads

 

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