For my ethnography project Gianna and I will be collaborating to investigate the up and coming artists in greater Columbus specifically Kid Cudi. Other artistist include Young Milionairez and Fam Boyz. These artists are currently taking the hip hop scene in ohio and putting their own spin on it. At the same time they are embracing the ways of other hip hop artists from the area who have already become famous, such as John Legend, to learn and gain popularity as time continues.
We will be looking deeper into the scene by investigating the underground hip hop websites, magazines and record that play a part in making these artist well known stars. Our study started from the 2008 Ohio Hip Hop Awards. Gianna and I will use this as a start along with websites like cleveland-underground-hip-hop.com, hiphopcolumbus.com, and more. Some of these songs have been placed on YouTube, so for your viewing pleasure we have a placed a link for a video clip from our main artist, Kid Cudi: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKD2EWLKcNU&feature=related.
Because the Ohio Hip Hop scene is continuing to develop we are hoping to catch these artists on their rise to fame and inquire knowledge from people from the scene in Ohio and followers of the scene other places such as locally here. Some questions coud include: have you heard of these artists? What do you think about them? Why do you think if at all that they can survive in the Hip Hop world today? Do you think they fit into the Hip Hop scene that is popularly known today?
What difficulties do they face as artists coming from the midwest? Coming from Ohio myself (Cincinnati) I'm having trouble making a connection between the 2008 Ohio Hip Hop awards and widespread success in the American music scene. Performers from smaller areas that gain national recognition generally have been introduced on national TV shows such as American Idol or documentaries, and then gained more recognition that way-- would this be a possible route for these artists from Columbus?
ReplyDeleteAlso, would their fans be local or dispersed? Local fans would definitely be needed to gain more recognition close to home, but I also think that websites like YouTube and MySpace could really help these artists.
Wow! I had no idea that there was a legitimate hip hop scene in Ohio. I would be interested to know how it developed and what sets in apart from the more well-known scenes on the coasts.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad the two of you are working together on this topic, since you'll be able to brainstorm together about the most productive focus for the project -- as Chris notes, it has the potential to be really broad. Sounds like the Ohio Hip Hop Awards may give you a place to start. I think your first step should be identifying the actual people you might be able to contact (fans, artists?) for individual interviews. You should also keep an eye on the blogs of classmates who are working on similar topics (for instance, Adrian on indie hip-hop in Atlanta, John on another locality-defined scene [Brooklyn, but not hip-hop]). Last year a student in this class worked on Minneapolis hip-hop; see http://miriammusicalyouthcultures.blogspot.com.
ReplyDeleteNancy, you should try editing this post so the YouTube video actually appears here. It isn't hard to do. Once you are viewing the post in edit mode, use the "Edit HTML" tab and replace the YouTube link with the embed code that appears right next to the video on its YouTube page (look where it says "Embed", then copy and paste that material). Give it a try!