Funk (music)

Funk
James Brown, the progenitor of funk
Stylistic origins	Soul rhythm and blues jazz psychedelia
Cultural origins	Mid-1960s, United States
Typical instruments	Bass guitar electric guitar drums drum machines keyboards (piano Hammond organ clavinet synthesizer) horns congas
Derivative forms	Disco hip hop post-punk dance-punk boogie contemporary R&B electro house breakbeat new jack swing oldschool jungle neurofunk liquid funk
Subgenres
Deep funk go-go nu-funk P-Funk
Fusion genres
Acid jazz afrobeat avant-funk free funk funk metal funk rock funky house G-funk glitch hop jazz-funk psychedelic funk skweee UK funky synth-funk
Other topics
Musicians psychedelic soul

External video

Watch: "Clyde Stubblefield/ Funky Drummer" on YouTube

Funk is a music genre that originated in the mid-1960s when African American musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of soul music, jazz, and rhythm and blues (R&B). Funk de-emphasizes melody and chord progressions used in other related genres and brings a strong rhythmic groove of a bass line played by an electric bassist and a drum part played by a drummer to the foreground. Like much of African-inspired music, funk typically consists of a complex groove with rhythm instruments playing interlocking grooves. Funk uses the same richly-colored extended chords found in bebop jazz, such as minor chords with added sevenths and elevenths, or dominant seventh chords with altered ninths.

Funk originated in the mid-1960s, with James Brown's development of a signature groove that emphasized the downbeat—with heavy emphasis on the first beat of every measure ("The One"), and the application of swung 16th notes and syncopation on all bass lines, drum patterns, and guitar riffs. Other musical groups, including Sly and the Family Stone and Parliament-Funkadelic, soon began to adopt and develop Brown's innovations. While much of the written history of funk focuses on men, there have been notable funk women, including Chaka Khan, Labelle, Lyn Collins, Brides of Funkenstein, Klymaxx, Mother's Finest, and Betty Davis.