Roots of hip hop

Rapping (or emceeing,MCing, or rhyming) is a musical form of vocal delivery that incorporates "rhyme, rhythmic speech, and street vernacular," (slang) which is performed or chanted in a variety of ways, usually over a backbeat or musical accompaniment of "beats". The components of rapping include "content", "flow" (rhythm, rhyme and cadence), and "delivery". Rap differs from spoken-word poetry in that rap is usually performed in time to a beat (external meter). Rapping is often associated with and a primary ingredient of hip-hop music (though there is hip hop without rapping, such as instrumental songs), but the origins of the phenomenon predate hip-hop culture by centuries. Rapping is also used in Kwaito music, a genre that originated in Johannesburg, South Africa, and is composed of hip-hop elements. Another form of rap that predates hip hop was boxer Muhammad Ali's rhythmic poetry used to taunt his opponents in the 1960s and 1970s, or Gil Scott-Heron's melismatic style.

Rapping can be delivered over a beat, typically provided by a DJ, turntablist or Beatboxer, or without accompaniment. Stylistically, rap occupies a gray area between speech, prose, poetry, and singing. The word (meaning originally "to hit"), as used to describe quick speech or repartee, predates the musical form. The word had been used in British English since the 16th century. It was part of the African American dialect of English in the 1960s meaning "to converse", and very soon after that in its present usage as a term denoting the musical style. Today, the terms "rap" and "rapping" are so closely associated with hip-hop music that many writers use the terms interchangeably.

...
Wikipedia