The Significance of Courage and Hope

I’m going to share my opinion of the significance of courage and hope for an artist. Not just any artists, but all artists. Me for example, I love the art of rap. I love the craft, the techniques, the patterns, and way some rappers can capture an audience with incredible delivery. Artists like KRS-One, melle mel, Cool Mo Dee, they all knew how to capture the attention of their audience and once they had it they could say anything they wanted and the people loved it. Back then it was all about the lyrics, and artists were competitive. In several places people would sit around and have cyphers, or showcases if you will. This is where local artists would go and say the rhymes they had written the night before to any beat that a local dj played, or sometimes acapella. This is what I fell in love with. I fell in love with rap/hip hop because it was a way of free expression, and it works to all kinds of beats and instruments. I like the challenge of being put on the spot to a beat I may or may not of heard, and spitting the best verse I can. But it wasn’t always like that. I’ve been writing since I was in grade 7.  It wasn’t until I learned about what other artists have been through to get to where they are that I had the courage to even say anything in front of people. The most inspiring artists in my mind are the members of Bone-Thugs-N-Harmony. The five members we’re from Cleveland Ohioan and all five lived on the same block growing up. They talk about standing on the corner around a trash can fire rapping with each other. They didn’t only rap though, they had a talent for singing and harmonizing. This made a come up difficult for them because they were from a place where if you sang then you were considered soft, and that could be dangerous. But they still had the courage to bring a new idea into the rap game. This is what inspires me because as much as I love rap, I also really enjoy old school instrumentals and classic music. I want to find different ways to incorporate all of it together and make something new. I’ve wanted to do it for years and only in the past year or so did I have the courage to stand up even just in front of my friends and show them what I had written. People already knew that I liked to rap my favorite verses from all artists, but rapping something that i myself wrote was hard. It took maybe 10 times before I was completely comfortable with it, now I’m at the point where I don’t even care if I stumble my words, and I’ve also encouraged my friends to do the same.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhaTg00auRM

By Geoffrey Andrews