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Why Not Hip Hop?

By Peter Lloyd

We would never expect America's C-Span to win awards for the creativity or innovation of their television productions. That's not what they're after. But it wouldn't take much for C-Span to liven up its sleepier moments and at the same time attract, perhaps, a wider audience.

First of all, the very idea of letting a people watch its deliberative body live and unedited is in itself a glorious innovation. After all, governments derive "their just powers from the consent of the governed." And in the noble interest of keeping the governed informed, C-Span lets us watch while our representatives, debate, and vote.

While they vote, C-Span often lets us watch the floor of the Senate of House. Not much goes on visually during a congressional vote, and even less audio-wise, so the producers cut the sound and play classical music.

50 CentNot many people have a problem with Mozart in the background but why not rock and roll, big band, blues, jazz, or hip hop?

We call the US a melting pot, so why does all the background music behind the pot's live deliberations have to come from the music of dead white men? Why only music that used to be the most creative, innovative—the cutting edge of several centuries ago?

Today's most innovative music would be just fine with me and a lot of other folks. But I'm afraid we'd could introduce the C-Span audience to newer music gradually.

Start with Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, but move on to Aretha Franklin, Elvis, Bill Monroe, King Sonny Ade, Janis Joplin, Rolling Stones, Smashing Pumpkins, the Peter Adams Band. Toss in some klezmer, polkas, and rāgas—there's so much great music to choose from!

Is C-Span afraid to offend somebody? What about putting them to sleep? Which is worse?

MozartBesides, I'm not sure Mozart doesn't offend, but someone decided to play it anyway. "If they don't like it," a producer must have decided, "let them change the channel." Why not take the same attitude about hip hop?

Maybe someone has tested a focus group or two of C-Span viewers and found that classical music goes over best. Playing it safe with melodies favored by the choir might be fine for the mall or the elevator, but C-Span presents government, which represents all of us—the lifeblood of democracy. Not just those with calcified tastes.

Washington DC architecture is invested deeply in classical architecture, which represents our ideological roots. However democracy is dynamic, innately innovative, the stuff of change.

Mozart may or may not make you more intelligent, but hip hop will definitely keep you current. And if you think it's all vulgarity, anger, and booming bass, you've heard only brief samples from the cars stopped next to you at stop lights.

Peter Lloyd is co-creator with Stephen Grossman of Animal Crackers, the breakthrough problem-solving tool designed to crack your toughest problems.
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