Scratching

This passage is about how DJs use different techniques to create music.

Lexile Level: 1130L

Categories: Science & Technology Art & Music

When you have an itch, you scratch it. But for musicians, scratching may mean something else. When a hip-hop DJ moves a vinyl record back and forth on a turntable, it is called scratching. The phonograph needle stays in the groove of the record and makes a distinctive scratch rhythm that doesn't necessarily interrupt the music playing on the record. When playing dance music at parties, DJs wanted to do more than play song after song like the radio. They wanted to build on and rearrange the music on the records to create their own music. They became performers for the live audience of the people at the party. Now DJs can show off their scratching skills in international competitions. DJs expanded upon scratching with many other collage techniques like sound sampling, in which snippets of music or speech from compact discs, movies, or television programs are worked into or overtop of other music.