"I will grant people the fact that Rap is a Folk Art, but so is graffiti.

"What Rap is not is Folk Music, and anyone who goes to a Folk Music Festival and has to listen to a rapper between Irish folk bands and bluegrass is being abused." pdq

That's my thought too. How can it be music if it can't be sung? Can you imagine sittng around the library table teaching your children the songs?

"I don't get quite why you think it isn't music--why isn't it music? or do we have to get down to "what is music?" M.Ted

My question: Is everything that has a beat music? Is the hooting of a grouse or a distant hammer tapping tacks into a board or a neighing herd of horses or the screaming of a crowd greeting a rock star music?

I would no more book a rapper into a folk club than I would book an opera singer. I like opera, as it happens, and I can appreciate the muscle of a rap rendition but they ain't folk music. Like pdq, I contend it is folk art, pure and simple.