R&B is a musical genre that evolved out of jump blues in the 1940’s. R&B maintained the upbeat and the tempo characteristics of jump blues but the song itself became more meaningful and there was less room for improvisation.

In the 1950’s R&B was already a very popular style and both vocalists alone and vocal groups dominated the top of the charts with names like: Ray Charles, Ruth Brown, The Drifters and The Coasters. Of course, over the years there was a shift in style and R&B became more soul which was much funkier and loser. Soul was a very diverse genre, there were numerous possibilities that one could see by the emergence of sub-genres like Motown and Stax.

However, after many profound changes in the world of music, what we have today is called R&B but it has nothing to do with its roots.

Nowadays, R&B might be the most complex music genre there is, due to the fusion it often makes with several other styles.

R&B and Soul music were always tightly connected but the 70’s brought the rise of Urban music. Urban music is a term used to describe all types of musical movements that have a social or street origin. It could be drum n’ bass, hip hop, rap, rave, ect…

The purpose of R&B, was always to do upbeat songs, where the word SONG has the most importance. Today the sky is the limit when it comes for inspiration from R&B artists. Hip hop and R&B are very tightly connected….in a way that many hip hop artists release albums that have a great R&B inspiration, and this gets them close to the chart tops. It can also be inspired by electronic music, and we can see that clearly when artists and producers recycle oldschool tunes or use the latest cool sounds and effects.

Of course, one thing hasn’t changed and that is the power of the singer in an R&B song. Artists like Mariah Carey, Beyonce, Rihanna, etc..have great voices and will capture audiences for many many years.

I’d say every music genre has its ups and downs, but it sure is interesting to see how R&B will evolve in the 21^st century, where every musical genre seems to have been invented and the common word that connects all styles is: repeat!

Making R&B songs can be easy if you have a great voice. You can get yourself a cheap producer and build a demo in no time. But what you want to do is a powerful demo that shows you know about music, have style and a great sense of what’s hot. To do that you gotta have the right R&B samples . Build your own demos and make the next big hit with Future Loops’ R&B loops. Check out how you can make groovy powerful track with the right R&B beats .