Who Is Miley Cyrus: A Genre Or Humorous Music Career?
1538 Words7 Pages
It is in human nature to categorize; from food, race, and political views to musical style. Specifically, when it comes to musical style, we tend to place artists into what we call genres. Genres are categories based on musical style; genres range from Rock and Roll to Hip-Hop to Jazz. While categorizing artists tend to facilitate conditions for music listeners when searching for music, classifying artists occasionally restricts their innate ability to branch and develop their own musical style. Resentment often arises from fans when an artist experiments or transitions into a different genre. A unique artist that may come to mind is the famous or infamous Miley Cyrus. Cyrus’ musical career began aimed towards pop music until the release of…show more content… For the first time, Cyrus completely breaks away from the strictly pop and country music style and begins to add different genres. Although many fans were shocked by the new image from the former Disney star, this step was an important one for Cyrus to be considered part of the genre-curious music style. Cyrus still kept her collection of pop music with the hits, “We Can’t Stop,” “Wrecking Ball,” and “SMS (Bangerz)” featuring pop music queen, Britney Spears. This time, however, alongside the pop music, Cyrus begins to incorporate the rap genre. Rap music is far different than pop or country music because it “…is generally not sung and lyrics are spoken against a backdrop… often consists of beats and rhythms borrowed from soul, funk, or rock genres.” (wiseGEEK). Artists will typically add in their own style to the music. (wiseGEEK). A track from Bangerz that is undoubtedly rap is “Do My Thang.” The verses are spoken rather than sung and Cyrus sings the chorus adding her personal design to the song. Furthering her experiment with rap, Cyrus worked with artists and producers in the rap music industry. Within the same year as the release of Bangerz, Cyrus is featured on will.i.am’s track “Feelin’ Myself” in which Cyrus sings and raps alongside well-known rappers French Montana and Wiz Khalifa. Cyrus also worked with Mike.Will.Made-It, who has produced for rappers such as…show more content… Many debate whether acoustic is a genre or not however, “acoustic music [simply] is that which is made naturally without the use of electricity, electronics, etc.…. any of natural sound.” (Last.fm). Cyrus’ acoustic music consists of covers of songs from a variety of artists. A collection of her acoustic work are part of The Backyard Sessions, which features Cyrus singing with nothing but a band playing along. Cyrus has covered songs such as Dolly Parton’s “Jolene,” Crowded House’s “Don’t Dream It’s over,” and Melanie’s “Look What They’ve Done to My Song, Ma.” All of which have received over ten-million ‘thumbs-up’ on YouTube. Cyrus has also performed live acoustic music such as Lana Del Rey’s “Summertime Sadness” and Outkast’s “Hey Ya” at her Bangerz concert. Both of these songs are featured in an article which shows the “9 Songs that Prove Miley Cyrus Is the Best Cover Artist of Our Generation.”