2005), the courts ruled that unlicensed sampling constitutes copyright infringement. Courts have taken different positions on whether sampling without permission is permitted. The process of acquiring permission for a sample is known as clearance, and can be complex and costly samples from well known sources may be prohibitively expensive. Sampling without permission can infringe copyright or may be fair use. The first album created entirely from samples, Endtroducing by DJ Shadow, was released in 1996. Samples such as the Amen break, the ' Funky Drummer' drum break and orchestra hit have been used in thousands of recordings James Brown, Loleatta Holloway, Fab Five Freddy and Led Zeppelin are among the most sampled artists. It has since influenced many genres of music, particularly electronic music and pop. Sampling is a foundation of hip hop music, which emerged with 1980s producers sampling funk and soul records, particularly drum breaks. As technology improved, cheaper standalone samplers with more memory emerged, such as the E-mu Emulator, Akai S950, and Akai MPC.

The term sampling was coined in the late 1970s by the creators of the Fairlight CMI, a synthesizer with the ability to record and play back short sounds. The mid-20th century saw the introduction of keyboard instruments that played sounds recorded on tape, such as the Mellotron. They are usually integrated using hardware ( samplers) or software such as digital audio workstations.Ī process similar to sampling originated in the 1940s with musique concrète, experimental music created by splicing and looping tape. Samples may comprise elements such as rhythm, melody, speech, sounds or entire bars of music, and may be layered, equalized, sped up or slowed down, repitched, looped, or otherwise manipulated. In music, sampling is the reuse of a portion (or sample) of a sound recording in another recording.

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