Original link: https://musenxi.com/archives/how-to-practice-freestyle.html
foreword
This article is dedicated to those who play / love rap and want to practice freestyle. Personal experience, for reference only. (The rap mentioned in the text is a single language rap by default, you can understand it as your own native language rap)
a preliminary understanding
In fact, there are many types of freestyle. Write the words but do not arrange the rhythm, and temporarily compose the flow with the beat, so that the singing is also freestyle. Knowing a theme, listening to the beat in advance, writing the lyrics in a short time and then singing it out, is also a kind of freestyle.
But what we are going to talk about today is the one that everyone has been exposed to the most and is also the most fundamental – just give the beat, and start talking when you take the microphone. It is called “fundamental” because after practicing this, other freestyles are not a problem.
I first came into contact with freestyle when I saw a freestyle battle on TV (of course I have now forgotten what it was), and I saw the players on the stage with a lot of punchlines, fancy swearing, rough yet elegant, guaranteed rhyme At the same time, he can arrange the rhythm, sometimes use rhetoric skillfully, sometimes cite historical facts, and the admiration will arise spontaneously. So when I first came into contact with rap, I also started to explore freestyle. The current level is not to say that it is very high, but if you give a random beat, you can still convince ordinary people. (Big guy takes a detour)
How to learn this kind of thing is more difficult to say, and there is no systematic tutorial on the Internet. Most of them rely on blind practice and groping. But as a good person, I have some experience, and sharing it will definitely help everyone. So here, I will use as simple and concise words as possible to explain several sections of freestyle to practice and some of my own practice methods. I’ve broken it down into two big chunks — words, Flow. Words are divided into two smaller pieces – rhyme, content.
See below →
word
Rhyming <br />Rhyming is something that everyone understands and positions differently. Now there is a saying, “Rhyming in front of the mind is nothing”, and I don’t judge. But there is no doubt that rhyme greatly affects the sense of hearing. It is indeed an ability, and among ordinary listeners, those with rhymes are definitely better than those who are full of thoughts.
Rhyming is nothing more than arranging words with the same initials/finals in a sentence and making them manifest. Some people always blame their lack of vocabulary. Should they memorize rhymes? Not also. Take a closer look at the rap songs you’ve heard, and listen to those complicated multi-bet arrangements. Are there any words you don’t know or don’t understand? Let me tell you the truth, what you lack is not vocabulary, but the ability to extract rhyming words. Your brain is not sensitive to words that rhyme because you don’t need them, but they’re all in your head.
Therefore, what should be trained is the rhyming prompting ability.
*My training method I: (this is very important, other exercises after this are based on this)
At first, find a beat, count eight beats with the rhythm, and replace the “seven and eight” in the last two beats with a word, and the next word should rhyme with the previous one, either single or double. When you can’t think of a word, just say a word, and the next word continues to bet with it. Example: “123456 watermelon, 123456 kill, 123456 hip-hop, 123456 chicken* (bushi)”. After you become proficient, you can say a word every four beats, or you can change to a faster beat to follow.
Content <br />There must be logic after rhyme, otherwise it’s just casual gibberish. After there is logic, there must be ideas to improve the depth of language. If you can still play stalks, it is naturally the icing on the cake. At the same time, there is one more thing I want to say. I mentioned above that some people will memorize rhymes for the sake of rhyme, and they will memorize them one by one, which may make you rhyme quickly, but I personally do not support this approach very much. . Because if it’s like this, maybe the next time you think of “pencil”, it’s “raised”, then “a thousand miles”, then another final and then something else. You don’t think of “apocalypse” and “fairy”. A set of rhymes going down a line will greatly limit the play of your content. What I advocate is to say what you want to say, and then let the rhyme help, instead of making up the story with the memorized rhyme. Such freestyle is not free at all.
*My training method II:
After the initial practice of Method I, try to rhyme with words that have a certain relationship. Of course, it can be two words that seem to be unrelated, but you can tell their relationship by imagination and imagination. After you are proficient, there are two advanced trainings here – 1. Think of a topic at will, and only practice rhyming with words related to the topic. Example: “amusement park” “…joy,…spectators,…vacation,…trojan horse” 2. Saw an object and rhymed with words related to what you saw and thought, ex: saw a roll of paper towels , “Paper towel”, thinking that doing that thing every night is very “hard” and almost “incontinent”, so now there is a burst of shame and “shame”, and more “is an addiction”, so I have to “rehabilitate”. (bush)
Flow
First of all, what is flow? This is too lazy to write the truth, after all, people without a little purity won’t see it… Anyway, if you don’t understand, you can ask the Google girl. Then I will say straight to the point that in freestyle, there are several problems that need to be solved in terms of flow. First, how to use flow to highlight rhymes. Second, how does the flow match the rhythm to make the singing and listening feel comfortable (sense of hearing). Third, how to use flow to solve the word count problem in a sentence. (For example, if you have to say nine words in eight beats, then you will have to say two words in one beat when arranging flow.) For the latter two, you can only rely on constant trial and pondering, and you can listen to your favorite rapper more , their songs, how the flow is arranged, and why it sounds so good. You can write a little article when you have something to do, and read it with a beat. It must be smooth and rhythmic. As for the first question, here I provide a step-by-step exercise. →
*My training method III: (step by step)
1. Nonsense and nonsense follow the beat, and occasionally speed up and stop the beat or something.
2. On the basis of the previous step, add rhyming words at the end or in the middle of the sentence.
3. Speak clearly on the basis of the previous step. (can be without logic)
ps has a small method to practice flow anytime, anywhere. Wear a headset, listen to the beat you like, and beat the beat you say in your daily life. You don’t need to rhyme or anything, just speak normally, and then beat it.
Epilogue
The above is my experience and method of practicing freestyle, I hope it can help you avoid some detours. But how good the final result can be depends on the time. Like Boom, Babe, who doesn’t talk boringly in front of the mirror every day.
Great works are performed not by strength, but by perseverance. -Samuel Johnson
Then I’ll get you here, young man.
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