NpgSoldier said:

bahahahaha

Boulez? Stravinsky? Are you popping pills? It's James Brown!

Some Xperts: Michael Tilson Thomas (MTT) and James Brown (Godfather)

American Public Media and the San Francisco Symphony:

The MTT Files

Program 7: We Were Playing Boulez, But We Were Listening To James Brown! (2009)

As a university student, Michael Tilson Thomas and his colleagues were on the cutting edge of modern classical music. One day, while he was driving on the LA freeway, a song by James Brown came on the radio. That song, and the many that followed, changed MTT's views about how to perform the music of Boulez, Stravinsky, and the like. The level of energy, the precision, the sense of time, the angularity — all gave the young conductor insight into the music he was performing.

The core of this program, an extensive interview with James Brown about his music, was recorded at Brown's home in Georgia.

Listen to the program
(it's a .pls - so you'll need winamp, vlc-player, whatever...)

Playlist

(If no performer is listed, piece performed by San Fransisco Symphony and Michael Tilson Thomas.)

for the playlist, see source

James Brown.

Three stars Prince can't outshine: Ray Charles, Stevie Wonder, James Brown. He ain't really even in the conversation with any of them.

George Clinton

Thibaut said:

Hey, that was my choice on the first page of this thread!

I've always felt that James Brown was more of a soulful funk than a nasty down and dirty funk. And Prince as the mixture of rock, soul, gospal, blues, nastyfunk. To me Prince created his own style of funk, I hear it most in his songs with a heavy bass guitar slap. I tend to crave Prince's style of funk more because it brings more rock to it. But when I really want pure funk, I dig out Bootsy Collins Funkadelic and George Clinton. "What's a Telephone Bill?" & "Munchies for your Love,""Stretching Out in A Rubber Band" "Mother Ship Connection." Bootsie is skank nasty funk and one of the most underated Bass Guitar players to ever play. If I'm not mistaken I think he started in James Brown's band when he was 18 before joining parliment.

funksterr said:

Outshine with respect to what? Musicianship? Songwriting? Impact on music? or Funk?

Ray wasn't a funk artist so I'm assuming you mean one of the others.

The student always pays homeage to the master.

jcurley said:

James Brown is only funk? What about most of his music from 1956-1964? Or his two "jazz" albums (Soul On Top and Gettin' Down To It)? Is "Bewildered" funk? Is "World" funk? There was more than just funk to James Brown.