The Second Track

The Stolen Beat: How Hip-Hop Hijacked Jazz's Crown Jewel and Made It Infinite

Episode Summary

In 1973, a forgotten jazz drummer named Gregory Sylvester laid down the most sampled break in music history, then watched helplessly as hip-hop transformed his four-bar drum solo into the backbone of an entire culture. This is the story of how one perfect breakbeat became the DNA of modern music—and why the original artist never saw a dime.