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Without them, there is no music, "said about the beatmakers Fadily Camara, master of ceremonies of the first edition of the Flames, the Victoires du rap and its currents, who dedicated a prize to these artists of the shadows. Sometimes called "composers" or "producers", beatmakers, literally rhythm makers, use their creativity to compose the instrumental part of rap songs, called "prod" or "instru".
These artists, little known to the general public, are essential in the music industry, only a few rappers compose their own instruments, like Jul or Niro. Some make their prods alone and then send them to the rappers they want to work with. Others collaborate directly with them, in the studio, such as Benjay, beatmaker who mainly produced for Damso, but also PLK or Rim'K.
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We are in the same room so it facilitates the exchange, and then they can also propose their ideas and bring their creativity, "he explains. "From a distance, I find that there is more uncertainty. We send our prods to rappers without knowing under what conditions they will listen to them: sometimes without headphones, having had a bad day, etc." Originally from Seine-et-Marne, Benjay trained alone in beatmaking. First thanks to a game on PlayStation Portable when he was only 12 years old, then via "YouTube tutorials", practicing on his mother's computer.
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"Democratize"
In 2015, at the age of 18, he made his "first big placement" with the instrument of the song Finis-les by rapper Alonzo, whose clip totaled nearly 70 million views on YouTube. Still on the benches of the university, he uses his Crous scholarship to invest in equipment, then ends up abandoning his English license in order to capitalize on this first success.
In beatmaking, no need for a diploma: you make your weapons "on the job" because "it is especially by practicing that you progress," he says. "The Internet is a real gold mine of information," adds Mao Maker, a YouTuber who posts tutorials allowing those who wish to train themselves for free in this art. This former optician, who practiced for "about ten years" on the family computer, wants to "democratize beatmaking".
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What I want above all is to remove the blockage that we can have at the beginning by saying I do not have the equipment or I do not know how to do, all this stuff that has blocked me for a long time, "she says.
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"Competitive"
Interest in beatmaking has grown greatly in recent years, a direct result of rap's growing popularity. "The digitization of music creation tools, the development of beatmaking software that is easy to access and increasingly sophisticated, but also the virtuous circle in which rap is since the consideration of streaming by the SNEP (National Union of Phonographic Publishing, editor's note) in 2016, all this creates a snowball effect that pushes more and more people to get started. ", analyzes the journalist Raphaël Da Cruz, specialist in rap and more particularly beatmaking.
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But that makes it a very competitive industry, similar to a basket of crabs. You have to struggle to refine your style and stand out from the crowd," he insists. If beatmakers are now more exposed than their predecessors were in the 2000s and 2010s, thanks to social networks, they remain very little known to the general public.
However, players in the music industry are looking to put them more in the spotlight. Invited to festivals, honored at ceremonies... Programmes are even entirely devoted to them in the specialized media, such as "La Prod" on Mouv' or "BPM" on Booska-P. "Even if some have trouble recognizing him, they are musicians," says Raphaël Da Cruz, presenter of these two shows. The Flames rewarded Tarik Azzouz, a Frenchman whose talent is sought after as far away as the United States by Jay-Z, DJ Khaled and Lil Wayne.
