This style of house music can often have an acoustic feeling.^[3] The online music store Beatport is credited with driving the popularity of deep house,^[4] but also with mislabeling a number of artists in the process^[5] and with giving rise to the future house genre.

Characteristics

Deep house is known for tempos typically from 110 to 125 BPM ^[6][7]

, spacious use of percussion elements, muted basslines, soft keyboard sounds (pads), use of advanced chord structures, ambient mixes, and soulful vocals. Lyrics usually focus on positive/uplifting or forlorn modern blues lyrics. In the early compositions (1986–89), influences of jazz music were most frequently brought out by using more complex chords than simple triads (7ths, 9ths, 13ths, suspensions, alterations) which are held for many bars and give compositions a slightly dissonant feel. The use of vocals became more common in deep house than in many other forms of house music. Sonic qualities include soulful vocals (if vocals are included), slow and concentrated pleasantly dissonant melodies, and a smooth, stylish, and chic demeanor. The use of women's vocals is more common than males in deep house tracks. Deep house music rarely reaches a climax, but lingers on as a comfortable, hypnotic and relaxing sound.

History

Deep house was largely pioneered by Chicago producers such as Marshall Jefferson (On the House) and Larry Heard (Mr. Fingers) and with tracks such as "Mystery of Love" (1985) and "Can You Feel It?" (1986);^[8] the latter had a similar impact on deep house to that of Derrick May's "Strings Of Life" (1987) on Detroit techno.^[9] The jazzy sound became more common due to the favored use of gentler, more organic (yet still synthesizer based) production and instrument sounds. Author Richie Unterberger has stated that Heard's deep house sound moved house music away from its posthuman tendencies back towards the lush, soulful sound of early disco music (particularly that of old Philadelphia International and Salsoul records).^[10]

In the 2000s and in the 2010s, the genre remained very popular. Today,{{when|date=February 2019}} the term Deep House is often misused^[11] and is utilized to encapsulate various types of bassline driven house music.

Nowadays,{{when|date=February 2019}} deep house is very popular and represented by record labels labels like Innervisions, Defected, Crosstown Rebels, Suara, Mother Recordings, Diynamic, Strictly Rhythm, Exploited, and Enormous Tunes, to name a few.^[12]

Artists, DJs and record labels

For a list of deep house musicians, see: Deep house musicians

Record labels of the genre include Alleviated Records (Larry Heard), AFTR:HRS, Glasgow Underground, Naked Music, Om Records, Peacefrog Records, Soma, Source, Anjunadeep and Spinnin' Deep. Examples of deep house albums from artists known from other genres include The Martyr Mantras (1990) and A New Decade (1989) from The Style Council, as well as Until Now (2012), from Swedish House Mafia.

See also

• List of electronic music genres
• Club Zanzibar

References