The year: 2093. The place: a classroom (or whatever the cyber-equivalent will be). The topic: Pop Music at the Dawn of the 21st Century.

Whatever else is taught, there will be no way to avoid discussing rap music. A phenomenon that many thought would fade quickly, rap has shaped two decades of popular culture. You can’t watch five minutes of TV advertising and not be aware of the influence.

Yet, by 2093, rap music will be old-fashioned music, embraced by a dwindling bunch of elderly people. Rap will be an historical style. So, how will a teacher in 2093 explain rap?

One thing for sure, playing sample recordings and saying “here, this is rap,” will not suffice. Representative hits will be selected and played, of course. And one or two of the famous (notorious) rappers will be presented and discussed. But a musico-historical context will have to go much further if rap is to make sense.

The class will have to examine today’s societal woes (drug culture, gang violence) and the paparazzi-driven celebrity worship. Fashion will have to be considered. (Wouldn’t you love hear the explanation of why men’s trousers were belted at their thighs?) The references in the lyrics will be discussed: racial strife, youth unemployment, high-crime neighborhoods, and above all, the violent denigration of women. And all of this will be contrasted with the glossy stardom of rappers and rap culture, created by Hollywood and the media.

And that leads us to the economic side of rap. Huge money is at stake, as it always is with any pop phenomenon. Plus what about the technology that delivers today’s pop music to young people? Just think how technology has evolved even throughout rap’s brief existence: from tapes and CDs to iPods and Apps.

When our futuristic students take all of this down (using some kind of cyber-chip-pen, surely) and apply the information to a 3-minute rap song, they will have acquired a solid piece of Music History.

Yes, Music History. Whether its Mozart or Monteverdi, Elvis or Donizetti, Gershwin or Jay-Z, the principles of music history remain the same, no matter what the music. Music has context and meaning. It always is a product of a given time, place, and set of social, political, and cultural conditions, influenced by geography and governed by technology and economics.

Studying music history, or any of the Fine Arts, requires a thoughtful layering of the factors that affect daily life.

As for rap, well, it’s also our job (and yours) to pass on the best of Western Culture, instilling an appreciation of beauty, so that people in 2093 will still have Mozart and Gershwin as a point of contrast.