Hip hop soul

Hip hop soul is a subgenre of contemporary R&B music, most popular during the early and mid 1990s, which fuses R&B or soul singing with hip hop musical production. The subgenre had evolved from a previous R&B subgenre, new jack swing, which had incorporated hip-hop influences into R&B music. By contrast, hip hop soul is, as described in The Encyclopedia of African American Music, "quite literally soul singing over hip hop grooves".

The genre was most popular during the mid and late 1990s with artists such as Mary J. Blige (known as the "Queen of Hip-Hop Soul"), Jodeci, Faith Evans, TLC, and R. Kelly. By the late 1990s, hip hop soul would lead to the creation of neo soul, which retained the hip hop and R&B influences while also adding elements of classic 1970s soul music.