Three culturally influential forms of music are calypso, dance and jazz music. Each style is fairly distinct from one another but have had varying degrees of influence on the global scene of music.

Calypso's influence on music is not necessarily been in the lyrical sense. But in terms of instrumentation a respect for improvisation, its influence has been profound. Steel pan music, also known as steel drum, is known globally. A discussion of the history of calypso music.

Jazz music has influenced all forms of music. Even forms of music that have limited influence by jazz will still claim to be influenced by jazz, if not only to gain intellectual acceptance. Refer to the appendices for a brief history of jazz. The style of music that has recently been influenced by jazz is dance music, with the most skilled dance producers rising to their own plateau, less capable producers have resorted to using jazz musicians or samples of their music.

Music has been influenced to varying degrees by technology. Calypso music has managed to keep its style and essence, but it has incorporated more technology in its production. Due to the use of brass instruments in Calypso, this has led to wind controllers, being used to produce sound. This is done by recording MIDI events and then assigning them to sound sources. This is done through using sampled sounds or synthesised sound. Steel pan music being governed by performance has had less impact by modern technology improvements. Due to technology, styles such as drum and bass to give rise to the possibility of greater acceptance of steel pan music, the style. Steel pan music as it stands has been accepted in the lighter sense. Drum and bass and its mainstream underground culture, allows for the future possibility for this style being accepted in a serious manner. The fundamental constructs of the music are very similar (Calypso, drum and bass).

Technological advances have led to new music styles, these music styles are driven more along the lines of sound than structure. This has led to the possibility of the new styles being fused with the old styles. Many would argue that although sound has progressed music has not (Winston Marsalis). To incorporate the new sounds which structure jazz fusion, a jazz sideshow, was born.

70s disco music is probably the first technological dance music that was popularly accepted and played. Today's equivalents, recent history has shown, is dance music. Technological advances has allowed for more musical constructs to be incorporated. This is largely due to hip hop style sampling and musical interfaces with MIDI technology.

Concepts such as multitrack recording, synthesisers, sampler and computers have led to better storage and dynamic manipulation of music.

Multitrack recording has allowed for greater manipulation of audio tracks. Best example of this would be an effects process on an instrument, without that effects process affecting any other tracks.

Samplers have allowed for fusion of all types of loops musical, theatrical, sound into music. They have helped to give music more body and a "closer studio to live sound".

Digital audio workstations allow for dynamic music manipulation. They give greater post recording power.

Computers have allowed for all of the above to be done in a virtual environment. The dynamic storage nature has allowed for this.

Calypso is performed to a high beats to minute of 120 – 150. Time signature is 4/4. Instrumentation saxophone, steelpan, drum kits, percussion, voice and windcontrollers are common to calypso music. The amount music in terms of bars ranges between 80 – 120.Jazz music is normally based around a group. Many groups are a trio or quartet. Piano, drums and bass. Often when it is a quartet the group will also have a saxophone player. The normally play to time signatures of 2/4, 6/8 and 4/4. Dance music is also normally 4/4 with synthesizers, samplers, record decks among others and sometimes vocals.

Music is influenced by various forms of technology. The main concepts that affect all forms of music are related to computers. Automation of some sorts has affected all forms of music. The use of loops is facilitated by computer sequences as well as sampling devices. In dance music this has led to the music being more repetitive and to a certain extent critical demise has resulted. The use of multitrack technology has allowed for the fusion of other styles of music to give the apparent increase of dynamics, in the musical structures. Samplers, multitrack technology has led to a great deal of fusion. This fusion is compounded by the use of synthesisers across the spectrum of music styles." Hooks" have mainly been mimicked, copied to encompass this fusion. Fruity loops, Cubase, Reason are among some other software packages which allow this to take place.

There are a lot of common constructs that are used in music. Musically the most dominant feature is the use of scales. Whether deliberately or accident most music does this. Arabian scales, blues scales (Billy Jean) are some other common constructs that they use. Hip-hop music and country music are dominated by scales also. Although many would feel that the producers are making original work whether sampled or not they are almost definitely reiterating a musical scale.

Harmonised music is dominated by the use of chords. Chords are fused together by musicians to give a song melody. Rhythmic patterns in calypso are similar to an uptempo rhumba or salsa. The main rhythms that a listener would pick up from a modern calypso tune would be the Bosanova and Mambo. The bosanova and mambo are the rhythmic patterns that are present in a lot of soulful dance music. Hip Hop is dominated by Rhumba beats set to various tempos, underground or old school breakdance beat have the symbolic high hat hit every other bar at 4/4 tempo. Most styles of music today don’t have recognisable musical structures that are sent in a similar mold to more classical forms of music. Orchestra, Big Band etc. Rock bands for example will have a drummer and a singer. Aside from these two musicians you can not be sure of the size of the group or even the instruments that they will play. You can expect computer based support instruments as well folk playing harmonica players for musical breakdowns and song intros.