Learning to read rhythm

[wishface]

Ive been studying from a MI book entitled Encyclopedia of Reading Rhythms. It says you should count along while you play, is that a common technique for learning? I find it harder to play the parts while i'm trying to count. Especially at speed. Is this a good way of learning? I can't imagine that in a professional situation (ha!) you'd be welcome to count out loud!

[philparker]

Different situations will require different attention, but in general, yes, you have to count! In some instances it can be both tedious and distracting (because you have to focus so hard, if that makes sense?).

When I play with the orchestra we often have pieces with many bars rest, sometimes 24 bars rest - there is no option other than to count. Yes, it is tedious, but there is no avoiding it. When counting for rhythm, if you haven't learnt the piece or you are sight-reading the counting and sub-dividing can become automatic as opposed to loud in your head. When learning music, you also have to count, but eventually (as above) you can learn to divide the bars without counting and you only have to count on the tricky bits, but it is still necessary.

No, you don't have to count 1e&a2e&a...but you have to learn the patterns and learn how to sub-divide the bar and sub-divide the quarter-note.

Counting is necessary when learning, but shouldn't be necessary when you have learnt the piece; start at a slow speed and by the time you get up to speed you shouldn't have to count - and yes, it is very much required in a professional situation!

Sorry if I waffled on a bit!

[Gareth Hughes]

The counting isn’t so much that you need it want to say ‘1234’ out loud, it’s more for you to have an internal reference point. The more you do it - counting out loud while tapping a rhythm - the more your brain will switch off the focus on counting (though you will still be counting) and then you can focus on tapping the rhythm.

We do this all the time when we tap our foot or bob our head to the beat while playing a bass line that has all sorts of rhythmic variations. Counting out loud seems tricky at first because you are now having to consciously do it, just as consciously thinking ‘left foot, right foot’ would feel odd whilst walking over rough ground.

Try switching things around - instead of saying ‘1234’, try clapping the beats ‘1234’ whilst saying the rhythm, using ‘da da’ or some variation to vocalise the patterns.

The fight sequence in ‘Cool’ from ‘West Side Story’ is probably the only time I’ve consciously counted beats on a professional gig. Absolute headache!!!!

[RCMJ]

HI there,

I've made a series of videos dealing with basic beat counting and wonder if you might find them useful....only just uploaded the first one, but there will be more to follow:

This is just beat one....but I made it to help a few my beginner students and it seemed to work....more syncopated rhythms will follow in the next few weeks/months...

[chris_b]

Rhythm is about patterns. Get those patterns into your head and reading the dots becomes very easy.

You don't read the letters in words, you recognise the patterns the letters make and you instantly know what  the word is.

[RCMJ]

Chris_b I couldn't agree more! Pattern recognition. is exactly what helps you get rhythms properly internalised....

Anyway, slight problem with  the last video, so I're tweaked it here:

 

 

[RCMJ]

..and this new one is the "and of one"...the idea being you can practice just this one rhythm in a fun way whilst absorbing the notation...

 

 

[stewblack]

As recommended by he who shall be obeyed, I speak of none other than @TKenrick@TKenrick this is absolutely brilliant

 

Edited December 2, 2019 by stewblack

[paul_c2]

2 hours ago, RCMJ said:

..and this new one is the "and of one"...the idea being you can practice just this one rhythm in a fun way whilst absorbing the notation...

 

 

That's interesting, it reminds me of a track I created to demonstrate that its entirely possible to have a bassline which never plays on the first beat of the bar (except....the very last note). Also, its an illustration of how much "phaser" effect you can apply to a guitar, so much so that it completely smothers the 16th notes out:

 

[philparker]

10 hours ago, stewblack said:

As recommended by he who shall be obeyed, I speak of none other than @TKenrick@TKenrick this is absolutely brilliant

 

Plus One: Ikeep a copy of this on my desk at work and you can do so much practise without an instrument (even though I regularly sight-read) - it is a great source. 

[ambient]

On 01/12/2019 at 23:52, stewblack said:

As recommended by he who shall be obeyed, I speak of none other than @TKenrick@TKenrick this is absolutely brilliant

 

I was recommended that many years ago. It is an excellent book.

[ambient]

You only really need to count when you’re starting off. Once the ‘feel’ of the rhythm becomes a part of you, once you understand it, then you wouldn’t need to. When a child is learning to read the words in a book, they break the words down, into smaller words or syllables. Reading music is very similar.

[stewblack]

23 minutes ago, ambient said:

You only really need to count when you’re starting off. Once the ‘feel’ of the rhythm becomes a part of you, once you understand it, then you wouldn’t need to. When a child is learning to read the words in a book, they break the words down, into smaller words or syllables. Reading music is very similar.

My main problem is age. I have vague memories from piano lessons in the early 70s but I have only just started trying to read and write music in the last year. 

Learning appears to be quite a bit more difficult the older one gets. 

[ambient]

3 minutes ago, stewblack said:

My main problem is age. I have vague memories from piano lessons in the early 70s but I have only just started trying to read and write music in the last year. 

Learning appears to be quite a bit more difficult the older one gets. 

I agree, I think it does, as do a lot of things.

I encourage students to concentrate on one rhythm at a time, and keep playing that until you can just play it without thinking. If you actually look at a written out parts, you’ll see the same groups or phrases repeated. If you’ve got the Motown book, look through that and you’ll see what I mean.

Don’t try and learn too many rhythmic groupings at once, take your time. 

[stewblack]

That's great advice, thank you. 

[TKenrick]

On 01/12/2019 at 23:52, stewblack said:

As recommended by he who shall be obeyed, I speak of none other than @TKenrick

Funnily enough that's what my wife never refers to me as 🤣

On 10/12/2019 at 23:29, ambient said:

I encourage students to concentrate on one rhythm at a time, and keep playing that until you can just play it without thinking. If you actually look at a written out parts, you’ll see the same groups or phrases repeated. If you’ve got the Motown book, look through that and you’ll see what I mean.

Don’t try and learn too many rhythmic groupings at once, take your time. 

Nailed it. Notation is a language, just like any other - you have to get a firm grasp on the individual syllables before you can expect to string words together with any degree of fluency. Books like Bellson etc do this in a systematic way, which is why I'm such a fan of them.

Anthony Vitti's Fingerfunk Workbooks are also great for working on rhythmic lines in a more musical context than a strict rhythm reading book.

[bassintheface]

It depends what I'm playing (piece and instrument) and also whether I'm reading the dots or playing through the changes of a progression I already know, but I always count and subdivide In some instances, but yes, counting is important - (a) to 'know' where you are in a bar / phrase and to 'tie' in with other instruments (b) to maintain tempo and to not rush 'inside the bar' if that makes sense.

Groove and feel is also important of course.

When playing with an orchestra, due to the tonnes & tonnes  of bars rest, I end up marking on key 'entries', then might count the last 4 bars or so then leading into my next entry.

[tinyd]

I recently came across a great Android app that seems to work pretty well - "Complete Rhythm Trainer". It has exercises where you tap along to rhythms and it scores you accordingly. I'm sure there are other out there but this one works well for me.

[RCMJ]

Here's another one of my basic rhythm series videos, beat one and then the off beat. 

Format is the same as the others, 8 bars each time with two bars rest. This is played with a pick upstroke/downstroke. Same as the other videos, the idea is to absorb the rhythms and the notation which pops up as you play a long:

https://youtu.be/dsZoi_lHw-s

[Bilbo]

There comes a point where you 'see' rhythms as a lump in the same way you see words not letters or phrases not words. It all comes with practice. 

[wishface]

Thanks for the replies

[JapanAxe]

On 08/01/2020 at 18:56, Bilbo said:

There comes a point where you 'see' rhythms as a lump in the same way you see words not letters or phrases not words. It all comes with practice. 

It's down to pattern recognition. Eventually se a rhythm written and you recognise it and play it, rather than having to work it out.

[RCMJ]

I've been steadily uploading a set of basic rhythmic patterns to my YouTube channel.

There's still some more to go but I've made a playlist....hopefully this will help you internalise and learn to recognise the notation of some basic patterns, think of them as the building blocks of more complex rhythms....exactly as Bilbo says above!

 

[paul_c2]

19 hours ago, JapanAxe said:

It's down to pattern recognition. Eventually se a rhythm written and you recognise it and play it, rather than having to work it out.

This.

Occasionally you'll see a rhythm written in a "funny" way and you have to stop and think, for example:

 

[Bilbo]

1 minute ago, paul_c2 said:

This.

Occasionally you'll see a rhythm written in a "funny" way and you have to stop and think, for example:

 

That's just badly presented.