Yes, it is. This always hung me up— the seemingly infinite tempo possibilities for any one thing you practice. It was a constantly lurking thing that I’m not doing this fast enough, and you would […]
Category: time
Very occasional quote of the day: ectopic pulse
Film editor Walter Murch talks about Richard Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries, conducted by George Solti, used in the famous “Charlie’s Point” scene in Apocalypse Now. Late in post-production Decca denied the filmmakers the right […]
Very occasional quote(s) of the day: consecrated and desynchronized
A couple of quotes from the pianist Ethan Iverson. From blog post Rhythmic Folklore: “Consecrated jazz drummers have less accurate time than rock and fusion drummers for a reason. The beat is connected to the […]
Very occasional quote of the day: Roy on time
“Mingus use to say the damndest thing about me years ago. He’d say, ‘Well, Roy Haynes. You don’t always play the beat, you suggest the beat!’ I didn’t know what the heck I was doing. […]
Counting the grid
It’s a *mechanical* tool, from way back. I had a conversation with a student about counting subdivisions when you practice— “the grid.” It’s a common thing to do, that I don’t recommend— not all the […]
Dealing with it: bad time
We’ll see if this becomes a regular feature: dealing with it. If anyone has thoughts, ideas, frustrations in real life playing situations, mention them in the comments, and maybe I can write something about it. […]
Time and whatnot
Object To Be Destroyed by Man Ray It is often said that in a musical ensemble, keeping time is everyone’s responsibility. And in some hypothetical quantum universe or other fantastical musical fairyland, people may actually […]
Very occasional quote of the day: Buddy’s time
From the bassist Chuck Bergeron who was in Buddy Rich’s band in the 80s: “One afternoon, after a couple of nights of feeling that he wasn’t happy with where I was placing the beat, I […]
Microtiming jive
Microtiming is a term that gives me hives every time I hear musicians use it. To me it suggests misaligned priorities, a disappearance up one’s own rear end, and the resulting degraded musical abilities. The […]
Very occasional quote of the day: Motian on time
“I believe that ‘time’ is always there. I don’t mean a particular pulse, but the time itself. It’s all there somehow like a huge sign that’s up there and it says time. It’s there and […]
Very occasional quote of the day: time in perspective
A good few lines about time from Robert Glasper, in an interview with Ethan Iverson: People worry about the metronome, “I’m not gonna move, I’m not gonna move!” because that means you are good. If […]
Gadd on time
Another item from Rick Mattingly’s 1983 Modern Drummer interview with Steve Gadd. It’s encouraging that a lot of the very common fuzzy talk about time makes no more sense to the greatest studio drummer in […]