Way to improve the ability to keep rhythm

Question

I can count: "1-and 2-and 3-and 4-and ...", I can tap "one-two-three, one-two-three, ..."

But I find it difficult to actually play and count at the same time.

And the more difficult part is, clearly, subdivision.

Do you really count in your mind to the smallest time value? In 32th? Or 64th, for the whole duration of the piece? or only for measures which aren't "easy" (only quarter or eights)?

What happens to me is that I am usually rather precise at the start of the piece, then I get carried by the flow, and then I am out of rhythm and everything falls apart.

I am playing a wind instrument so there is the added difficulty of having to "steal" some time for inhaling or exhaling. I am a self-learner, having private lessons with a teacher is not an option due to the demands of work, family, ... but I would really like to improve since I am unsatisfied with my current "sloppy" playing.

What approach can I try to improve?

Answer 1

I play both piano and saxophone, and in my experience it is much harder to keep track of the rhythm while playing a wind instrument.

The first thing I would do is write out the counting numbers and clap the rhythms while counting out loud. The subdivisions are very important and, yes, those with good rhythm will keep track of the subdivisions throughout the entire piece. They are necessary for understanding the proportions of the lengths of the different notes. Clapping the rhythm while counting with the subdivisions should help your ear hear the pattern of note lengths. You can add other body movements to help you feel the beat as well, like tapping your toes or nodding your head a little. After clapping out the rhythms a few times, try playing it while counting silently in your head.

Focus on small amounts, a measure or two, at a time. Look at the piece and try to find rhythmic patterns that come back. You will begin to get a sense of how those repeated patterns feel, so you won't have to relearn them each time.

A metronome will come in handy, too, but it is only really useful after you have gotten the hang of counting the subdivisions. Use the feature that will make a special ding on beat one.

A little more about subdivision: How the music is subdivided really depends on what is happening rhythmically in the piece. If the piece's smallest notes are mainly 8th notes, it is really not necessary to count a smaller subdivision than that. The occasional 16th notes can be counted in when you get to them. But if a piece has a lot of 16th notes, it is useful to continually use that subdivision throughout the piece. If a piece has even smaller note values, like 32nd or 64th notes (not beginner pieces!), it is useful to use something smaller than a quarter note to equal the beat and subdivide proportionally from there. Most do not count smaller than four divisions per beat.

Answer 2

I don't think anyone really counts such a small subdivisions while playing. It's more like a rhythm of more complex and fast passages gets memorized as a "whole chunk" with practice. The more you are exposed to different types of rhythms the more natural they become.

Did you try playing with metronome and experimenting with setting it to click densely or sparsely and see how that helps to stay in sync.

Also try to tap and clap various rythms against the metronome to internalize different types of rhythms.

Answer 3

Do you really count in your mind to the smallest time value? In 32th? Or 64th, for the whole duration of the piece? or only for measures which aren't "easy" (only quarter or eights)?

If you want to improve just count the smallest value of the time and slow down the playback speed (0,5 or 0,75) and the counting (16th notes) . If the rhythm is even (e.g. 2/8=4/16) you can count the numbers 1-e-3-e-5- as 1,2,3 (just counting the 8th notes).

This is a good video for training:

A group of music teachers in our canton Bern has created a rhythm language that contained the most usual rhythm patterns (speaking the words of moving like stand,step, running, jumping, runing around etc referring to half notes, crotchets, 2 quavers, 4 16ths.) You can invent your own rhythm language using words (family names, first names, cities, countries, animals, vegetables that represent rhythm patterns and motifs).

Answer 4

I have two useful approaches for internalising rhythm, that help you maintain it over time and also get the feel for divisions of sixteenth notes. They helped me, so maybe you can try (though I never used a wind instrument)!

1: Play along to the song at different tempos while practising. A surprising amount of people learn bars of pieces just by reading sheet music, only listening to the song occassionally. I certainly did, and my rhythym suffered for it! Download a music slowing app the lets you change the tempo and if you learn bars at, say, 70% of original tempo, you can play along at that tempo. I use this on android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.smp.musicspeed, but maybe there's an ios equivelant.

2: Rhythm internalisation exercises (example pictured). Doing these let's you "feel" beat divisions intuitively. Similar to how your ear can detect harmonic intervals, you can detect the different subdivisions of a beat. There's a characteristic "feel" to each of the beat divisions. I use TA-KA-DI-MI as rhythmic solfege for 16th notes (so a full TA-KA-DI-MI is one quarter note), but you could use "1 e and a, 2 e and a..." or whatever suits. If you get good at these, all you need is accurate quarter notes and you can "feel" the accuracy of your eighths and sixteenths, and correct if you lose rhythym during play. So you don't need to count sixteenths, just quarters.

!

Answer 5

Let your body do the counting (e.g. of quarter notes) and your mind will be free to think about your playing. How many musicians tap their foot, nod their head or shake any other part of the body? For a reason!

As soon as your body helps you keeping track, it will be easier to keep the rhythm. This experience was huge for me ;-) It has to be practiced of course but to me it came quite easily...

Answer 6

I pretty much count everything. For simple pieces it's fairly unconscious, but if you stopped me at any given moment and asked exactly where I was, I'd know if I was on the and of 3 or whatever. If it's a highly syncopated piece my counting is much more active, and sometimes I'll even count aloud under my breath (I know, that's not practical for wind instruments.

I don't count anything faster than I can syllabify though - if it's 32nd notes or 64ths I'm counting the sixteenths.

In order to do that you need to be able to recognize the common ways things divide up. For example, one beat can divide into two eighths or subdivide into four sixteenths. You can also have eighth & two 16ths or two 16ths and an eighth, or 16th-8th-16th, or dotted eighth/16th or 16th/dotted eighth. So there aren't very many patterns.

To improve your rhythm you want to be able to feel any one of those patterns at sight. My advice would be to get a basic snare drum book (Rubank, Haskell Harr, Alfred drum method, etc.) and practice playing each of the exercises. Just pick a note and play the whole thing through articulating the one pitch.

Since snare drum parts don't have melody, you're removing a level of complication. I think you'll find your rhythm will improve after just a few days of doing that, and it'll improve quite a bit over two weeks or so.

Answer 7

I'd like to suggest an exercise which I believe will give you a very strong sense of time within 2-3 months. The exercise is quite enjoyable too. I'll first describe it and then explain the logic behind it.

Basically, buy a a pair of drumsticks and practice keeping time with them while you listen to music.

You can tap on any surface, but if you can afford to get a rubber drummer training pad that'll be even more enjoyable.

At first practice playing all the downbeats. Aim at playing so precisely that the sound of your tapping disappears into the music's downbeats.

Keep doing that until you can tap very precisely along with ordinary songs from beginning to end. at first you'll get distracted, confused, etc. but just keep going and your brain will get it, you'll eventually totally master this.

When the basic tapping becomes too easy, start to tap only on the upbeats. (Only on the "and" portions). It will be tricky at first, but again, keep practicing, it'll get easier and easier and eventually effortless.

When that becomes easy too, add some variations. For example, alternate one bar where you tap the down beats with one bar where you tap only the upbeats, or any other combination you fancy.

This can be very enjoyable too, because you can do it while listening to the music you like anyway. In fact, it will give you a better understanding of the music you hear, too.

This exercise leads to internalizing the sense of the beat to a very high degree.

And the reason is that your physical movement (moving the stick) and the sharp sound of each "tick" of the stick become deeply ingrained in your brain, and will go on subconsciously whenever you listen or play.

Notice that the same internalization will NOT happen if you only listen to the music passively -- you will have to practice coordinating a well defined physical movement (your arm's swinging the stick) with the beat of the music you hear. And you will also need to feed a very precise reference -- the sound of the stick hitting a surface -- to your brain as well. For example, if you only practiced by waving your arms like the director of an orchestra, you will not get the same benefit as using a drumstick, not even close.

My personal experience, when I figured out I could do this exercise and started doing it during long commutes (usually tapping the padding of the next seat on an empty bus I used to take daily) is that it made a dramatic impact in the quality of my sense of time, groove, and quality of playing.