In this second part of the post, we zoom out a little from the nuts and bolts of the rhythm, get a little more philosophical, and ask whether we ‘really know that rhythm’ from the angle of what the rhythm really means. We’re talking less about whether we ‘know’ the rhythm and more about whether we understand it.
Playing with intent
I have definitely felt that understanding the meaning, context and purpose of a rhythm in its original context changes the way I learn, internalise and perform it. Hence wanting to write this blog! Have you felt this too?
I’d say a compelling performance on any instrument (or even any art) is one of intent. If there's no intention behind your notes played (or your brush strokes on the canvas, or the words you recite in a poem) then what are you doing, exactly?
In the context of our group, sometimes the intention might be simply to energise the audience. That's often enough of a reason to love this music. Listening back to those same early recordings of myself and my band, this is one of the things we definitely were getting right from the early days.
But, often going deeper by playing the rhythms their roots, ancestry and original context in mind will bring out something more. In my experience it makes it more satisfying and meaningful to play, and in turn more compelling to watch.
The meaning of the rhythm
I’m not suggesting that rhythms are some sort of morse code to convey a literal message. Their meaning is much more visceral than that, and often impossible to put into words. It relates to both your own internal experience of and the cultural context of that rhythm.
Imagine you and your equally musical twin both learned how to play the same rhythm, but they learned it directly from a mestre in Brazil and you learned it later from their notebook. They learned it in the very birthplace of that style of music, alongside people who live and breathe it, rubbing shoulder to shoulder with the sweaty bodies of the crowd dancing to it, while you learned it from a distorted video on their phone. Who do you think would have a better sense of that rhythm, a better understanding of how it feels to play it and what the intent could be behind it?
I’m not saying that you can’t learn to perform it to the same standard as each other, but I do think you would have a harder time putting on an authentic performance or making it mean as much to you or the audience.
Even then, when you perform that rhythm, are you in the same headspace as your twin? Are you performing from the same place within yourself as they are?
Take this to the next level and try to teach this rhythm, and I would suggest that the differences will be multiplied.
In another analogy, imagine trying to recount a bedtime story your mother used to read to you decades ago. You could probably recount the deep structure and the sentiment of the story even if you can’t remember the exact wording of all the sentences. You might remember some flashes of the images on the well-thumbed pages, but forget some of the names of the characters. It would probably bring back some strong emotions as you recall the story, maybe even the smell of your family home. Maybe you’d interpret the same story in a new light through your life-wisened eyes. Now imagine someone else reading that same story out loud from the book in front of you. They would now be reciting it perfectly word for word, but it certainly wouldn’t mean the same thing to them as your remembered version. It wouldn’t be read in the same way your mother used to read it, that’s for sure. To anyone else listening, maybe it wouldn’t be as heart-warming a moment, either.
What I’m getting at is that the way we perform a rhythm is inevitably influenced by where we learned it, what it meant to us when we learned it, what it has meant to us in previous performances, and what it means to us in that moment of performance. All of this is above and beyond the nuts and bolts of the rhythm itself and all of which becomes richer the more we learn about the rhythm. A robot (or computer drum track or voice recorder) replaying a rhythm perfectly won’t have the same impact as someone embodying the rhythm in front of you.
A robot replaying a rhythm, however perfectly, won’t have the same impact as someone embodying the rhythm in front of you.
Learning from source
No excuse for taking your teacher’s word as gospel. Go and investigate for yourself...
A Brazilian mestre tours Europe and videos are shared of the cool new breaks they taught in the workshops. You could learn that material from the video without having to pay and travel to the workshop, and would definitely learn something. But you don't know what you didn't learn from the workshop. You don't know the context in which that material was presented, what it meant to the mestre, why and how it came into existence, how the mestre and his directors taught it, etc. This is a much bigger part of our learning than the rhythms themselves.
It’s not generally possible for us to go to deepest, darkest Brazil and visit the oldest surviving member of the original group that created that rhythm in the 1800s. But I think that the closer we get to the source of a rhythm, the better we can understand it, remember it and perform it.
Thankfully, we can do this much easier than ever before. YouTube, for example, allows us to have a bird’s eye view of baterias performing their latest material, with very clear video and sound, all while you munch on cornflakes in your kitchen 5000 miles away. Or you can visit the living room of a world-famous musician for a private lesson. While this never going to be a substitute for being there in person, it does mean that we can very close to source, very easily.
So, there is no excuse for taking your teacher’s word as gospel! Go and investigate for yourself how a rhythm should sound and the setting in which it’s traditionally played.
Learning to listen
In the course of learning any instrument, you don’t just learn to play but also learn to hear. As you become a better musician, you become not only more capable of performing accurately but also more aware of when you aren’t.
...more capable of performing accurately and more aware of when you aren’t.
This highlights a big difficulty with mixing abilities in a musical ensemble! You become more aware not only of your own mistakes but those of others. (Apply this to the idea of a community percussion group, where the focus is entirely on groove but often with less experienced drummers, and it’s no wonder samba bands have a bad rep in some circles)!
When I hear recordings of me playing a basic samba groove years ago, the same pattern that I play now, I cringe! I was playing it right to my ear at the time, and right on paper, and probably right to everyone listening at the time, but what’s changed is my improved ability to hear the rhythm and improved understanding of how it ‘should’ sound.
I think we should all be aware of this as part of learning every rhythm.
With that attitude, each time your teacher is stood in front of you playing a rhythm, try to really listen to the sound they are making. Don’t just check the handing or the pattern, pay attention to the timing, the accents, the swing, the ghost notes and put a little of those into your own playing. When you’re listening to music, try to tune into the subtleties of the performance. When you are playing alongside someone else (who’s playing well), try to really listen to their sound and your sound together as one, adjusting your sound to add to it, not distract from it, adjusting your swing to synchronize together as much as possible.
On the positive side, when you reach the level of being able to do this well, it takes on a magical new form. I like the Portuguese word ‘sintonizado’ (as in a well tuned-in analogue radio) to describe this idea of being perfectly in sync.
Levels of detail
You really understand a rhythm when you understand what notes can you take out of it.
In my teaching of music (not only percussion), I have increasingly found it helpful for students to understand a phrase in layers of detail. This is hard to explain without demonstrating a rhythm, but to put it into words let’s imagine a groove as a sentence.
Level 1: The cat sat on the mat.
Level 2: The lazy cat sat on the doormat.
Level 3: The lazy cat, after wolfing down a big meal, relaxed on the plush new doormat.
These describe the same thing in three levels of detail. When learning a rhythm, try doing the same thing; learn in parallel levels of detail rather than a static sequence of notes one after the other.
Try to focus on the important notes first. Then, when you’ve got that down, flesh them out with the less important ones for more feel. Then, when you’ve got that, throw in a variation for flair and energy.
Your understanding of the rhythm will be much stronger than if you had just jumped into learning the complicated rhythm from start to finish.
Here's a video of someone putting this idea into action. Starting with one drum, a simple ijexá pattern, adding one foot, then effortlessly riffing in more and more complexity until playing 6 instruments at the same time, freely flowing and without losing the feel of an ijexá.
The essence of the rhythm
It's equally important to apply these levels of detail the other way around - boil down the rhythm to its simplest form. Which notes are the less important ones? Which ones can you take out without losing the rhythm’s identity? To do this requires an understanding of the style as a whole.
In learning from a range of different sources (as above) you will inevitably learn different versions of the same rhythm. Often thinking in layers is a good way to make sense of this. Some layers might be more complex, like a face-melting solo variation, while another might be a very subtle difference in pattern, instrumentation, articulation or feel. Just look at how every mestre of a bateria of the samba schools in Rio teaches a slightly different arrangement of the samba groove.
Even beyond the samba schools, there are countless ways to play a ‘samba’, on countless instruments. Some very simple, some very complex. Some are only a ‘level 1’ or ‘level 2’ in their entirety, some feel like a ‘level 10’! To understand what makes them all a samba, and to understand what notes you can take out of the ‘level 10’ but for it to still be a samba, means you really understand the rhythm.
Do you really know that rhythm? A checklist.
Tying together everything in Part 1 and Part 2, here's a little checklist for you to test your own understanding of some of the rhythms you play. Ask yourself:
Am I really listening to it?
Does it sound the same as when my teacher/my bandmate plays it?
Will I remember it in a week’s time?
Would I be able to teach it to someone else?
Would I be able to play it while relaxed, smiling, stepping, and engaging with the audience?
Would I be able to start it in a different way or on a different part of the pattern?
Would I be able to play it while saying something out loud or singing?
Would I be able to play it at very different tempos? Try a metronome.
Do I understand why I’m playing it at that tempo?
Do I understand why I’m playing that combination of notes?
Do I understand how I could add or remove levels of detail without it losing its identity?
What do I understand about the roots of the rhythm; who originally played it and where is it performed today?