Re: POLYRHYTHMIC COUNTERPOINT

[andy butler <akbutler@tiscali.co.uk>]

mark francombe wrote:

> clever to me, and Im very impressed with the head patting tummy stroking 
> IS 7 beats against 5 a pleasant "musical" sound, if 
> you remove the er... 16ths.. well not 16ths... but you know what I mean?
> 

The trouble with odd times is that people tend to 
think that getting the notes in right place is *success*,
and leave it at that.

A stiff 4/4 where you see the player's lips move as they
go "1 er and a..." isn't much fun to listen to.
Same with polyrhythms.

I can just about do 7 against 5 with right and left hands.
It's not practical to think of the subdivisions, to 
learn it you have to
1) work out a beat so that the 2 hands are at least tapping
away in the right places. 
2) get in going, in this case with the right hand doing a regular
    7 tap, and the left flapping away at an inaccurate travesty of 5.
3) make a perceptual shift to listen to the left hand, and then even it
  up.

..it feels good when hearing the 5 get even, and the 7 sort of running 
away over the top,
but musical?..... well one day maybe.


When I'm allowed to play drums (not often) I have a 5 against 4 beat where 
the
left hand in 4 plays 3 toms in sequence while the right hand stays
on the ride, a poly within poly effect...I think it sounds cool,
especially if I can get the kick on every other beat of the 5 ( another 
simple poly).

I guess that makes the tom figure in 3/1.25

..or the ride in 5/0.8


andy