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Do you count or feel rythms?

#61
An exercise I am trying to get into is writing out all the riffs I make up on staff paper. I never did very much of that before, but I am learning a lot by having to break down and count out the stuff I improvise. Highly recommended!

My answer to the question is feel, but good counting is the best tool for getting to the right feel quicker.
 
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#62
Usually if it’s a tricky rhythm, I start out by counting. After a few times practicing, I stop counting and can just feel it. I would say though, 90% of the time, maybe 95%, it’s feel from the jump. But if it’s a weird time or something I count until I can feel. Then I stop counting.
 
#66
Joe Nerve said:
Same as everyone else said... but I'll add...

That song is all over the faarikkken place. Unless in a Metallica tribute band, you couldn't pay me enough to learn that :) . And if I were in a Metallica tribute, I'd fight long and hard NOT to play it :) .
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If I went to see a Metallica trib, it would be the one song that I didn’t want to hear.

Edit: or anything after Justice...
 
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#67
Admittedly, I stick to more simple than sophisticated musics. But occasionally I run up on stuff I have to count initially, and then once I 'get it', I feel it. For me counting works for time, but there's no groove or the collective pull of guys playing together on a metronome: What was once magically idiosyncratic time or pitch wobbles on older recordings can now be magically corrected in the digital domain, and now Keith and Charlie could be more accurate than a Rolex, and quartet vocals now sound like 'choir' presets on a synth.

The wonder of the modern age !
 
#72
I guess I'll keep doing what I've been always doing. I play rythms without counting or putting too much thought to them until it becomes a problem. Sometimes when I learn something new I do some counting and thinking, but if I have to think too much then playing isn't fun for me.

I kind of regret mentioning that Metallica song because it's not the best example and some people didn't quite understand what I was talking about :D
Anyway I found a new way of "counting" it and after about two minutes of trying I started to "feel" and hear it differently :thumbsup: (I can't think numbers when I play but I try to hear or think some notes are kind of "bigger" than others)
There is another song where I had the same kind of problem and maybe I can start hearing that one differently too.
 
#76
IamGroot said:
If you read sheet music, you would have had the tune down by now
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I know I propably should. :D
But the part which I was talking about was something I actually understood, but I kept hearing it "wrong" when I was playing it.
The song was a bad example, but I had the same kind of problem when I played a melody/riff (with an electric guitar) in a Megadeth song called dread and the fugitive mind. Same kind of thing happened to me there when I tried repeating three notes which were not triplets but they made me hear "ooone two three one two three one two three...". And i completely lost track of where the "one" was and the melody doesn't even start on one so it was a problem.

I found a way to hear those kind of things differently and it makes it easier for me to play. I just have to remember not to listen to them like I used to.
 
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#77
kaljultdgl said:
I know I propably should. :D
But the part which I was talking about was something I actually understood, but I kept hearing it "wrong" when I was playing it.
The song was a bad example, but I had the same kind of problem when I played a melody/riff (with an electric guitar) in a Megadeth song called dread and the fugitive mind. Same kind of thing happened to me there when I tried repeating three notes which were not triplets but they made me hear "ooone two three one two three one two three...". And i completely lost track of where the "one" was and the melody doesn't even start on one so it was a problem.

I found a way to hear those kind of things differently and it makes it easier for me to play. I just have to remember not to listen to them like I used to.
Click to expand...
Sheet music, a metronome, and the courage and patience to read stuff as it written, not as you hear it is a great thing. I have been humbled more than a few times having to relearn what I thought heard.
 
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#80
Rusti said:
Would you say that reading sheet music makes counting superflous?
I'm relatively new to playing the bass and I sometimes struggle with reading, counting, tapping my foot and playing at the same time...
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I was discouraged from counting by my first teacher....who in retrospect while he had a lot of street cred and wrote a book on two handed tapping wasn't a very good teacher.

As a result of those early lessons I did my best to not count out rhythms for a long time..

Later in life, when I resumed some jazz and double bass studies, what did I discover ?Some of these guys counted..:woot:

I asked one of the instructors (sax guy) what his thoughts were on counting vs not counting, and his response was basically whatever it takes to get you through the tune.

As a result my thoughts on counting have changed. Ultimately the goal is to feel everything from the quarter note on down to smaller subdivisions, but that doesn't happen overnight. It only happens with lots of practice and lots of the right kind of practice.

For me, in a lot of ways that meant going to square one and counting/assigning numerical values to rhythms while i played them or tapped them out just to be able to further my understanding/feel for them.
 
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