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Timing who needs a mentronome?

#41
jeffbonny said:
Pause to think that metronome use in music is less than 500 years old.
It's highly improbable that there were no musicians with good time before then. The metronome has corrupted the meaning of good time into metronomic or mechanical time.
What was the definition of good time before metronomes existed?
Click to expand...
"Hey, did that sound in time to you guys?"

"Yeah."

"Pretty much."

"I liked it."

Always worked for me.
 
#43
But my time has been pretty darn good most of the time and I never touched a metronome or drum machine till the early 90's and I've been playing music since I was a little kid in the 60's.
 
#44
JimmyM said:
But my time has been pretty darn good most of the time and I never touched a metronome or drum machine till the early 90's and I've been playing music since I was a little kid in the 60's.
Click to expand...

Well, that's just great. Does that mean that you can't comprehend how some other players might benefit from metronome training?
 
#45
guy n. cognito said:
In car racing, it is said that one must learn to drive in control before learning to drive out of control. Playing music in time is the same concept. I've met some really good players with horrible timing
Click to expand...

The metronome actually kills control by suppressing your internal sense of time.

Those who think criticism of the metronome is unique to Jeff Berlin should check this out: Quotes critical of the metronome.
 
#46
jeffbonny said:
The metronome actually kills control by suppressing your internal sense of time.

Those who think criticism of the metronome is unique to Jeff Berlin should check this out: Quotes critical of the metronome.
Click to expand...

That's an interesting opinion. Others, however, hold the opinion that the metronome is a tool by which to develop you internal sense of time.
 
#47
JimmyM said:
Metronomes are the death of music. I'll give you two great examples...
Click to expand...

Those two examples aren't of practicing with a metronome specifically, they are examples of recording to one, which I agree has taken a lot away from recorded music in recent times, since most things are recorded to a click these days. Big difference between using a metronome as a reference when you practice and making sure all your recordings use one.

Nothing in the world beats playing live with a great drummer but since I don't have the space for a drumset in my practice room, have neighbors who might not like the constant drumming, and I'm not close personal friends with Charlie Watts, I use the next best thing to practice, a metronome. You can still rush or delay subdivisions to get a certain feel if you set the click only on the beat, you can get even more freedom if you set it only on the back beats or downbeats too. To me it's all in how you use the tool.
 
#52
the yeti said:
but does precise timing always equal good timing? in some situation the answer is clearly yes, but are there situations where precision reduces "feel"?
Click to expand...

Have you ever heard of playing behind the beat? It has its place, like in slow jazz ballads when you don't necessarily want the rhythm section "pushing" the song forward. However, you still need to play consistently behind the beat.

Swung notes are typically notated with a quarter-note/eighth-note triplet split, but the actual weighting of notes is entirely felt. Now, arguably, this is a case where feel trumps, but there is still a solid beat and notes have to be hit on those specific beats, so you still need the precision.

I would say that no, precision does not reduce feel.
 
#53
FunkMetalBass said:
Have you ever heard of playing behind the beat? It has its place, like in slow jazz ballads when you don't necessarily want the rhythm section "pushing" the song forward. However, you still need to play consistently behind the beat.

Swung notes are typically notated with a quarter-note/eighth-note triplet split, but the actual weighting of notes is entirely felt. Now, arguably, this is a case where feel trumps, but there is still a solid beat and notes have to be hit on those specific beats, so you still need the precision.

I would say that no, precision does not reduce feel.
Click to expand...

This.
Besides, isn't "the feeling" defined by playing the right note AT THE RIGHT TIME?
 
#54
guy n. cognito said:
In your opinion, of course.
Click to expand...

In my informed opinion. I've been using the metronome for about 40 years and been thinking hard about its real value for over ten. I still use a metronome for some specific practice playing different places in relation to the absolute center of the beat but I do not believe it will EVER teach someone "good" time.

What a lot of people fail to grasp is that time like amplitude and attack is dynamic. Always playing with metronomic time is like always playing with a compressor set to heavy limiting.
 
#56
I'm a self taught drummer who learned without a metronome. I started with a pretty decent sense of time at the outset and developed it over time by playing with other players. My sense of time developed quite nicely that way. That said, I think a metronome is a very useful tool and it certainly wouldn't harm anyone to use one.
 
#57
jeffbonny said:
Pause to think that metronome use in music is less than 500 years old.
It's highly improbable that there were no musicians with good time before then. The metronome has corrupted the meaning of good time into metronomic or mechanical time.
What was the definition of good time before metronomes existed?
Click to expand...

if you are going back that far, what ever the conductor decided.
 
#59
GeoffT said:
Those two examples aren't of practicing with a metronome specifically, they are examples of recording to one, which I agree has taken a lot away from recorded music in recent times, since most things are recorded to a click these days. Big difference between using a metronome as a reference when you practice and making sure all your recordings use one.

Nothing in the world beats playing live with a great drummer but since I don't have the space for a drumset in my practice room, have neighbors who might not like the constant drumming, and I'm not close personal friends with Charlie Watts, I use the next best thing to practice, a metronome. You can still rush or delay subdivisions to get a certain feel if you set the click only on the beat, you can get even more freedom if you set it only on the back beats or downbeats too. To me it's all in how you use the tool.
Click to expand...
That does nothing for your internal sense of time, though. That makes it fun for you and gives you a beat to work with, but if you turn it off, are you lost? I seriously doubt it.
 

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