All about rhythm - part 4

What is Rhythm?

I hope by now you can remember the last three notes we went through, that is, the semibreve, minim and the crotchet and also their respective values. In this post, we will take a look at how it is all put together to make rhythm happen. I will put these notes within boxes or what is called in music, bars, with no more than 4 beats to each box or bar. There will be two bars for each one of the examples and they will look something like this.
Example 1




Example 2




Example 3




As you may have noticed, the notes are all the same. Each of the two bar examples will form what we call, a rhythm. A rhythm can be formed with anything from one bar to any number of bars. Now we will try to clap out these three simple rhythms. In order to know when to clap, we will put a count under each note like below, to help to show you when to clap. Keep a steady count like 1, 2, 3, 4. At any time you see a note above the number that you are counting; you clap your hands together. Remember, that it is very important to try to keep your counting at a steady pulse.
Example 1




Example 2




Example 3




In the next step, I have included 3 simple audio file that you can use to help you clap at a steadier pace. Try it out for yourself. It is based on exactly the same examples as above except there are 4 bars of rhythm plus one extra bar at the beginning. The first bar you do not clap because that is the first 4 beats which we call the “count-in”. That is to give you an idea of the speed you need to count at. The sound of the bell is to let you know it is the first beat. So, are you ready to try? Let’s go.
Example 1


Example 2


Example 3


See you in the next post for some more exciting rhythm playing stuff!

All about rhythm - part 3

What is Rhythm?

By now, you might have realised that rhythm is simply the backbone of whatever music that you want to make. You can create rhythm even by simply clapping your hands together, but before you can make any rhythm sound proper, you need to have pulse. What is pulse, you might ask?

This pulse has a tempo or speed to which listeners can feel and tap their foot or dance along with the piece of music, and is usually called its common name the ‘beat’. In music and music theory, the pulse consists of beats in a repeating series.

How can we describe a beat? A beat can be described in a way a coin gets its value. Like a 10 cent coin has a value of 10 smaller one-cent values in one coin instead of in 50 coins. So in that way, each one-cent value would represent a 'beat'.

In music, one of the first things that are usually taught to students are note values. Traditionally, students are required to recognize these values and recreate the rhythm from memorizing patterns. These are good disciplines but sometimes do take away the 'feel' of the rhythm and will make music sound very mechanical. You will want to make music that feels 'alive' and not robotic.

Let's have a look at these note values and understand how they work. We will start with the simple ones first.

The first of these values would be the long note which is called the semibreve. This is long because it holds a value of 4 beats. Think of a semibreve as a 4 cent coin which has a value of 4 one-cent values in one coin. A semibreve would look like this.

Next would be the minim note which has a value of 2 beats which is halve of a semibreve. A minim looks like a semibreve but with a line down the side of it.

And the next would be the crotchet note which has a value of 1 beat, again which is half of a minim. A crotchet looks like this.

A simple way I would use to help me remember the values of the three notes above is that the first note has a value of 4 beats, if it has a line beside it, then that would make it half which is 2 beats, and then if it has the color black in the middle, that would half it again making it 1. Try to remember this and in the next post we will be able to see how all this is going to work.

All about rhythm - part 2

What is Rhythm?

The simplest form of rhythm can be described in the way our heart beats. If you place your ear against your friend’s chest, you will be able to hear his heart beat. It beats in a certain kind of regular time. This time is almost very even. When the person is active like after walking up the stairs, you will hear it beat faster, but as the heart beats faster, it is still in an almost regular speed. That is rhythm. That is a simple example of how rhythm affects our lives directly.

In continuing from the last post, if you had looked around you, you would have found lots of things that could make sounds like drums. Some of them would be your parents' kitchen simple stuff like a frying pan, wok, a cooking pot and even your school lunch box. Besides these items, others would be an empty shoe box, a dustbin and even empty plastic buckets. All these items can be used to make sounds like drums although not exactly with the same sound as an actual drum but still it is a sound.

You can also make sounds with other stuff like beating a pair of chopsticks together, spoons and other stuff that is hard. When you hit these stuff to make a sound in a regular pattern, you have a rhythm. In this post, I have included a music clip which contains the sound of tribal drums. Tribal drums look something like this.


Listen to the clip. You can use two pencils or a pair of chopsticks to hit each on a shoe box to make a sound. Hit them together and try to follow along with the audio.


Now in the next clip, you have some sounds made with a set of modern drums. Modern drums look like this.


You will find a lot of these modern drums when you see bands playing. Now listen to this and you can hear quite a lot of difference between tribal drums and modern drums.


Assignment:
After listening to the above two clips, can you spot at least three differences between tribal drums and modern drums?

All about rhythm

What is Rhythm?

In this post and with the following posts, I will attempt to explain the very basics of rhythm and how important it is to music. It is very important that students and parents understand this element as it forms the very backbone of how music is created and how rhythm makes music more interesting. We will start at the very beginning and work

on it step by step along the way. We will also look into some history of the early beginnings of rhythm and the instruments used. Some posts will also have a little quiz at the end. See if you can figure it out.

To begin with, other than the melody, rhythm is one of the most basic important parts of music. Rhythm is just the timing of notes or sounds that are made. Hmm, that sounds simple enough. If you look around you, you will be able to notice that, rhythm happens almost always in our life.

Many early forms of music were made up of only the sound of beating of drums, sticks or anything that will make a sound even clapping of hands.

Early tribal people would beat on drums for many reasons. In Africa, the drum is used to communicate across distances, something like the way we use our phone today.

This beating of drums was also an important part of a performance carried out in religious and community rituals like in a funeral or marriage ceremony.

In western America, the native Indians used drums and chants (a kind of singing with not much musical form) to bring the rain!

In China, red drums have always been a symbol of the power of the ruler and the destiny of the army. Drums are brought out whenever there were ceremonies or festivities. Weddings and funerals and all ceremonial occasions demand the insistent beat of drums. The two oldest drums found in China came from the Zia dynasty, the first dynasty of China, approximately 4,000 years ago. They were found near the Yellow River at a place called Taosi.

One of the drums is a meter high and made of a hollow tree trunk. In its day, it had a skin across the upper opening and was painted red, as drums of China often continue to be. According to ancient writings, human blood was rubbed into drums for magical purposes, but the colouring on this ancient drum came from another source.

The other drum from Taosi is made of clay. A pot used as a drum was also quite common in ancient times.

Assignment:

Can you look around your house and find out what are the things that you have, that can make drum sounds?