Re: POLYRHYTHMIC COUNTERPOINT

[Per Boysen <perboysen@gmail.com>]

On Tue, Sep 7, 2010 at 1:11 PM, mark francombe <mark@markfrancombe.com> 
wrote:
> Im not completely sure that I GET when something is 7;4 for example, if
> there is a click click click on every beat. My mind makes it 4:4 cos I 
>LIKE
> that, Im comfortable with it. Fabios clicking video seems very clever to 
>me,
> and Im very impressed with the head patting tummy stroking aspect of it, 
>but
> IS 7 beats against 5 a pleasant "musical" sound, if you remove the er...
> 16ths.. well not 16ths... but you know what I mean?

Very interesting topic! :-)) Ten years ago I was only comfortable
playing (and imagining - "playing in the mind") the times 4/4 and 6/8.
I knew Dave Brubeck's classic Take Five and Paul McCartney's Bond
theme Live and Let Die with the riff in 5/4, but I had not played
hands-on in 5/4. Very much thanks to Rick's inspiration I started
learning 5/4 by tapping one hand's fingers, thumb indicating each
bar's downbeat, and thinking improvised melodies that fit in with that
groove. With that method it took a day to incorporate it with my usual
musical reactions so I could move on to using real instruments to play
in 5/4. The turning point is to get comfortable with the new groove,
so you won't have to think about it when improvising.

If looping with an EDP or with Mobius there is a good and fun exercise
you can do. Set the "8ths Per Cycle" to 5 or 10 and start doing
"Substitue Stuff" (replacing quantized slices of the loop with your
live audio input). I prefere 10 for playing in 5/4 because that makes
you substitute 8th notes - if one Cycle equals one bar, that is.

In my looping setup I keep a bunch of fast commands to switch "8ths
Per Cycle" for the particular reason of moving between different time
measures when improvising. But I restrict my options to these five:

- "8ths Per Cycle = 16" for playing normal four-on-the-floor music.
- "8ths Per Cycle = 10" for playing in 5/4.
- "8ths Per Cycle = 12" for playing in 6/8.
- "8ths Per Cycle = 14" for playing in 7/8 (this one I like very much).
- "8ths Per Cycle = 9" for playing in 9/8 (this is pretty new to me).

For each of these five alternatives I also have a special "fast
button" to set the grid to 64th note duration. This is for creating
glitchy granular loops that will nevertheless lock into the odd groove
as they evolve.

7/8 is a favorite of mine. This groove tends to give any noise you
play a mesmerizing rhythm. A simple but very rewarding trick. To learn
it quickly you can use the finger tapping method and imagine each bar
as "4 fingers + 3 fingers". A different approach to 7/8 would be "3
fingers + 4 fingers" per bar.

Per