Swinging with a metronome

[Yukio]

I think the terms swing, swung and shuffle get confused, along with syncopation. I’ve heard a lot of ukulele groups get stuck on the triplet feel shuffle for their island strum, and I wonder if it’s because it’s harder to play straight while strumming both up and down than it is to give it some asymmetry.

I agree @Mfturner, that the terms get jumbled up and confused. Please correct me if I am wrong, but I think of shuffle as exaggerated swing rhythm. Not quite as much as /dotted quarter, eighth, dotted quarter, eighth / (which sounds cartoonish to my ears) but shuffle is closer to this than swing on the spectrum between straight quarter notes and the dotted quarter and eighth notes extreme.

I would like it if you could explain a bit more the difference between triplet shuffle and island strum if you are able. Thanks!

 

[Yukio]

Before I watched Yukio's video, I imagined that he would actually make it swing by putting something under one side of the metronome, thereby interfering with the equal timing and rushing every other beat. It's a pretty fun thing to do, worth an experiment.

I have a metronome (my plastic Japanese Nikko) that I rescued from a thrift store. He had been dropped (?) at some point and his mechanism was knocked out of whack and thus produced a loping rhythm. I straightened it out as best I could, but I still have to put something under one side if I want to get perfect straight rhythm out of him.

 

[Yukio]

As alluded to by @Wiggy in his post above, the 2 & 4 are often called the 'back beats' in popular music. A metronome set for half-tempo can thus be used to emphasise these back beats in a rock, blues, or pop song, even if it is not swing. Here is an up-tempo number from Paul McCartney. I wanted to include the ritardando at the end, so to silence the metronome, I had to use a length of thread and a wine cork as a weight to arrest the swinging pendulum. Skip to 3:45 if you want to see just this part.

 

[Wiggy]

...What makes the clacking sound on this Jelly Roll Morton recording? It may be obnoxious to some, but I LOVE the fat wooden clack! sound that hits on every beat.

Sounds like a "flam."

<edit> ...on a wood block.

 

[Mfturner]

I’m no swinging expert, but i like what Aimee Nolte says in her videos (hope the link works):

Or her examples here:


When I use the word shuffle, I personally mean an exaggerated swing, like what you hear in a lot of blues (not all, BB King with the Thrill is Gone is straight). Most anything from Albert Collins is a shuffle, even faster tempo stuff, just listen to the bass lines.



Hmm, first attempt was blocked, too bad…

 

[UkerDrew]

This is brilliant @Yukio and perfect timing for me so thanks Tim for sharing it. Learning this half time back beat trick before I really start practicing with my new metronome is going to save me so much time! I've always had a feel for swing but I tend to drift around it when doing jazzier stuff on my baritones so I can't wait to revisit some of those songs I worked out before but now with a solid 2/4 to back me up.

 

[GreatPotoo]

Yes, just another reason to like @Yukio !
Although, I admit, I haven't been playing against a beat lately, I have put in my time (pun intended). Here's a few of my beat boxes.
View attachment 153589
Great instructional and motivational video @Yukio .

Is that Seth Thomas from the sixties? It looks exactly like the one we had in north Minneapolis. Takes me back!

 

[Renaissance-Man]

Is that Seth Thomas from the sixties? It looks exactly like the one we had in north Minneapolis. Takes me back!

Yes, it is. I got it when I was 13 years old. My wife, also my high school sweetheart, packed it up for me when I moved from my parents house.

 

[GreatPotoo]

It really takes effort to digest this thread. You are really making me think. Thanks Tim, Yukio, and everybody for helping me focus on something so interesting and positive. It's actually been years since I studied music and it's all coming back to me. Back then I thought, I dunno, maybe I thought I knew it all. Since I found you, I'm blown away every day by extreme interest. Thanks for helping me live again!

 

[GreatPotoo]

Yes, it is. I got it when I was 13 years old. My wife, also my high school sweetheart, packed it up for me when I moved from my parents house.

I'm certain it's the very same one. That's great. Good for her!

No idea what happened to ours. Maybe it's still there. One of my kids bought the house.

 

[Yukio]

Here is something that is mentioned in discussions on playing with a metronome, but I don't think it has been mentioned yet in this thread; when you are exactly on the beat with the metronome, the sound of the metronome essentially disappears.

This evening, the YouTube algorithm surfaced this old video I made. In it, I am playing a classic swing tune with the metronome set to beat out the 2 & 4. As I count in the tune, I am pretty much with the metronome at the start, but you can clearly hear the clicks; so I am not perfectly in the pocket. By the second verse, there are fairly long sections where you can barely make out the clicks. This is where I am really in-sync with the metronome, playing right on top of the 2 & 4.

This is not to say that this is something you are trying for all the time. It can be an artistic choice to land a little ahead or behind the beat. But it would be good if you can also make the choice to play exactly on the beat as well.

Disclaimer: I found out later that the song was written by Chu Berry with lyrics by Andy Razaf. Even though Fats Waller made a well-known recording of the song, he didn't actually write the music.

 

[casualmusic]

Driving the ukulele tempo from beats 2 and 4 is similar to mandolin which is another trebly instrument voice.

This makes a nice separation from bass instrument sounds on Beats 1 and 3.

It’s magical to walk up to a string band session in the gloaming and hear the heartbeat bass-treble, bass-treble pattern under the singing.

 

[Yukio]

Driving the ukulele tempo from beats 2 and 4 is similar to mandolin which is another trebly instrument voice.

This makes a nice separation from bass instrument sounds on Beats 1 and 3.

It’s magical to walk up to a string band session in the gloaming and hear the heartbeat bass-treble, bass-treble pattern under the singing.

The same formula applies to swing. Bass on 1 & 3. Chording rhythm instrument (guitar, banjo, ukulele, piano, etc.) on 2 & 4.

 

[Doug W]

Very good video. I have been using the metronome lately to try and reign in my sins. While going through an Irish fiddle tunes book, trying to learn the tunes on both uke and mandolin, I decided to check my progress against a metronome and found that I had been slowing down on the hard parts and then speeding up on the easier parts.

Now I start at a speed where I can play the whole thing, then slowly speed up.

 

[Oldscruggsfan]

I completely missed this entire thread when first posted back in June. Thank you for reviving it! I needed to know the difference between beat and tempo and thanks to @Yukio , now I do!

 

[jtsteam]

Just as a random observation, since I've seen this thread pop up... it's for other people to judge, but I'm pretty sure that the single biggest thing that's helped me is routinely practising with a click of some form. The click is unforgiving. It is so much better to play the wrong note or the wrong chord at the right time than to play the right note just after people expected it. Don't make people trip up when they're dancing!

When I'm watching people play the uke on SOTU (for example), and I have a shaker or some other percussion instrument handy, I might grab it and shake along. Usually it works fine . But please don't make me put it down!