Scribd
Upload
114 views2 pages

General Rhythmic Profile: Some Basic Rhythms in Jazz

Uploaded by

Sofiane Mouelhi

The document discusses several basic rhythmic styles in jazz including swing, Latin, bebop, and ballad. Swing refers to elongating the first of two eighth notes and shortening the second. Latin rhythm features articulating the 'and' of beats 2 and 4. Bebop is a very fast or slow style with improvised eighth note lines often ending in a two note figure. Ballads are slow with optional ornamentation.

Copyright:

© All Rights Reserved
Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
Download as pdf or txt

General Rhythmic Profile: Some Basic Rhythms in Jazz

Uploaded by

Sofiane Mouelhi
114 views2 pages
The document discusses several basic rhythmic styles in jazz including swing, Latin, bebop, and ballad. Swing refers to elongating the first of two eighth notes and shortening the second. Latin rhythm features articulating the 'and' of beats 2 and 4. Bebop is a very fast or slow style with improvised eighth note lines often ending in a two note figure. Ballads are slow with optional ornamentation.

Original Description:

tyuiop

Original Title

Basic Rhythms

Copyright

© © All Rights Reserved

Available Formats

PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

The document discusses several basic rhythmic styles in jazz including swing, Latin, bebop, and ballad. Swing refers to elongating the first of two eighth notes and shortening the second. Latin rhythm features articulating the 'and' of beats 2 and 4. Bebop is a very fast or slow style with improvised eighth note lines often ending in a two note figure. Ballads are slow with optional ornamentation.

Copyright:

© All Rights Reserved
Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
Download as pdf or txt
114 views2 pages

General Rhythmic Profile: Some Basic Rhythms in Jazz

Uploaded by

Sofiane Mouelhi
The document discusses several basic rhythmic styles in jazz including swing, Latin, bebop, and ballad. Swing refers to elongating the first of two eighth notes and shortening the second. Latin rhythm features articulating the 'and' of beats 2 and 4. Bebop is a very fast or slow style with improvised eighth note lines often ending in a two note figure. Ballads are slow with optional ornamentation.

Copyright:

© All Rights Reserved
Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
Download as pdf or txt
You are on page 1/ 2

Some basic rhythms in jazz

General Rhythmic Profile


While so called traditional music (form the common practice era and beyond) accentuates the
fist and third beats in 4/4 meter, jazz, blues, pop, rock, etc. has an accentuation on beats two
and four, known as a backbeat. This is especially noticeable in the drums, where the hi hat is
stepped-on on those beats.

A great way to get an applied sense of a backbeat (in the absence of a drummer) is to set a
metronome at half the intended tempo of whatever is being practiced. Then align the slower
pulses with beats 2 & 4 while practicing/playing.

Beat/count: 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
Metronome: click click click click

This will actually be hard at first, because one usually associates the click of a metronome with
the downbeat (beat 1). But over time it will become a seemingly natural way to play and will
prepare you for playing with a real drummer.

Swing

While swing Music is characterized as a style of jazz associated with the Big Band era of the
1930s, the term swing can generally refer to a way of handling rhythm. Whether in 4/4
(most common) or 3/4, swinging refers to taking what would usually be evenly dispersed
eight notes and instead grouping them in pairs so that the first of the two is longer and the
second is proportionally shorter. Typically (and moreover approximately), the first eighth note
(longer) is treated as two tied eighths within an eighth-note triplet figure; the second eighth
(shorter) is treated like the third eighth of the triplet figure.

or

While this description can be captured with the above notation, it is not notated as such and
should be felt rather than read. In notation, the pair of eighth notes are noted as just that,
but sometimes with the additional performance instruction of swing written at the top of the
score, as exemplified in the chart of Duke Ellingtons It Dont Mean A Thing:

But in most cases, it is just assumed that the interpreter of the chart will handle the rhythm as
swing and no specific instruction is given beyond a general tempo and/or something vague
like jazz:
Latin

A Latin rhythm is generally characterize a rhythm section and bass line that articulates the
and of 2 & 4 in a 4/4 meter at a medium tempo. |: 1..(2) & 3..(4) & :|

Like swing, the notated melody in a chart might not indicate such a rhythm, but it may be
instructed at the top of the chart with the expectation that the players will know how to affect
such a rhythm.

Bebop (Bop)

Bebop refers to a very fast (or very slow), complex style developed in the 1940s that
incorporated improvised lines of eighth notes often ending with a two-note figure (sounding
like be-bop).

Ballad

The ballad is a slow tempo song, often with the drums utilizing brushes instead of sticks in
order to imply a gentle atmosphere. Because of its slow tempo, the ballad often allowed
players to insert lavish improvised lines and runs, displace rhythms and incorporate
reharmonized and altered chords. Such choices were, of course, up to the player and the chart
itself would not indicate where such insertions should be made (i.e. the chart appeared to be
rather ordinary).

Harmonic implications

Interestingly, regardless of these different rhythmic styles (and there are many more!), the
use of harmony and chord progressions is remarkably similar. This will be discussed
separately...

You might also like