Metronome

[gardo]

Does anyone use an actual metronome to practice? I don't ,I need a syncopated beat

 

[gardo]

This is why classical performers can't improvise, do jazz or put feeling into anything. The metronome turns them into a pianola.

 

They used to make me use one at the guitar institute:( I actually have a proper pendulum metronome, unused for many years. Cubase also wants you to play to a click track which is more about convenience for the software mechanics than music

For a band timing is important but for a subtly different reason. Synchronization and mechanical timing are not the same thing.

You know more about this than I do. A steady tempo is important and I tap my foot like a metronome but I can't listen to one when I play.

I need something more like this for example

[video=youtube_share;2ewJbvsAiLI]

[1001gear]

Good classical musicians have more musical feel than specialists in any other music genre.. Not only does their palate run the gamut of musical expression, the application of expression and nuance must be liquid and navigate more parameters and stricter criteria than pop music and jazz genre. Further, professional musicians (actual experts - not the garden variety gigger) must be versed in performance at the highest levels and guess what drives this? Rock steady time. Without this, there's nothing to stabilize the feel. You get the antsyness the 60s and 70s; sounds incompetent, however deliberate.

[WRGKMC]

I started out in music playing violin and I never really needed to use one. I've always excellent tempo. I been using drum machines instead of metronomes for about 25 years now. Having a choice of full beats is so much better then using a click because you can nail down all kinds of grooves, plus it more natural for a guitarist that plays with drummer live.

 

The best part is you can focus on various parts of the drum beat to play different parts. You have the kick for backing bass parts, snare for back beats, toms for fills and cymbals and other percussion for all kinds of riffs and chords within the beat you can trigger off of.

 

The beat gives you're playing the backing to you can elevate your playing much higher then playing solo or using a click too. Of course many units have a clicker too, but having 300+ different beats plus the ability to swap sets like you can on some of these newer units like Zoom and Rolland plus the ability to build your own beats is light years ahead of an antiquated metronome.

 

Not to say a metronome isn't a big step up from using nothing at all, its just so much better and more inspiring to use full drum beats over a click, once you're past the basics and are actually playing full songs. It does make you work harder and more consistently too. It doesn't get tired and it doesn't wait for you to catch up. If you have a tempo problem you find out soon enough.

 

I can say I've played with some acoustic players who have never used any kind of tempo device and it can be real dicey playing with them. They become self conscious or start letting they're ears drift to listening to the accompaniment and you wind up in a train wreak. I'm really good at jumping beats to keep in sync with people who have poor tempo, but some times you simply have to tell them what they're weakness is and start playing to a beat. The improvements they can make can be amazing when they take that advice.

[Phil O'Keefe]

A metronome is one of the best practice tools around.

 

It's a myth to say that those who develop good, consistent time through the use of a metronome while practicing are unable to swing. Can you play with other musicians and lock to that as a reference? What about a drummer who's laying down a basic quarter note pattern? While they may display more variance than the metronome, it's not all that dissimilar. It's just a marker that's showing you where the quarter note downbeats are - what you do within that framework is entirely up to you.

[gardo]

In theory this makes perfect sense but in practice it just doesn't work out;unless I play "The Syncopated Clock". It's great for rhythm playing but when trying to play even my basic warm up riffs I can't remember the next note. Funny thing though ,a blinking light doesn't bother me at all. So I guess I'll stick to the light

[Grant Harding]

I always use drum tracks, backings, or actual songs. I never had a metronome (or lessons) and that's how I learned feel and rhythm.

Plus I spent my formative years in the WI and played a lot of reggae, which tends to have a tight/sloppy feel that falls apart if you emphasize the 2, 3, or 4

[gardo]

This explains a lot. I told my daughter that I find the metronome distracting. , She asked me which one I was using and informed me that sometimes it's off .

[Grant Harding]

Aligning your internal clock to a metronome that's not right seems about the worst thing you could do to your playing.

[humbuckerstrat]

I use my foot.

[nice keetee]

I use my foot.

 

 

Seriously, I think it's OK to sometimes practice to a click/metronome. Occasionally.

One tune we were working on required us to at least loosely sync to a hardware sequencer.

Drummer was not able to lock into at all, even for a couple of bars...

[gardo]

So do I,most of the time

[soundcreation]

With all respect to Mike Longo...that's just an incredibly ignorant comment. Last time I checked...swinging still requires you to be "in time".

 

If you can play along to a beat but a click throws you off then it's just in your head. There is no difference. Practice with a click more. Slow it down and build it up.

[gardo]

I prefer a blinking light to a click

[WRGKMC]

Cant use visual. Its not the same thing and its way too difficult to time your eyes to your ears. The mind simply isn't wired for that. You should get used to using your ears not your eyes for timing. You'll always be lagging behind using visuals in real time.

 

Reading music is different. You use your eyes but you're reading ahead of what's going on in real time. If you wait for the note to sync the bus has already left the station and you're playing catchup instead of anticipating what you'll be playing. Reading music does require using your eyes but you're reading in advance of what you're actually playing.

 

Click tempo using the ears becomes an automatic response The only time you have to concentrate on it is when you drift out of tempo, not to keep in tempo. When you're locked in you can completely forget about it. This is important because you got allot of other things to worry about when performing.

 

Click is also the common thread you have performing with other players. If your tempo isn't as solid as a metronome then you wont be in sync with other players. You'll either be a runaway train running too far ahead or dead weight slowing them down and when it comes to musical breaks where there is dead silence you'll be the guy who either comes in too soon or two late and makes the band sound sloppy.

[Mark Wein]

As someone who has taught music for nearly 30 years, worked as a professional musician almost that entire time and is in his second stint of music school I have to say that I still practice with a metronome at least an hour a day. People who can not play in time with a metronome really do not have the ability to play in time accurately with anything. Especially on a subdivisional level. I see this on a regular basis with my adult students, even the ones who have been playing in bands for decades. The metronome is there to help train your internal clock. I don't know a single working or professional musician that would dispute that but I have met hundreds of hobbyist and amateur musicians who just don't get that simple fact.

 

Backing tracks and drum loops are easier to play with because they fill in the subdivisions, decreasing the time that you need to be subdividing for yourself. A great tool and good to use but in reality you should be able to tap your foot with a metronome and play whatever music that you want in time with it.

 

The other thing is that you don't need a physical metronome to work with in this day and age of smart phones and cheap software. Free metronome apps for phones and tablets are the reason why I quit stocking metronomes in my store.

[hellion_213]

I don't typically practice to a metronome, I do on occasion, but not typically. Recording, however, I do like a click track in the headphones most of the time.

[1001gear]

Asking for two page response but aay...

Tempo is one thing but there's groove stuff that absolutely requires exact subdivisions. The feel comes from articulation, phrasing, dynamics etc...

[humbuckerstrat]

Awesome