Playing syncopated music has always been really hard for me. But I made a huge breakthrough today and I wanted to share with folks if it helps others.
So what I discovered is that for me to do multiple things simultaneously and in time, I had to start with some basic coordinated muscle memory and then slowly improve the timing.
This really worked well. It's still not easy but it opens up doors to being able to do this for more difficult material
If you want to read the details of what I mean, please read below...
I was playing a chord progression on this 4 bar phrase where the bolded text is where I need to play:
1 e + a | 2 e + a | 3 e + a | 4 e + a
1 e + a | 2 e + a | 3 e + a | 4 e + a
1 e + a | 2 e + a | 3 e + a | 4 e + a
1 e + a | 2 e + a | 3 e + a | 4 e + a
It was really weird because I discovered some things about where I struggled:
- If I just vocalized the notes while I tapped my foot, I was fine. I worked up in terms of tempo using a metronome: 68, 74, 80, 100, 120. I did this with my piano teacher and she said I was accurate.
- If I tried to play the phrase on the piano with a metronome, I could do it, but it was really hard and I couldn't tap my foot.
- If I tried to play the phrase on the piano while I tapped my foot, I kept losing the beat, especially on measures 2 and 4. My foot would start tapping inaccurately and I would also start to play imprecisely. My foot had a tendency to want to sync with what I was playing.
- Even if I didn't play the note, and just tried to tap on the piano, I kept losing the beat like in the second case. This was also at my piano class.
- If I played on each beat with my left hand and played chords on my right hand, I could do it. I could even tap my foot while doing this. This is something I had done a few weeks earlier both in my piano class and at home.
So my breakthrough came after I got home, by using this approach:
- Start with a slow tempo (without metronome) the basic muscle memory first. ie: for bar 1:
- Tap foot and play chord simultaneously
- Play chord
- Tap foot
- Play chord
- Tap food
- Play chord
- Tap foot and play chord simultaneously
- Get the timing accurate for the bar.
- Repeat steps 1 and 2 for each bar of the phrase.
- Put all 4 bars together.
- Increase the tempo. (although I would also do this sometimes during Step 2).
Submitted March 16, 2024 at 01:34PM by thinkfast37 https://www.reddit.com/r/Learnmusic/comments/1bga3gk/my_breakthrough_learning_syncopation/?utm_source=ifttt