Mirco
503 posts
Jul 20, 2017
9:55 PM
|
I have been practicing scales. I started with quarter notes and then moved on to eighth notes, just to change it up. I have been building up my speed with this. Today, I tried doing 16th notes, and I noticed my max bpm was about half of my max bpm on 8th notes (this makes total sense, as I am fitting in twice as many notes). It made me question: is there a real reason for doing eighth notes vs. 16th notes (or 32nd, 64th, for that matter)? These are just arbitrary divisions in time, right? Any multiple of 4 would work just as well, right?
I can understand why practicing triplets is necessary, as it's a different division of time.
----------
Marc Graci
YouTube Channel
|
STME58
2009 posts
Jul 20, 2017
11:30 PM
|
You are right. Eight notes at 60 BPM are the same as quarter notes at 120. There have been many times I have looked at a piece of music and thought it was nearly impossible due to all the black notes, to discover it was quite playable at the tempo indicated.
It is important to keep that in mind also when dealing with time signatures like 7/8 or 5/4, just keep counting and play the duplets or tuplets as indicated.
|
Mirco
504 posts
Jul 21, 2017
9:58 AM
|
Maybe I am not clear. I mean:
I am practicing scales currently, using a metronome. I can do a particular pattern with eighth notes at 130 bpm. When I go to sixteenth notes, I can manage 65 bpm.
Since it doesn't affect my speed in any way, is there any benefit to practicing sixteenth notes instead of eighth notes? Does it help me subdividing the beat when playing in a live setting?
In short: why practice 16th notes when 8th are just as good?
----------
Marc Graci
YouTube Channel
|
slaphappy
300 posts
Jul 21, 2017
11:44 AM
|
I don't think there's any benefit or any real difference if you are just changing the tempo so 8ths = 16ths.
I think the goal is to be able to play 16ths at the same tempo you are playing 8ths... right?
----------
4' 4+ 3' 2~~~
-Mike Ziemba
Harmonica is Life!
|
The Iceman
3270 posts
Jul 21, 2017
3:12 PM
|
If the listener closes his eyes and hears no difference between 8th notes at 130 bpm and 16th notes at 65 bpm, you are not gaining anything by what you've described. It's just kinda an exercise in semantics - one step removed from the actual music.
How about doing those 16th notes at 65 bpm and then increasing the bpm by "5" until you reach your "ceiling" and then stay there until you can slowly push through that ceiling. Now, repeat by adding another 5 bpm, etc. Then you will be making advances to your technique.
----------
The Iceman
|
nacoran
9535 posts
Jul 21, 2017
6:39 PM
|
This reminds me of an old Yogi Berra story. Yogi walked into a pizza parlor and asked for a pizza. The owner asked him if he wanted it cut into 6 pieces or 8. Yogi responded, "You better make it 6. I don't think I could eat 8".
----------
Nate
Facebook
Thread Organizer (A list of all sorts of useful threads)
First Post- May 8, 2009
|
timeistight
2153 posts
Jul 21, 2017
9:27 PM
|
I disagree. Just because you can make fast eighth notes sound like slow sixteenths doesn't mean you should. Sixteen eighth notes is two bars at 4/4 time; sixteen sixteenths is only one bar. They shouldn't feel the same.
|
STME58
2010 posts
Jul 21, 2017
11:00 PM
|
timeistight, I can’t remember where I saw it but I recall seeing a video where a piano master is showing a student the difference in "feel" between playing a piece in 4/4 and playing it in cut time. I believe this is similar to what you are talking about. The two are mathematically equivalent, but there is a difference when you count in 2 rather than 4.
|
Diggsblues
2128 posts
Jul 23, 2017
4:27 AM
|
I would keep pushing the eighth notes to 200 bpm. The difference between the eighth and sixteenth notes is the accent. The eighth notes will be naturally on the first note of the two and the sixteenth will be on the first note of the grouping of four notes. The eighth notes will keep you "honest" in your note values.
----------
|
Mirco
511 posts
Jul 23, 2017
9:08 PM
|
Keep "pushing the eighth notes to 200 bpm"? That's ambitious. If I got to that point, and I was comfortable with it, is that quick enough for most situations? I'm at maybe 140 or so...
I asked Dave Barrett about this. He said that, to some extent, it is an arbitrary distinction, but that a player should practice for the type of situations that they will encounter on stage. So, even though...
140 bpm eighth notes is the same as 70 bpm sixteenth notes...
Dave suggests I practice whatever one I think I would end up using on stage.
And, like some have written here, it makes a difference on where the note lands in relation to the beat. So there is a reason to practice both ways.
----------
Marc Graci
YouTube Channel
|
Joe_L
2738 posts
Jul 23, 2017
10:03 PM
|
If your goal is to play on stage in public, you might as well focus on David's suggestion. If your goal is to play as fast as Sugar Blue, then focus on exercises to build speed.
----------
The Blues Photo Gallery
|
dchurch
141 posts
Jul 24, 2017
7:20 PM
|
Whole, half, quarter notes can sound exactly the same with a change of BPM but there is a major difference on your mental count or reading.
Notation often contains dotted sixteenth notes mix with quater rests.... in the same measure. So yes there is a practical benefit if you want to practice counting or reading music. But if you are just speeding up notes of equal duration, be it a scale or the same note... it makes little difference. Like playing notes on the up or down beat.
"In short: why practice 16th notes when 8th are just as good?"
You could also ask, why practice 8th notes when whole notes are just as good.
----------
It's about time I got around to this.
|
Mirco
514 posts
Jul 24, 2017
8:55 PM
|
From a practical standpoint, in what range of bpm do most blues songs typically fall?
----------
Marc Graci
YouTube Channel
|
dchurch
143 posts
Jul 24, 2017
10:41 PM
|
There is quite a difference between a slow blues and something that jumps. My stab at an answere is about 60 to 120. With around 70 being what I personally think of as a good blues tempo, JMO.
I'm sure there are folks here that could come up with an actual average based on a library of songs.
----------
It's about time I got around to this.
|
