No Sense of Rhythm? The 3 Step Cure - PHH 177

And why is it so critical? Well, you can tell when the beat is even. This is how our music flows. This is how it has continuity. This is where that smooth, seamless stuff happens. It comes from the willingness to make the beat more important than anything else. It's why we're able to talk about playing past mistakes. The mistake won't be obvious if the beat continues. You need to be willing to make maintaining that pulse more important than anything else.

Welcome to the Practicing Harp Happiness Podcast. I'm Ann Sullivan, a harpist on a mission to empower every harpist to experience more harp happiness. Over my decades long harp journey, I've had lots of successes and more than a few failures. And I know firsthand like to feel that playing the harp the way you want may not be possible for you. Now, I play and teach all over the world and I know what most harpists are never taught the secrets to gaining the skills and confidence you need to play the harp with beauty, freedom and joy. That's what the Practicing Harp Happiness Podcast is all about. Showing you simple steps to help you play the music you want the way you want. If you're an experienced harpist looking for that next level, or a harp newbie anxious to avoid the pitfalls, or a harpist who just wants more fulfillment and a little encouragement, you're in the right place, my friend. So let's get started.

First, I want to let you in on something special. I think the most important thing you can do for your harp playing is to develop the habits that lead to success. Whatever that looks like for you. All of us want to learn how to play the harp beautifully, how to play with confidence and enjoy making music. And if you really want to learn those things, videos are great. But live learning is essential. You need to be able to ask questions and get answers. You can't do that with just a video, which is what makes the Miharp Mastery community so special. My Harp Mastery membership is for those who really want an online experience that lets them learn at their own pace and learn what they want and be able to learn live from expert coaches every single week. Plus, you get to connect with other harpists in the community who have the same desires for their playing. This is not only a powerful learning platform, but it's also the most generous community of harpists and anywhere on the planet. They're harpists with a positive outlook, a growth mindset, and a spirit of support for their fellow harpists on the journey with them. We're ready for you. Join us. Just go to harpmastery.com join now that's harpmastery.com join now welcome to the show. Do you have no sense of rhythm? Has someone told you that you have no sense of rhythm? Or do you sometimes wonder if you do? Well right off the bat? Let me tell you that if someone said that to you, I know they are dead wrong. In the first place. I don't believe that people can be so connected and drawn to music that they commit themselves to studying and learning an instrument for years without an innate sense of rhythm. Rhythm, like any other musical skill, is a subject that is studied intentionally in music schools. It's not a topic that is merely left to chance with an either you got it or you don't philosophy. The great Elvis Presley said, rhythm is something you either have or you don't, but when you have it, you have it all over.

However, his meaning and our investigations into a sense of rhythm are somewhat different. My point is that if you think you need to develop your sense of rhythm, you probably do. So do we all. And a sense of rhythm is completely trainable. After all, we live our entire lives with rhythm. Actually, we are rhythm in our heartbeat, our pulse, our breath. Rhythm is as natural to us as breathing. Well, in fact, it is breathing. So why is it so hard? My observations have led me to the conclusion that although we have a sense of rhythm, we frequently don't obey it. Even worse, we often actively ignore it. We actually choose not to play in rhythm. Our sense of rhythm is there. We just flip the switch and turn it off. It's usually not intentional. And that's the good news, because all we have to do is find the switch to flip it back on. And it's really not so difficult. All you have to do is believe and commit to one sentence, an attitude you need to adopt, at least for the duration of this podcast, and I hope for a lot longer. But I'm going to keep you in suspense about that one sentence just for a little bit. And I want to remind you that we now have our Harp Mastery app for iPhone and iPad. We're so excited about launching this new app, and even more excited that there are so many people using it. If you have ever purchased anything from Harp Mastery, you're going to love it, because your library of courses that you will have purchased is accessible right from the app, which means you've got it with you wherever you are. If you're a member of the Hub, you can access the Hub right from the app. If you've been a member of the Hub for a while you know that it's been a little bit awkward because the hub is one app and your courses are in another app. No longer is that the case. They are all in the same app and you can get to them all from that Harp Mastery app. And in addition, there are other offerings that we're making right on the app. So it's an easy way to get involved in the community, to see what's going on, to take advantage of learning opportunities, all that good stuff all in one place and all, you know, in the palm of your hand wherever you go. So right now, to remind you, the app is only available for iPhone and iPad, we are working on the Android app and it will be coming in a few short weeks, I promise. As an Android user, I'm really looking forward to that myself. But I. But if you are an iPhone or iPad user, check out the app. I've always wanted to say get the app. And now you can. You'll find the link to the app in the App Store, right in the Show Notes. Or of course you can just use your phone and go to the App Store and you'll see it there also in the Show Notes. I've linked to a blog post from our archives. It's a little humorous blog post that might be a really nice companion piece to today's podcast. The blog post is called you'd Metronome Speaks, and it's kind of a humorous look at what your metronome might ask of you or tell you if you were to take a look at it one day. I realize that some of you love using your metronome as I do, others not quite so comfortable with it. And I want to assure you too, that today's podcast is not all about metronome. It truly is about training your own sense of rhythm. But metronomes often come into that, and we're going to be talking about that today too. So learning to use your metronome comfortably is something that is really helpful. The blog post works a little bit on that, but we're going to be working on that today too. And so perhaps it's about time that I shared that one sentence with you. Our one sentence that could change everything for you. Here it is. And it's worth writing down somewhere. So if you can, if it's convenient right now, get out that pen and paper and just jot it down. Stick it on that sticky note, put it on your music stand. This is something that you are going to want to remember. And don't worry, I'll explain It as we go. You might know the famous saying, winning isn't everything. It's the only thing. It's often attributed to football legend Vince Lombardi, but actually, apparently it was first used by UCLA Bruins head coach Red Sanders, who apparently was using this sentence even in the 1930s. That early. But we're not worried about winning here. What we're worried about is timing. So I want your sentence to read this. Timing isn't everything. It's the only thing. Timing isn't everything. It's the only thing. I know we're talking about rhythm today, and timing suggests something just a little bit different. And that's on purpose. Well, of course. Why would I do that? By accident, right? So the thing is that in our music, there are different levels of things that we talk about under this big umbrella of rhythm, and they are all a little bit different and require different sorts of things. So if you look at the page, those notes that you see, the combination of quarter notes and half notes and eighth notes and 16th notes and whatever else, that combination of notes that's printed on the page, that is actually the rhythm of the piece. That's the progression of note values that create that unique particular rhythm for a melody. So that's what it is. That's the rhythm. But that rhythm is the top layer. We understand that rhythm. The rhythm makes sense to us because it is in the framework of a meter, right? The meter is the time signature. The time, you know, 3, 4, 2, 4, 4, 4, one of those or something else. But the meter signature creates those measures or bars that organize the rhythm of the piece so that we can feel it and it makes sense to us. Not every piece has a meter. And composers have often left meters a little bit ambiguous because. Because it creates a particular mood that they want for their piece. But when a piece has a meter, then we feel that pattern, that repeating pattern of strong beats and weak beats, like 1, 2, strong, weak, boop, boop. And that organizes the rhythm of the notes, the dots, the little quarter notes, eighth notes, whatever they are. So underneath the rhythm, the layer underneath that is the meter. But the meter has a layer below that, too. It's like digging into the rock here. And at the very foundation, the bedrock, that is the foundation for the meter. And the rhythm is the beat, the pulse. And that's the steadiness. That's the inevitable pulse that just comes along, and it's the engine that is driving the piece. And when that beat is even and regular, then we can understand, as a listener, we can understand the Meter, how some are stronger, some are weaker. We can feel that pattern and then we can feel how the rhythm goes on top of that. Whether the strong beats line up, in which case we have a very nice, logical, orderly rhythm, or maybe they don't line up and we have something that's more syncopated and jazzy sounding. But that's the thing. Lots of times we start from the rhythm with all those fast notes and we don't always pay attention to the meter that really is making sense of those notes. And sometimes we ignore the actual basic beat that is the foundation of it all. And if you're going to play a complicated rhythm, top level sort of rhythm, well then your understanding of the beat, your relationship with the beat, is where that all starts. So if you're having trouble with complex rhythms, we need to dig a little bit deeper. And that's where we're going today. We're just going to get really fundamental and talk about the beat. The beat is where our sense of rhythm starts. Imagine this scene for a second. You're in a crowd of people. You're listening to a band play and it's good foot stomping kind of music. And everybody's clapping along with the band and having a good time, and so are you. Everything's going well. But you look around the crowd and you see that one person who's clapping, but they're not clapping with the beat, they're trying to clap along and it just isn't working. We look at them and we say, that poor person has no sense of rhythm. But there's a lot that goes into that and that's what we're going to explore. How do you know if you have a sense of rhythm or not? Most often we're judging our sense of rhythm or someone else's, or by what we experience them doing. But that's not how the process actually works. That's just the end result of the process. There are really three steps. The first is that we hear the beat, right? There is a beat happening and we hear it. Or perhaps there's no beat happening. Imagine when you are sitting down to start playing a piece of music. The beat. Beat doesn't exist anywhere. You actually are creating that as you start to play. So there is a beat, there is a pulse somewhere. It's either happening and you hear it or you're going to create it. The second thing that happens is that you have to relate to that beat. You have to consciously connect to it.

So that you and the beat are in agreement. This is what we call internalizing the beat. Think about the way a metronome clicks and it clicks and it's outside us. Well, for us to actually play along with the metronome, what we have to do is we have to listen to it and we have to absorb it. We have to let its pulse become our pulse, our internal pulse. I mean, not like we're changing our heartbeat, but we're bringing it in. Because in step three, what we need to do is we need to communicate that beat. Now, in my example, the poor person was communicating the beat by clapping, and they hadn't correctly at least internalized the beats. So the externalization of the beat, the way they communicated it by clapping, didn't come out right.

Most of the time, as musicians, what we do is we hear the beat and we internalize it. We relate to it, and then we communicate it. We play with the beat. The problem comes when we don't. So we're hearing it, we're internalizing it, and we want to externalize it accurately. So those are the three steps in the most basic part of rhythm, which is just expressing the beat. And this is why I said that timing isn't everything. It's the only thing. Once you get this part right, then everything else can fall into place. When the beat is. Is steady, when you understand the beat and you've internalized it, that internal metronome is going. Sometimes we talk about it that way, don't we? That internal metronome is going. Then your job is to communicate that beat through your playing or your hand clapping, if that's what you're doing. But to communicate that beat in that same steady fashion. And that's most basically what we mean. When somebody has or doesn't have a sense of rhythm, there's usually a problem in one of those steps. And I bet you can guess which step usually has the problem. But just in case you can't, we're going to go through all three. The first step, hearing or creating the beat, is clearly the simplest. I mean, if you turn a metronome on or somebody counts for you, you can hear the beat. Boom. It's right there. It's there for us. Now, if we have to start without someone else counting or without the metronome, then it's a little bit harder because we have to create the beat ourselves. And generally the best way to do that is to count a measure or two before you start so that you have that steady pulse starting ahead of time. So there's nothing that's really rocket science in this step. But I would urge you to to become a more conscious listener when it comes to hearing the beat so that you're really paying attention to what that metronome is telling you. If you're listening to a metronome. After all, a metronome is pretty easy to ignore. So you really want to think about that. And it's a good idea, even if you have the metronome on, to count a measure or two so that you can start feeling that pulse and feeling the meter as well before you start. Very, very helpful. Those are things you probably already know, and hopefully you do those all the time because that's the best way to make sure that you're starting a piece at the right tempo or that you're going to play with the metronome. But you can actually train your listening to the beat just a little bit more. And this is kind of a fun exercise to do. Put on a recording of a piece you don't know. Pick a nice long one, maybe even an orchestral recording, something. But find a recording of a piece that you don't know and clap along to the beat. It may take you a little bit to find exactly where the beat is. Be sure that you're listening to other instruments too. Don't just make it a harp recording, you know, choose different recordings by different instruments so that you get used to how that sounds in your ears as well. But clap along to the beat so that you know that you can find it and then take it to the next step. And once you've found the beat, see if you can figure out what meter the piece is in. Does it seem to have that strong repeating beat every other beat like it would be in two? Or does it feel like it's in three or four? Or does it have a two feeling, but maybe feel like six, eight? You know, start with those pretty common meters first, you know, like 2, 4, 3, 4, 4, 4, 6, 8 of you can make sense of it enough to fit one of those with them. But maybe it's more complicated and you can figure that out as well. But thinking about how the beat that you've identified relates and forms, you know, is formed by the meter into that pattern of strong beats and weak beats. And learning to hear the meter is also very, very good training, once again, something that if you'd gone to music school and maybe you did, you would have learned this. And you. So maybe you're right now just saying, oh, yeah, I forgot about that. And it really is good training. So hearing the beat or Creating the beat is pretty simple. Just be sure you're paying attention. But this brings us to a pretty difficult stage, and that's relating to the beat or internalizing it. I think internalizing the beat is difficult because we can't really check ourselves. Well, we can, and we'll get to that in a moment. Because the externalization obviously is how you check that. That's the poor person that can't seem to get there clapping with everybody else's. Right. So the externalization is certainly how we can check it, but we need to work at the internalization just a little bit. And this is the stage that we don't usually do. And maybe it's just because it feels like we can't explain it, or it's like, okay, well, what is my internal metronome anyway? And how do I know if I have one or if it's working? You know, there aren't really clear cut ways to, you know, open yourself up, look inside, say, yep, internal metronome's clicking. Okay, got it. There's no good way to check it. So we tend to skip over this stage. But it's really critical. And training it can be actually kind of fun. But here's how I would suggest you do it. You're going to need to listen to the beat, like listen to the metronome. And as you listen, you want to count along in your head just a little bit because it helps keep you involved. It's really easy to drift off with this. I mean, it's almost like a meditation practice. And we really want to be a little bit more present in what we're doing. So don't let yourself, you know, fall asleep while you do this. So you want the metronome on and then count with it, breathe with it. And I don't mean, you know, breathe in and out on every breath, but feel your breath slow down, start to cycle a little bit, just the way the pulse is. What's wonderful about this is that it is very much like a meditation practice. You can learn to feel the inevitability of the beat and you can relax into it. It's very simple, it's very calming, it's very unflustered. And you can put the beat on at a relatively slow kind of tempo. I'm just going to turn my metronome on for a second and we'll just. I'm going to put it on at 60, because 60 is such a nice, you know, one beat per second kind of pulse. So we'll turn it on.

And Just listen to it. Now, if you have a metronome and you don't like the sound of your metronome, you know, get another metronome or check out a metronome on your phone that has a sound that you do like, and that's okay. But you can just sit and just listen to it, relax into it, see how you feel.

But your goal is to let yourself just relax into it. Now, really, you need to sit quietly to do this. But that wouldn't make a good podcast, so. But that's what we're doing, and that's the idea. Try it at different speeds. You can try it slower. Here's a nice.

A nice slow pulse, and you can just breathe into it.

You don't want to go too fast. That's not the idea. You can. But doing a variety of speeds, of course, is really good for training. You want to think about yourself as allowing for the spaces between those beats. We don't want to be in a hurry. We don't want to anticipate the next beat. We just want to get there. And that's why I use the word inevitability. The metronome is going to give you that inevitability, isn't it? That beat is just going to keep coming around, Relax into that. That regularity, that constant beat. That can be so comforting. It can be really quite comforting, actually. So be careful. You don't get a little too relaxed, but you want to allow for the space in between the beads. Don't get there too soon, don't get there too late. And in fact, it may help you to anticipate that next beat properly. If you think about subdividing, if the beats are slow, you can think about, you know, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4. And this is also one of the things that our gesture when we play the harp, a raising gesture, can help. It can help use that space in between beats. It can help us almost physically represent the beat by taking up that entire space that entire time.

So once you've listened to the pulse and you're nice and relaxed and you're falling in line with that, that nice steady pulse, then let's begin to externalize it. Because, after all, externalizing is the only way to know if you're actually internalizing it. So what I would suggest is, is something just a little bit different and not anything musical. We'll get to the music in a moment. But taking this away from a musical context can take a lot of the pressure off. So you're going to Listen to that beat and then as you're listening and you feel like you've, you know, you've gotten it right, you're in the flow. Then count from one up to 10 with each number on a click. And remember, then if you're counting in English, that number seven with two syllables, see if you can get it out so that it's almost one syllable so you don't add an extra beat. So just like 1, 2, 3, 4, count all the way up to 10. And you're going to do this with the metronome. Once you get to 10, then start again and count backwards. 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, and let it just go. And why would you count backwards? Well, because it's something we don't usually do and because it's definitely not musical and it's just going to give you a way to match that pulse with what you're saying.

Once again, we're not doing it this at the harp, so we don't have any of those extra things like, oh, no, that note's out of tune, or I played the wrong string, or I used the wrong finger, or my finger knuckles aren't curved, or all those other considerations. We don't want those. We really just want to think about the beat. Now, when you're good with counting 1 to 10 and 10 to 1, then do the Alphabet. Say the Alphabet forwards with every beat. Then when you get to the end, say the Alphabet backwards with every beat. Takes a little bit more focus. It's a little bit harder and it's okay if you're going to miss a letter, you know, it's like, oh, what comes before Q? I don't remember, by the way, it's P. But in any case, if you don't remember that next letter in the sequence, say anything. Just say it on the click. I want to remind you about our sentence. Timing isn't everything. It's the only thing. We just need to get there at the right time. Doesn't matter exactly what you say. If you say a W when it should have been a B, doesn't matter. Just say it on the click and learn to let that pulse keep you calm and not keep you flustered. This is an excellent exercise for just working with the beat because I promise you, you can sense the beat. I know you can. You just need to get it away from the harp a little bit, perhaps. So work with these exercises just a little bit and you'll be so relaxed that you'll be ready to go onto something just a little bit more Challenging, communicating the beat or externalizing the beat. This is all about the doing. Your hearing of the beat and your internalizing of it can be perfect. But if you let the doing get in the way, then none of that matters. This is what happens to most people who think they have trouble with rhythm. They get so busy trying to play the notes and the fingering and think about their technique that they use what you might call convenient counting and in the process make the beat uneven. You know, sort of, I'm moving right along, 1, 2, 3. And then it started to get harder. So it goes 1, 2, 3, 1, 1, 2, 3, 1- 2, 3. So that's what happens. We're trying to do all these other things and we put the idea of the beat on the back burner, if you like. But if you do that in a lesson, then your teacher is going to tell you, ah, you need to practice with the metronome. But that doesn't necessarily help because we can't pay attention to the metronome and, and the notes at the same time. So if you are the person who says, and there are lots of them, if you are the person who says, I can't work with the metronome because I can't pay attention to it, it's because you're trying to do so many other things that you really don't have another brain cell to spend listening to the metronome and doing super slow practice can help with this, but it doesn't always help enough. We absolutely have to learn how to practice and make the timing the only thing so that we can let go of some of the notes, let go of some of those other things, and concentrate on getting the timing right. This is why I say we usually are ignoring our sense of rhythm rather than just not having one. We just put it behind everything else and it makes sense. We're only doing what we're supposed to do. We know we have to get the notes right and we have to play them with the right fingers. And we have a lot of stuff that we have to do. And if the time is going too fast, we just don't have the time, quite literally, in order to get those things lined up. This is why thinking about the counting and the timing from the very first day you start a piece, each is essential. And if you have trained yourself the way we talked about a moment ago to work with the metronome and be pretty comfortable with it, you can start learning those notes and learning them with the metronome and then getting rid of the metronome and using just your own counting, which is really terrific. Right? But this will help you get that timing right right from the beginning as you start to put something hands together. This is another place where we often let the timing go, and that's part of the learning process too. I want to be clear that sometimes you need to let the timing go because you can only concentrate on so much. But then you need to bring it back because there's no value in just saying, I'm going to get the fingering right. I'm going to get my technique right. I'm going to get these hands together and. And never saying, now I have to get the timing right. That's one of those things that's very, very critical. And why is it so critical? Well, you can tell when the beat is even. This is how our music flows. This is how it has continuity. This is where that smooth, seamless stuff happens. It comes from the willingness to make the beat more important than anything else. It's why we're able to talk about playing past mistakes. The mistake won't be obvious if the beat continues. You need to be willing to make maintaining that pulse more important than anything else. Once again, doesn't mean we don't want you to play the right notes. We do, but. But there are times when you need to put the pulse first as well. Okay, so how could you do this? Well, I want you to start very simply because I need you to convince yourself that it's not your sense of rhythm that is the problem, that you just want to practice making sure you can match the metronome while you play. Or maybe it's just really making sure that you can learn to listen to the metronome while you play. If you've done the internalization work that we just talked about, you've gotten a little bit more comfortable with the metronome. So now we can come over to the harp and do a similar kind of thing. I want you to set the metronome on and then do a very simple scale. No, I don't care what fingering. You could do it with just one finger if you want. Your goal is just to have each note come on the next metronome. Click. You might find it helpful to raise and use that raising as sort of that fill in to help you fill in the beat visually so that you're not getting to the next beat too soon.

And you can actually feel that repetitive motion in a way that helps you keep the beat as well. It can also help to subdivide the beat. You. You know, if the. If this is what your metronome is doing, you can be thinking 1 and 1 and 1, and. Because thinking about the subdivisions, thinking about those ands will help you get to the next beat more accurately. When the beat is fast, you don't need to do that. If the beat is going 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2th, then you don't have time for ands. So you don't need to do that. You'll get there on time, or you won't, but you'll be practicing it. So start with a very simple scale. Remember, this is not a technical drill. It's not even a note drill. You could just be playing one note for all I care, and that will work. Your goal is to breathe, think about that rhythm, think about the metronome. Listen to the metronome, not to your fingers so much, and just match one. Good practice is. Is before you start playing, get that metronome on. Listen to it, breathe with it. Remember, you're not trying to breathe every beat. Just let it soak in a little bit. Breathe it in. Hear that progression of beats in your head. You can even count in your head with it if you want. And then maybe just clap with it a little bit and just feel the physical thing that has to happen to match every beat. Then maybe say, a scale with it, like C, D, E, F. Once again, making sure that you're matching the metronome. And then go ahead and play it.

That's a really good system for making sure you've internalized the beat in a way that allows you to externalize it accurately. So we listened to it, breathed with it, heard it in our head, counted with it, maybe in our head, clapped it, said it, and finally played it. If you want to make it just a little bit more advanced, you think, okay, I got this scale thing. Then try taking an interval, like the interval of a third with your second finger and thumb. You know, play a C and an E and do a whole scale of thirds and practice matching the metronome. Or maybe you could use triads. You can do anything you want, but keep the notes simple. The moment you have to think about the notes, then your metronome hearing is going to go out the window. And this is a drill for metronome hearing. So we don't want to make the notes so complicated that that's what you're thinking about. You'll have plenty of time to do that in your practice. Right? So this is just working with the beat and making sure that you can Externalize the beat well. When you're in a piece, choose a couple of measures that you can play and a tempo that you can play, and then do those same steps. You know, don't pick your hardest measures to start with this. Pick a few measures that you can play pretty well and choose a tempo you can play. Put the metronome on, listen to it, internalize it, breathe with it, count with it, hear how it's going to go in your head with the metronome. You know, hear it in your head, matching it up with the metronome. Maybe clap. The rhythm of it might be too complicated to say it, but once you've done that, then you can certainly play it. And that's how you train yourself to really externalize the beat well and to internalize the beat well and to listen to the beat well. All those three steps, right? We're hearing it or creating it, we're relating to it, which we also called internalizing it, and then we're communicating it or externalizing it. These are just three little steps, but they could add up to a major sea change in your understanding of your own sense of rhythm. So I certainly hope you give them a try, even if you feel like you have a sense of rhythm. And this is rhythmic training at its easiest. And we can all use just a little bit more of that. A quick reminder that our Heart Mastery app is ready for you if you are an iPhone or iPad user. So get the app, it's free, and it will make everything Heart Mastery a little bit easier for you to use. Next week on the podcast. We're talking about strengthening that weak finger and the right way to strengthen a weak finger, whichever finger it happens to be. And of course, if you're like me, your weak finger tends to move around a little bit. First it's this one, then it's that one. So hopefully some things that will help you that way. Next week on the podcast, I'd like to leave you with a quote from Maya Angelou. I was looking for things that were appropriate for rhythm and music and just a sense of rhythm. And I came across this beautiful quote that is I just wanted to share with you. And here it is. Everything in the universe has a rhythm, Everything dances. Just something to keep in mind as you go through your week this week. And of course, you are going to remember that, as always, you can add more harp happiness to the universe, to your world, and to your spirit every day, because all you have to do is play. Thanks so much for listening and I'll see you next time.

Thanks for tuning into another episode of the Practicing Harp Happiness Podcast. I release a new episode every Monday morning so you can hit your practice week running. Until then, remember to practice your Harp happiness every day. See you next time.