Thoughts on triplet-swing.

[emanresu]

"perfect triplet swing feel" is confusing to me.

I understand what a perfect triplet is.

What I don't understand is how the word "feel" or even the word "swing" changes anything.

If you're mathematically perfectly correct on the triplet, what does "swing" mean in that context? Accents?

And, more to the point, "feel" implies that you're not playing anything mathematically perfect.

If what you're asking is whether practicing a triplet with the first two notes tied together is going to help swing feel, I'd say only to the degree that it helps improve your time accuracy in a general way.

I'm guessing that it doesn't improve your feel.

A feeling coming from "perfection" is a legit feeling. Feel doesn't have to "flow" or something other to be a feel.
But I do understand that adding the word "feel" to the thing may have been a mistake.

edit: lets forget about feel! i'll update the OP

[Bob_Ross]

"perfect triplet swing feel" - is this vague?

Semantically, yes, it is absolutely vague.

Your question is really about perfect [sic] 8th note swing feel ...then, in expounding on that topic, you subsequently asked whether treating swing 8th notes as triplets would qualify as "perfect". Trying to incorporate the word "triplet" into the distilled summarization of your question(s) is what keeps confusing or misleading everyone (including myself, originally) about what you're actually asking.

Edit: I see that this thread has already gone on for another two pages since you asked "is this vague?" so I'm sure I'm just repeating what several folks have already written.

[emanresu]

Semantically, yes, it is absolutely vague.

What else could it mean?

[Tone bar]

You refuse to use any other note value descriptor than triplet, yet you're not asking about how to play triplets themselves.

[emanresu]

The way I see it, as "triplet swing" thing is only one thing. It is talked with the exact phrasing here, it means exactly what it is. A perfect one, 1/4 time signature filled with triplets or the time signature of twelve divided by something, grouped by 3.
That is the thing that instantly comes to mind and is easy. Nothing else.
Treating swing as in triplets or as in 12/8, that just means the mathematical perfection.

This problem of a convoluted view was a surprise to me.

At this point, I have got some thoughts from people that are very cool. Who got the jist early.
But now, it has turned into a crap thread, nitpicking about semantics+logic.

A useless one.

I apologize to every one reading this far and get nothing useful.... except DJG's attempt.

[pamosmusic]

Attachment 122649

God almighty … ^^^ … this is what he’s talking about. It was mostly clear, if a little ambiguous in the OP. It’s clear now.

Anyone have anything useful to contribute or are we going to continue to argue with how someone phrased something four pages ago in a language, not their first?

[emanresu]

You refuse to use any other note value descriptor than triplet, yet you're not asking about how to play triplets themselves.

You don't need any other values than "triplet".

[Tone bar]

The way I see it, as "triplet swing" thing is only one thing. It is talked with the exact phrasing here, it means exactly what it is. A perfect one, 1/4 time signature filled with triplets or the time signature of twelve divided by something, grouped by 3.
That is the thing that instantly comes to mind and is easy. Nothing else.
Treating swing as in triplets or as in 12/8, that just means the mathematical perfection.

You don't need any other values than "triplet".

Breh, that's not how it works. The feel of a single jazz musician or an entire band is absolutely NOT them playing within a grid of 12/8. If you listen to the rhythms an entire band plays, it's a whole flux of everything which does not fit a triplet or 12/8 mold.

Have you ever learned a transcription? And broken down what rhythmic feels you have to command to get the overall feel right?

[emanresu]

Breh, that's not how it works. The feel of a single jazz musician or an entire band is absolutely NOT them playing within a grid of 12/8. If you listen to the rhythms an entire band plays, it's a whole flux of everything which does not fit a triplet or 12/8 mold.

Have you ever learned a transcription? And broken down what rhythmic feels you have to command to get the overall feel right?

Have you ever responded to a query, word by word?

[pcjazz]

Barry Harris taught us to count 1-2-3-4-5-6 against a 4/4 bar. In one of Lenny Breau’s cuts with Richard Cotten you can hearing Lenny saying ‘1-2-3-4-5-6’ to the bassist. And of course Lenny was a master of 3 against 4 rhythmic phrasing — listen for example to his version of Freight Train.

[rpjazzguitar]

A feeling coming from "perfection" is a legit feeling. Feel doesn't have to "flow" or something other to be a feel.
But I do understand that adding the word "feel" to the thing may have been a mistake.

edit: lets forget about feel! i'll update the OP

I understand that perfection is a kind of "feel". But, I don't think that's what jazz musicians are referring to when they talk about "good feel". I think that "feel" refers to cool sounding variations on the strict time, at least in my corner of the jazz world.

If the question is, will practicing tied triplets in strict time help my "feel", I think the answer is it may improve your time awareness, but not your feel. That is, it is, I suspect, like any metronome practice. My experience with the metronome is that it improves my awareness of my relationship to the beat and I think that results in better time accuracy - which is a worthwhile thing to work on. But, as someone who has struggled with "time feel", I don't think it's the best way to work on that. Sadly, "time feel" seems more elusive.

[emanresu]

I whouldn't respond to this because it is too late and it is my off-time. With wine and entertainment. But here it is.

Feel: it has become a defining thing in music, meaning nothing at all.
"Feel" should be meaning a feeling. Yet, it is a strict and well-ruled thing... that you should get, practice and convey.

It is really my off-hour now.

[Tone bar]

Have you ever responded to a query, word by word?

My bad. You admitted it was a flawed view.

The way I see it, as "triplet swing" thing is only one thing. It is talked with the exact phrasing here, it means exactly what it is. A perfect one, 1/4 time signature filled with triplets or the time signature of twelve divided by something, grouped by 3.
That is the thing that instantly comes to mind and is easy. Nothing else.
Treating swing as in triplets or as in 12/8, that just means the mathematical perfection.

This problem of a convoluted view was a surprise to me.

But my explanation still stands. A 'perfect' jazz feel isn't a 'triplet' feel where if everything fits into a 12/8 grid it'll be super swingin and functional. Simply analyze actual music and figure out what rhythms they use. It's a flux of everything. Learn a transcription and analyze what rhythms you need to command to make the overall feel sound good. It's not only triplets or triplet feel.

[emanresu]

My bad. You admitted it was a flawed view.

But my explanation still stands. A 'perfect' jazz feel isn't a 'triplet' feel where if everything fits into a 12/8 grid it'll be super swingin and functional. Simply analyze actual music and figure out what rhythms they use. It's a flux of everything. Learn a transcription and analyze what rhythms you need to command to make the overall feel sound good. It's not only triplets or triplet feel.

Yeah. That was taken care of in the first page. Thanks for your thought, of course.

I needed the dive-in.

BTW, if someone would make "jazz to happen big time" in absuloute perfect triplets, what would that do? (thats not me)

[Tone bar]

BTW, if someone would make "jazz to happen big time" in absuloute perfect triplets, what would that do? (thats not me)

That was taken care of in the 1st page. :P

Yeah no, firstly if you fit 8th notes as perfectly quantized triplets it will sound horrible. Try it if you have midi capability. Play in an 8th note line then quantize it with the 1st 8th note as 2/3 of the grouplet and the 2nd 8th note as 1/3 of the grouplet. It sounds like a beginner who doesn't know how to play jazz. In real life, good players, which is much more representative of perfect, play their swung 8th notes only slightly mismatched. Increasing the mismatch will make it sound more old or hoaky. It's not the rule.

2nd, other rhythms are required to make a solo take flight, not only triplet feel, like 16th notes and 16th note triplets. These are in a straight feel, not an 8th note triplet feel.

3rd there are other rhythms too that are floating around in a jazz band that wouldn't fit into it either. Jazz isn't quantized music..

[emanresu]

I will try.

[dasein]

Arguments about 8th note swing feel is a little like arguments about "can you TRULY improvise spontaneously?" You can point to all kinds of different artists as proof for your particular position. And it's not wrong to do that. The issue is when someone claims that's universal.

There is a pretty wide range in players 8th note swing feel. It's going to be combination of personal preference and current fashion. Some players have a bit more of a bounce. Some are much straighter. Some are almost completely straight. And this doesn't even get into where they play on or behind the beat.

My advice: pick someone whose feel you like, and imitate them. For me, I like it to be pretty but not completely straight. Coltrane, Rollins, Charlie Parker's opening solo break on "Just Friends" -- those are my ideals. Actually my ideal might be Louis Armstrong's Hot Fives/Sevens, but that's a nearly impossible benchmark.

Really pay attention to the articulation, too. Slurs, ghost notes. And pay attention to how they use actual 8th note triplets in their lines to make the 8th note swing harder.

The "real" triplet feel in jazz is the quarter note triplets that are always present even if nobody's actively playing them. The ability to switch seamlessly between quarter note triplets and 8th notes will really help your playing. Listen to a lot of Billie Holiday with Lester Young (which you should be doing anyways).

[charlieparker]

I have to agree with @djg. Maybe I misinterpreted him, but mastering swing feel is really about mastering triplets and polyrhythms of 3 against 4. You should be able to play any subset of the triplets in a 4 beat measure.

With quarter not triplets you are playing every other note. With swing eights you are playing the first and third of each beat. You should start with those two and really be able to nail them.

Then move on from there to just playing the 3rd triplet of every beat or just the second, etc.

Once you can do that then you can take more liberties, but I think it's a good place to start.

[Tone bar]

^ I don't know where you guys are coming up with this. You should listen to your namesake and try to superimpose on his playing that his swing comes from triplets over the time. That's not accurate. His 8th notes are uneven, but they are not 2:1. And further subdivisions, which are played straight: triplets, 16ths, 16th note triplets, 32nd notes are more of what contribute to his swing. Not this strange rule you guys are coming up with. There can be triplet polyrhythms in jazz bands and implied polyrhythmic feels, and other rhythmic flux. But this arbitrary triplet framework rule where everything is based on that is not accurate.

[ragman1]

As far as I can see there's no problem here at all. There's just music with eighths and triplets. It's jazz so it needs to be swung. Either you do it or you don't. Just play the thing. If you can do it, fine. If you can't, too bad.

Practice helps, obviously, but there's no 'how' in the sense of some special amazing technique that'll produce a perfect in-the-pocket result every time. Doesn't exist.

So that's that.

The problem with giving confused people the right answer is that, because they're confused, they don't know if it's the right answer or not! So what can you do? I don't know.

[GuyBoden]

Miss Interpretation can be very dangerous.

[pamosmusic]

The problem with giving confused people the right answer is that, because they're confused, they don't know if it's the right answer or not! So what can you do? I don't know.

ole one-tempo ragman laying down the law

[Christian Miller]

I think it’s good to practice the triplet upbeat at medium tempos.

After a while the upbeat becomes a vibes thing

The thing that is quite fun is when you realise the inequality of swing eighths come not from the position of the upbeat but the placement of the downbeat. That’s when things get playful


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[Bob_Ross]

the inequality of swing eighths come not from the position of the upbeat but the placement of the downbeat.

Many years ago I worked with a very good professional trumpet player who insisted "delaying the placement of your upbeats is how a musician conveys their sense of time/groove/swing...but if you delay your downbeats, you're just late."

I didn't (and still don't) believe him completely...but I've always suspected there was something a little bit right about his perspective.

[Christian Miller]

Many years ago I worked with a very good professional trumpet player who insisted "delaying the placement of your upbeats is how a musician conveys their sense of time/groove/swing...but if you delay your downbeats, you're just late."

I didn't (and still don't) believe him completely...but I've always suspected there was something a little bit right about his perspective.

A lot of great players don’t quite understand swing because for them it’s intuitive. We don’t need the max plank institute to tell us the key to swing feel is finding the pocket and staying in it of course.

What I said is truest for eighth note bop lines. As with everything it depends. When we play with a rhythm section our upbeats need to be synched. But if there’s a downbeat accent that needs to be just so as well.

Connecting eighth note lines are placed straight and late. The reason why straight swings with a rhythm section is because the upbeats still hook up with the drums skip note etc. This is something that is encouraged by horn tonguing. It’s also why playing on top and overdotting often go together with beginners - not that a big dot always doesn’t swing.

(You can also cut across the swing and play straight and synched with the downbeat and straight which creates an implied double time. Oh hi Grant Green.)

OTOH if you are playing bass the placement can be pushed but not rushed. You certainly don’t want to drag, and that’s because you are playing accented downbeats.

My favourite is the example of this is how Paul Chamvers goes from relaxed ‘horn time’ to a more pushed ‘bass time’ in the head of So What into the solos.

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