Using The Musical Beat To Your Advantage
// January 29th, 2012 // No Comments » // music
One of the best of tools musicians have in their arsenal is a rather small thing we refer to as a “beat.” Though we tend to picture a beat as a very specific moment, there actually is quite a significant space, in musical terms, in which a note can be positioned and still be musically correct, or still be “on the beat,” as we say.
The Dual Nature of the Beat
To understand how this works, picture the beat as having a dual nature: the space where the note is positioned, called The Slot, and The Pulse, which is what the listener hears and refers to as the beat of the music. The Slot has a size to it which is measured in beats per minute or BPM. Naturally, the exact size of The Slot depends on the pace of the music. The beat is simply a note located somewhere in The Slot.
The Three Positions of the Slot
Imagine The Slot as providing three possible locations where any note can be placed to produce a beat, and these are, in laymen’s terms, Early, On Time and Late. The technical terms for them are Pushed, In the Pocket, and Pulled. Each choice of beat placement will create a unique feel to the music and alters how the listener hears the music.
Even though we are thinking of The Slot as being made up of three unique parts, in fact it’s a broad field with many points where the note could fall. We are making it easy for clarity’s sake.
Using Beat Placement
Whenever a musician makes use of a Push, it gives a drive to the music and makes the apparent pace seem faster,, creating a feeling of urgency and forward motion. When the beat is positioned In the Pocket, it creates a gratifying sensation that we associate with dance music such that, “you just can’t sit still,” as the saying goes. When a musician uses a Pull, which means the beat is late, it creates a feeling of weight and makes the apparent speed of the music seem slower than it actually is.
Using these techniques of beat placement, a musician or producer can make the impact of the music much stronger and more effective for any application. These strategies are generally used in the performance of ballet music for class owing to their efficacy in creating precisely the right musical conditions for dance, and drummers have been instinctively employing these techniques since music began.
This is brought to you by Don Caron who is a composer/writer/dancer/choreographer and who enjoys writing about a selection of subjects which naturally includes music. He has composed four albums of music for ballet class which are available from CDBaby.






