Rhythm Figures And Counting - The Process And Getting Started

[Music] hey there griff hamlin here from blues guitar unleashed welcome and thanks for joining me in today's video we're going to talk about what i often say is kind of the elephant in the room and it's if you've followed me for any amount of time at all you've heard me talk about rhythm counting and timing and all that so i've got two purposes today the first thing is i want to take a minute and demonstrate to you prove to you whatever you want to call it that rhythm is truly the single most important thing when it comes to your blue soloing and i don't mean rhythm as in like rhythm guitar and lead guitar which is all the same the reality is that rhythm is singularly responsible for how you sound and all you have to do to to realize that is think about the fact that you know stevie ray vaughan eric clapton you know bb king albert king freddie king johnny winner the list goes on and on and on of fantastic amazing you know blues players but they all basically use the same five notes okay we're you know we're all playing a pentatonic scale when it comes to playing over a blues in a we're all using a c d e and g most of the time if not all of the time okay so 95 98 of the time that's that's the five notes that are used okay and that's it okay so clearly it's not the note choice okay learning learning more notes getting more notes somehow you know adding adding different scales or uh you know different patterns well first of all different patterns usually doesn't add any more notes it's just different ways to play the notes you already know so it's not about that okay and we only have one other thing we can do and that's rhythm we we can't change anything else okay so let me let me prove a point really quick here i'm going to throw on a jam track show you we'll show you what i mean all right so here i've got basic blues and a nothing fancy i'm going to use what i call my my four note solo pattern okay so the basic i'll say building block of most anything is eighth notes but you'll notice that if all i do is play eighth notes things get kinda dull even if i stop [Music] even if i add some other notes [Music] even if i add some bands [Music] it just gets kind of dull but if i start to add some interest some variation [Music] it starts to sound a lot more interesting [Music] with any luck that's something that i don't have to convince you of i think it's pretty obvious particularly when i when i put them that close together right the rhythm is what makes it the rhythm is what makes a boring player sound interesting you'll notice that i'm not necessarily playing things that are super fast or super complicated i didn't change i didn't add a bunch more notes i didn't you know i had bends and double stops before i did bends and double stops after all those things there's nothing particularly different except the rhythm so now that you see that and and i'm just going to go with i'm going to assume that you agree with me at this point right that that the rhythm is the important part and you always hear me talk about it you always hear me talk about you got account and play right you got to do this stuff but obviously it's hard if it wasn't hard everybody would do it and what makes it hard is the fact that every other instrument on the planet you know piano players horn players um gosh just uh string players you know like violins and cellos and stuff they all have to count time from day one they have traditional musical notation in front of them they have to read it it has beats attached if they don't if they don't count the beats they can't play the music okay guitar is just different we tend to play by ear a lot of people are self-taught so the idea of counting you know one and two and three and four and all that kind of stuff is very foreign okay so this might be complicated it might not i'm not really sure but what's important is that i have for you right now i'm going to show you a process it's a very straightforward very simple just takes a few steps process to improve your counting improve your timing and ultimately improve your soloing and in fact as a side benefit not just your soloing everything you play and it'll make you faster too it's everything rhythm rhythm helps everything it's foundational every amount of time that you invest in this process doing this thing i'm about to show you is going to pay off down the road whether it's 10 minutes or 10 hours or 100 hours you're gonna get better you don't have to think about it okay so let me show you the process it starts with something that i call a rhythm figure so you'll notice that we have some notes here but the note heads i'll say are are all the same they're just circ they're just like slashes okay that means that they have no particular musical value they're just a rhythm okay now what's important here i'm gonna i'm gonna show you how to do this uh in a swing field so i have this guy right up here this is called a metric modulation now don't worry if none of this makes sense to you i'm gonna talk about it you're gonna get the hang of it you're gonna probably just pick it up as we go it's not that difficult but if you simply do what i do and say what i say as i go through this process you don't have to read any of this you don't have to know what any of this means i'm just going to explain it because it only takes a second so what this symbol means that i've circled is that whenever you see two eighth notes together okay we have a pair here a pair here a pair here and a pair here we're going to count that as if it's a quarter note and an eighth note in a triplet group again you don't have to know what that means that's fine all it means is that we're going to count one and for the first part and uh for the second part okay now some people count triplets as one triplet two triplet i count them one and uh two and uh and truth be told that uh is spelled d-u-h like duh doesn't matter one and a two and uh i don't care if you say you know one apple's pairs grapes it really doesn't matter what you say as long as you get three syllables okay so again does not matter and this is just kind of to give you the the skinny on why i'm about to write what i'm about to write which is one and so that particular note happens on one holds through the and then on uh i'm gonna strike that one two and uh three and uh four and uh and again even if that doesn't make one iota of sense to you it's fine don't worry about it do this start by simply counting what's on the screen we're gonna get our foot moving along with it okay so one and uh two and uh three and uh four and uh right so my foot on on the numbers goes down on the uh comes up first thing i'm gonna do is i'm gonna clap what we call clap the rhythm either clap it or hum it since i want you to count out loud you can't really hum so i'm simply gonna go one now if you've never ever ever ever ever done this before that might be really hard okay i don't know i don't know how much experience you have i don't know maybe you've played other instruments in the past i have no way to know any of that okay so i'm starting with the very very basics if you can't do what we just did don't go on yet press pause work on that for a little while it might take a week i don't know it doesn't matter take your time think of it this way this is the most foundational elemental important thing you can possibly do on your instrument this will make everything you ever learn for the rest of time easier and sound better so is it worth it i think so all right let me show you the next thing once i've got to where i can clap it i'm going to play a single note an a okay i'm using a blues in a for my track so i'm going to use an a to play and i'm using it at the tenth fret of the second string if you prefer to use you know uh the fifth fret on the first string sort of you know box one it i'm again i'm thinking about my four note solo pattern very simple 10th fret 8th fret 10th fret 8th fret on the top two strings so my root is that 10th fret on the second string so what i'm going to do is i'm going to count and play one and two uh again i don't know how easy or how hard that's gonna be for you but make sure you can do it you don't have to go fast you just have to be able to do kind of steady uh and even one and two and three and uh four and uh about there will be fine okay you don't have to go fast because what i have is i have these very special jam tracks for you to play along with let me show you what the slowest one sounds like three and four so i'm gonna use that just play one note thing but listen to what you're gonna hear [Music] so there's a little cowbell that you can try to play along with so with just that one note uh three and uh so you can practice your counting and you'll know if you're there one and two and three and four and uh again i'm just starting with the single note now as that goes by you don't have to get them all you don't even have to always use the root note for example i could change that would be okay but what i'm going to do is play just one note [Music] and i'm going to do that basically until you're kind of bored of it and then i'm going to try to change just the last note three and four so see how i just changed the last note [Music] 1 uh now when you get good at that and you could find like that's kind of boring what you try to do is you try to change the first and the last note so you get something like this [Music] and when you get the hang of that you try to mess up some things [Music] okay so see i'm starting to make up stuff [Music] [Music] and again it doesn't matter i could go like to box one if i wanted [Music] okay that's fine you can repeat something like a double stop that's fine i could go like if you're comfortable box four [Music] i just want to show you that what's important is not the notes that you choose but that you keep it in time and you can kind of use if you find yourself sort of getting bored kind of looking for more notes or more interesting things and not concentrating so much on the rhythm anymore because you got it that's good okay so that that boredom that creeps in with the notes that you're playing tells you that you're getting that rhythm down and as you play along with the track if you find that you play it and you're like oh i'm not sure if i did that right i didn't hear the click track i didn't hear the cowbell well if you didn't hear the cowbell then you were probably playing at the same time and you probably got it right so if you hear the cowbell plainly and clearly that's not good that means you didn't play so if it went and you didn't you should have okay so that's that's kind of a good thing you can do but resist the temptation to just use your ear and just play along with it it's really fun but you really want to you really want to also count it's the best of your ability count first get that down then turn on the track okay now that was the slow speed if you get really good at that and you're starting to play with it you're starting to mess things up a little bit you could try it a little bit faster i have a medium speed track as well and for this medium speed track i'm going to start with one note i actually missed a note let's try that again right so again when that gets easy maybe change the last note right and keep doing that maybe start maybe use a different pair of notes or change the first and the last there's a lot of different things you can do [Music] now you're starting to be creative [Music] i played one extra [Music] [Applause] [Music] and you just again keep working over that at that tempo and it gets comfortable that that gets in your ear and you've got it right it's you memorize it it's it's just a part of you you don't have to you don't have to worry about oh can i remember this down the road it doesn't work that way if you spend time practicing this way you're learning you're training yourself to focus on the rhythm and keep that front and center and the note choice secondary that's one of the hardest shifts to make is to switch from concentrating just on notes all the time to concentrating on rhythm primarily and have that always going and then you start to choose some notes now you might be even you know more adept at this you might have more experience you might be a better player maybe you played other instruments where you've had to count you feel comfortable with that i have a fast speed track as well try this a one two three a pull out if that gets it easy change the last note for the first and the last or i can mess up all kinds of stuff [Music] i think you get the idea and probably a lot of the ideas are going to be comparable because it's the same rhythm figure it's just faster your natural your ear is going to draw you to play certain things that you sort of stumble upon and that's cool you're probably going to play basically the same stuff at all the speeds nothing wrong with that okay now that rhythm figure that i showed you is is the most basic one right it simply starts on beat one ends on the uh of four all eighth notes no variety nothing at all okay and i get that eventually we want to have variety but what what we're going to try now is to shift this rhythm figure let me show you in this one we're starting with a rest so one and uh we're not going to play we're going to wait let it go by okay and blues a lot of times you want to let beat one go by when you're starting a lick okay so then everything's the same we got the two and uh we get the three and uh we get the four and uh but now we got one and uh into the next bar two and uh is is that rest this guy here's a half rest three and uh four and again it doesn't matter if you don't know what those symbols are don't worry you do a half a dozen of these you're gonna know what those symbols are and you're gonna know how they work just do what i do say what i say count as i count play as i play you can you can truly just follow along and you're gonna pick it all up so if i count this out the way that i showed you earlier one uh two uh three uh four uh one uh two uh three and uh four and uh sometimes i don't say the and it's kind of under my breath but if i'm more precise one and two and three and four and one and two three and uh four and uh and of course if i play just the one note right and if if this is easy for you you can skip the clapping but don't skip it unless this is really easy for you one and two and three and four and one and two and three and four and uh now when you get the hang of that okay the next thing you would do is you would put on that slow jam track and it's going to have the that that that that that right it's going to have that cowboy you're going to try to play along with it but if you can't count and play by yourself first don't turn on the jam track it's going to be really hard and and that's really it's it's not what you want to do because it's what you've been doing in all likelihood right i mean up until now uh you know i think about like how many youtube videos do you watch that have the count in them other than mine obviously i know i count everything but you probably watch lots of youtube videos from lots of different people and mostly they don't have any counting or any timing or anything so you're used to playing sort of detached from the beat well that's not been working out okay so make sure you you stay with it i know it can be frustrating but when you get it to where you can count it and play it you could do it over the slow track okay it sound a little bit like this one and two three and if i just do the single note one and done done and uh right and of course then i change just the last note and all that but i'm going to mess it up [Music] right this actually starts to sound a lot a lot more musical [Music] and that's all just because we got off of beat one [Music] and i'm not going to take too much time with that i'm going to leave you the track for you but let me show you what the medium might sound like and of course i say might because you're the one playing it three four one right simple [Music] keep it simple keep it simple right or i could switch to box one or i can switch to light box four [Music] again the notes and where you choose to play doesn't matter okay if you find that you're playing along and you're staying with it and you're starting to fish around for notes it's time to increase the speed or it's time to go on to another track because you got it and when you got it you don't have to go back okay remember this is foundational it stays with you so what we've done so far is we've started on beat one and we started on b2 what can be really tricky is to start on the uh right one and uh or two and uh but this is really common in blue so let me show you how this looks at the beginning we end up with a rest in this case an eighth rest so one and we're going to come in on the uh so you're gonna have to pay attention two and a three and uh four and up so the rest of it works just the way they all did and again doesn't matter if you can't read that doesn't matter just do what i do and say what i say everything's going to work out if we clap this it's one and uh two and uh three and uh four and uh notice my foot foot is really important i know it seems silly but you'd be amazed how much i can watch somebody and as soon as i see their foot start to bounce and do weird things i know they're about to make a mistake the foot matters count out loud tap your foot get the clapping going when you get that right single note one and two and uh three and uh four and uh one and uh two and uh three the four and uh one and notice that one is a rest so i'm stopping i'm not having the guitar ring out that's important too and and truly depending on where you're at that might be really really tough it might take days to get to where you can do that and that's okay take your time just you know be kind to yourself especially if you've never done this sort of thing before it can seem very tedious very taxing at first i promise that as you get more comfortable with it you'll get to the point i've watched many of my students they get to a point where they can't imagine not playing something with account it becomes such an integral part because it's an integral part of music so you're gonna when you get the hang of it and when it finally starts to sink in you're gonna wonder how you ever got along without it because it's a huge part of music and we're trying to play music after all okay so let me show you what this sounds like i'm gonna leave it to you to play uh to the slow track i'm gonna play to the medium speed track just to pick things up a little bit and just so you can see that this sounds a lot cooler a one two three single note [Music] so we're starting an ending on an uh [Music] make it a little bit more interesting just changing the first and the last all right i can change more stay in the four and up solo pattern [Music] go to box one maybe [Music] double stops [Music] like i said all of those things when you're fishing for notes you've got the rhythm all right let me show you one more example and this time we're going to do kind of like we did before one and uh that's all a rest two and that's a rest uh three and uh four and uh one and duh and then that's a rest two and uh three and four and that's all a rest but again you don't have to necessarily know how to read it you're going to figure it out you're going to get there probably just in these few examples you're already starting to get the hang of it if we clap this out right one and uh two and uh three and and two three and uh four and uh with the single note one and two and three and uh four and one and two three and uh one more time one and two and three and four and one and two and three and four and uh now again depending on where you're at that could have been really really hard or not that bad at all if it's not that bad at all jump into the slow track if that's not so bad jump to the medium track if that's not so bad jump to the fast track if it's really hard take your time here okay make sure you can count and play first and then go to the slow track then go to the medium track let me show you what the fast track sounds like a one two three four all right keep it easy at first [Music] and you might find out that as you get to the faster tracks that while you can play that rhythm figure at that tempo it really doesn't sound very good that's also a good experience you might not like what you play in fact most of the time you're probably not going to like what you play that's also part of the experience if you play it and you don't like it don't do that again all right so that's four counting examples this is a great place to start now uh these are all you know i'll say triplet based triplet feels the shuffle slow blues whatever you want to call it we're dividing each beat into three pieces of course there's also straight fields but i kind of just picked one for now so we're going to start right here and i'm going to leave you with all these jab tracks this video you know the whole thing i really want you to take some time and practice this stuff again even if it's only a few minutes a day it helps and it gets better okay so as always count slowly right one note you know clap do do the clapping or play the single note both it even is great when you get that down and you're playing at a nice comfortable tempo grab that slow track just try to play along with the cowbell start with just one note keep playing it until you can do that easily then try to change just the last note when that's easy try to change just the first note and the last note later on you can start to you know shuffle things around and make stuff up when that speed when that track speed gets dull and you find yourself fishing for more notes and that kind of thing and you're not making mistakes okay if you're making mistakes in the rhythm because you're fishing for notes you need to focus more on the rhythm but if you if you're making mistakes and staying in time that's okay okay that means that your brain your rhythm part we want that rhythm part back there that inner clock just locked in on what's going on and that leaves a lot more of your brain power to come up with cool notes so if you're getting bored it's time to go to a faster track keep things interesting all right so i'm going to leave you with all this to get started on it's a great great place to get started so do this download everything you see near around this video whatever i'll leave it somewhere depending on where you're seeing this i'll leave it nearby make sure you download it all and get to work on it and i will see you in the next video take care bye-bye

Channel: Blues Guitar Unleashed

Views: 18,086

Keywords: counting rhythms, rhythm lesson for beginners, music theory, blues guitar lesson, blues guitar unleashed, Griff Hamlin, Griff Hamlin Guitar Lesson, how to count rhythms

Id: ZGxhQLDPuPU

Length: 30min 31sec (1831 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 10 2022