More specifically counting to four is hard. Counting to four twelve times, and keeping track is hard. No. I didn’t think so either, but it seems to be. And to be fair, in the context I’m talking about, it really, kind of, is.
Here I’m talking about counting in music. Western music in particular because I know naught about Asian music or African, though Carlos Santana will tell you that most of what western music uses are African rhythms so maybe it is also based on a four-beat barre. A lot of music is based on roughly a four-beat barre with some variation. Cut time, or three-quarter time, or even six-eight time are some variations that are common, until you get to jazz and then all bets are off.
Learning to count in music is important. It lets/helps you to be able to play with other people. It’s the underlying thing that holds the group together, along with the key. If you can’t count how long you are supposed to be playing that chord or note, or how long someone else is playing that chord and where you fit in with it, and when they are going to change, then things don’t sound quite as good. And somebody is going to get confused. One of the best tools in learning to count is a metronome. And I’m finding a lot of bedroom musicians do not like to use one. I understand and relate. I didn’t either.
My relationship with the metronome is sporadic these days. It used to be non-existent. I didn’t want to use one, I hated to use one, and I wouldn’t use it. Though, my father, a musician himself who had played in band, and I think orchestra would tell me I needed to use one. He was right. But I didn’t really start any level of practice with one until I started playing with people. I found it was good for helping me learn to stay with the beat so that when I had a drummer to follow, who might be doing fills instead of just keeping the beat, I could stay with them. And while I don’t always use one these days, I do go back to it when I’m working on something that I’m having trouble with getting the timing for. Or when I’m trying to set a pace for my sister if we’re working on a piece together.
And this is how I learned that counting is hard. My sister and I have tried to work on three pieces together now and we did good with the first two though it took some work. The third one we still need to work on, I just happened to get caught up in something and haven’t gotten back to working with her on it. But I got a good laugh at something she put together because of how she matched things up. I forgot to tell her that so when she reads this it will be the first time, she learns of it, and I’ll get a text message. But I digress.
My sister is really my first understanding that counting is hard. And I have fun joking about it with my musician friends that I play with because it is the idea that something we learn to do at a young age is so hard when you get older. But it’s the context. And my sister isn’t the only one, she was just the first. I came across another person who is learning to count. Someone who wants to play with the jam that I play at and said, they aren’t very good at counting or keeping track, they are super worried about keeping up and making the chord changes at the right time, and all of that. And then there is my guitar student. Who takes chorus in school, and understands the notes, I will still have to work with them on counting. And until I sat down to write this, I had not thought at all about what is really going on when we count for music and that it truly is hard.
Let me take you through a basic 12 barre blues. A basic 12-barre blues is often in standard or four-four time. Meaning you get four beats to a barre; a whole note is held for four counts. In a 12-barre blues there is a 12-barre pattern. That means that after you play the first 12 barres you just repeat what you played until someone decides the song is done. So now you have to count to four, twelve times, and you have to keep track of how many times you counted to four. That sounds a little harder but not that hard, right?
Ok. So, let’s add the pattern. One 12 barre blues pattern is: the I chord for four barres, the IV chord for two barres, the I chord for two barres, the V chord for one barre, the IV chord for one barre, and the I chord for two barres. Then you repeat. Don’t worry about what those chords are, I’m just illustrating the pattern. An easier way to read this is:
I have to keep track of counting to four for four times, change my chord, then count to four for two times, change my chord, then count to four for two times again, change my chord, then count to four for one time, change my chord, count to four for one time, change my chord and count to four for two times, and don’t change my chord and start over. Easy until you try it. Because each count is for the same amount of time.
Let’s use seconds here. So, let’s say you are counting to four. You want to strum or play a note four times per barre. And each one should be for a second. You want to count 1 for 1 second, 2 for one second, 3 for one second, and four for one second. You don’t want to count 1 for one second, then 2 for 2 seconds, and three for one second, and four for 2 or 3 seconds. Then you have six or seven seconds to your barre instead of four seconds. Has your brain seized up and ceased to function yet? Now you know how your child or friend who is learning to play music feels.
So, that’s just chords by the way. That’s not trying to read the notes of a melody or just reading regular music where you have to deal with the whole notes, half notes, quarter notes and all other manner of fractions of a barre and their various combinations. Basically, you need to get the right number of notes to add up to whatever that top number on the time signature is into each barre. So, if your barre is four seconds long, then a whole note is four seconds, a half note is two seconds, and quarter note is one second, and all the notes in a barre add up to four seconds. As a very simple example because it is never that simple.
Now I get it. Counting is hard. Counting for music is hard. You don’t just keep track of counting one thing. Depending on what your part in the music is you could easily have three counters going at the same time that are all at different numbers. I’ve been counting for music for so long that it is second nature to me. Not that I’m always disciplined at it. I use a lot of music counting slang, I drift and make it up as I remember it. But, if I need to figure something out, I go back to the basics and count it out properly. Counting is part of the musical grammar. It’s part of how musicians relate to each other when they are playing together. So counting is important. And hard.
I will still give my sister a hard time about her not being able to count, because that’s what sisters do. But I understand better now why she has trouble. I’d really never thought about it. Now that I have, I hope to be able to show patience to my guitar student and the musician who wants to play at the jam. It really is a mental work out.
And that’s all I’ve got. Cheers!