Switching between 3 and 4 Feels

[oops]

Hey.

Had a workshop at Uni yesterday with a guy named Steve Magnusson (prominent jazz guitarist in Melbourne).

He talked a lot about listening, which was great, actually just what I needed (check my last thread), and then he went into a 4:3 polyrhythm which I thought was amazing.

He brought two drummers up on stage (me and another guy), had me playing In 3 with my left foot, and then in 4 with my right foot (which was cool). Then he had the other guy play a 'clave' type pattern in 3 on a snare.

Then he soloed over top of it, and he flowed between 3 and 4 feels. I can try and tab out the parts he had us playing if you want, but I was just wondering if anyone else has ever done this kind of stuff.

I always thought was a bit 'geeky' or too technical, but the way he did it it really flowed. He has amazing phrasing.

The basic pattern I was playing was somewhat like this...

HhhHhhHhhHhh

If that makes sense. Bold are the beats in 3, capitalized the beats in 4...

[dea]

I wouldn't say this is too technical, and I would also say this is a general skill that will implicitly and explicitly help you with every facet of your playing.

I use my metronome to practice these skills. I will generally set the metro to one time sig, then sing-n-play the other over the metro. Then switch the metro to the other time sig and sing-n-play the other. Once your comfortable piggy-backing the time sigs over each other, the transitions will fall out fairly easily.

I hope that helped. Let me know if my babbling was unclear.

[mrchattr]

I love using stuff like that, or even the slightly more comples hemiola (triplet over duple feel). It's so interesting to move beats around, find new patterns, and see what other improvisational musicians can do over it.