I really need to work on my timing. Speeding up or slowing down - not playing in a steady time - is an issue for me at sessions. I was listening to an interview with music teacher Robb Cappelletto, who has become known for being Billy Strings’ guitar teacher. In the interview Robb said (regardless of what genre or style you might play or want to learn), “We always need to talk about technique. We always need to talk about time and rhythm. We always need to talk about ear training. We always need to understand harmony. We always need to (talk about fingering patterns). Whatever level the student is at, we can always talk about all of these. There's always a higher level to take something to.”
The one that stood out for me is timing and rhythm. Later in that same podcast, Robb says:
You can use the metronome like bumpers and bumper bowling to keep nudging you back to the center. Or you can use the metronome like an electric fence. And the latter is far more helpful.
If your metronome is playing on every beat, you're not keeping time. The metronome is keeping time for you. There is so much clicking that there's no way you could possibly go out of time if you actually know how to play.
(I'm going to paraphrase some more things that Robb said in that interview)
Make the click one beat per measure. Now you have a lot of opportunity to speed up or slow down and get off with the metronome because you're playing eight eighth notes per click now. Continually cut the metronome in half. If your metronome is at 120, then you cut it to 60, but you're still playing the same speed. There's just less metronome to keep you on track. But there's still enough metronome to remind you if you are keeping time enough. You're testing your ability to keep time rather than using the metronome to keep human time.
You have to start with enough click to train a pulse. You need to train your ability to hear and have a reference of what even time is. You can't just put the metronome on 5 (bpm) and play 150. You can't just do that right away. It's gonna be frustrating and probably not very beneficial. So, you start with the metronome as an eighth note, and then you cut the metronome down to a quarter note. And then you cut it down to a half note. And then if you can get to the point where the metronome is once a bar, or once every 2 bars, or once every 4 bars.
If you can get to the point where you can do that, the metronome did not keep time. It was just there to let you know if you kept time or not. The metronome is not keeping the time for you. Continually cutting your metronome in half is something that everybody can build up to. Cut the metronome in half and make sure you're still keeping the time.
Robb also cautions, if you can't sing it, you can't play it.
If you try playing it before you can sing it then you're essentially just guessing and hoping the frets are gonna remind you what it sounds like. You’re just remembering the order of operations and what it looks like, but not actually thinking of the sound.
You should be able to dubba dubba dubba your way through anything before you try to play it. Because if you don't know what it sounds like, you don't know the rhythm, you don't really know the shape of the melody. You're just hoping the confusing matrix of strings and frets is going to solve this problem for you, and it won't.
OK, so I tried this exercise described above where you put the metronome at like 20 bpm, but play at 80 bpm so that you’re essentially playing two measures of music per click. It's really hard! This is going to take some practice, which is good. However, this concept inspired me to create these play along practice tracks for the jig Lilting Banshee and the reel The Maid Behind the Bar. In each case there are long gaps between melody where you have to fill in the blanks yourself and then hopefully sync back up with the music at the right time. Give it a shot!
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