MPOW #13 - Hitting the Beat

One of my favorite hobbies is dancing, and I love to really put a little mindfulness in different aspects of my hobbies. Lately, I've been trying to pay more attention to patterns of music, and especially the percussion in salsa music. I'm working up to being able to play that for myself - it's very complicated!

My latest practice has two aspects and several parts to each, training my ear to listen to a beat, and training my hands to tap to a beat. I will start with a basic tapping exercise this week. Learning to move hands and feet independently can be difficult if we don't have practice, so the concentration required to do this often shuts worries and other thoughts out of our minds. Only the room for the pattern can fit in.

If you are already a musician, the exercise today will be quite basic for you, so see if you can really get something deeper out of going to a basic. There's a note at the bottom especially for people who find this easy.

The mindfulness practice of the week: independent tapping
Sit comfortably where you can move your hands and your feet. If you have a metronome or a click track, use that to help you keep your timing. I talked a bit about this in last week's MPOW #12: Metronome Breathing. If you don't have a metronome, here's a site with mp3 files.
Part 1: 4/4 timing basics
Count 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4, ... Using your dominant hand, tap on every beat. In rock, this is typically hitting the hi hat.

Count: 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
DH:    X X X X X X X X

Part 2: Add in the kick drum
Using your foot, hit on the 1, 3, 1, 3, .... See if you can do this at the same time as your dominant hand hitting the 1, 2, 3, 4, ....

Count:  1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
DH:     X X X X X X X X
F:      X   X   X   X

Part 3: Add in the snare
The snare hits on the 2 and the 4. See if you can do this with your non-dominant hand. At first, you may want to leave the foot out.

Count:  1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
DH:     X X X X X X X X
ndH:      X   X   X   X

Then, when you are comfortable, add the kick drum back in:

Count:  1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
DH:     X X X X X X X X
F:      X   X   X   X
ndH:      X   X   X   X

You are now moving 3 parts of your body independently at the same time. This might require quite a bit of concentration. My hands tend to get rattled in the transition, but then they get the hang of it.

Part 4: 3 beats for every 2.
Here it becomes a little trickier since they're moving in different timing. See if you can figure this one out on your own. With you right hand tap every 2 beats. With your left hand, tap every 3 beats. Leave me a note if you want a tip. I just figured this one out for myself with the help of a friend.

For existing musicians and drummers and others who find this really easy
There are likely 2 ways you can get something out of this:
1. Learn to be comfortable doing something so easy. If you find it boring and tedious, explore that to see what you learn.
2. Push yourself in a new challenge. Likely you already find a state of flow whenever you work on a new rhythm or melody. Find something that's a bit beyond your skill right now or something that engages your entire mind and practice with that.