A natural approach to polyrhythms

[drumkid8888]

Hi Guys Just wondering whether anyone has experienced a more natural way of playing polyrhythms as opposed to the more academic way i.e. writing out a pattern and then working out mathematically, the relationship between parts. I ask this because i recently found myself automatically playing something which on reflection turned out to be polyrhythmic. i'll explain what happened very briefly. I played semi quavers(sixteenths) on the Bass drum, then this pattern over the top:RLRL-RRLR-RLRL-LRLL on various surfaces and with accents. I played this for quite a while. eventually, i found that my bass drum seemed to be on automatic and i could now increase or decrease the rate of the top pattern as i wished(without fluctuation of the b/d, but the pattern that sticks in my memory was this: RLRLR-RLRRL-RLLRL-LRLRL. or 5 over 4. i would love to hear from anyone with this or a similar experience.Best wishes- NICK-

[Nikk]

That's cool man. The idea of simply "feeling" polyrhythms as opposed to first intellectualizing them is a weird one. The thing you gotta consider is, although you felt that said polyrhythm simply flowed out of you, this may not be the case. Somewhere along the way, you developed an understanding of how such a polyrhythm would sound. You probly picked it up off a record or video a while back. In my opinion, we all gotta first intellectualize complicated stuff. After that is when we turn it all to music.

[MethodAir]

Polyrhythms get hard when you have rests...writing it out can help things be more organized as well as give more ideas to practice.

MethodAir

[Steve Holmes]

I think everyone has the ability to teach themself stuff and naturally stumble on to neat things. However when it comes to polyrythm's I think when you DO arrive at something its a good starting point. The goal is to be able to have FREEDOM with it I think. That comes from simplifying and practicing different combinations to be put together later.

That sounds like a cool thing you were playing though!
I did a somewhat lengthly post on this stuff a while ago, I tried to find it but its gone. [img]frown.gif[/img]

[Steve Holmes]

Dude is that pic in your signature?
Wow, thats a big signature.