Playing with rhythm

[Iris]

K. So I'm gonna try and describe this the best I can. I grew up playing various brass instruments and piano/keyboard. So I can read music. But I'm having trouble connecting the tab to the rhythm. After this part in the picture it's just a run of 16th notes. I'm finding that I'm getting the fingering down, but I'm concerned that I'm gonna learn it but it'll be in straight 8th notes and then I'll have to re-learn it with the 16th notes. So I guess I'm wondering what's the best way to practice in time with the rhythm. Hope that makes sense.

 

[Ed Seith]

Assuming there's drums in the recording, listen and tap along to the drums. If the3 song is in 4/4 time, it's easy - typical drumbeat has kick drum on 1 and snare on 3 - that's a basic beat - with hi-hat or ride cymbal keeping the whole 1-2-3-4 or 1-and-2-and-3-and-4-and... Once you read and listen along to the piece in time with the drums, it should be easier to play it along to a metronome or drum machine.

 

[Forgetabull]

So I can't read music anymore.. maybe 29yrs ago I could.. so you're winning already that you can still read it. Along with what Ed said, for 16th notes, you can do the:

8th Notes: One - And - Two - And - Three - And - Four - And
16th Notes: One - E - And - A - Two - E - And - A - Three - E - And - A - Four - E - And - A

The trick is to match your up/down strums to each word above where you accent on the number. I'd suggest starting with just a basic chord or single note and doing the "One - E - And - A" type thing to get your down/up strums to match your counting.

 

[chris_is_cool]

On top of what everyone is saying: When I see a section with a wild mix of notes with different length values, 8ths, 16ths, whatever: I take a metronome and put it to a really slow speed... like maybe 40 bpm or so, so that I can really easily identify each 16ths note. Then I play the passage to the metronome until I really nail the super slow version and have internallized how the rhythm should sound that slowly. Only then it's time to speed up.

 

[William B.]

I got trouble learning this stuff too, gonna try these tips next time