In this groove construction lesson you will follow a '34432' rhythm and play two sixteenth note kicks on the first two strokes of each block. This will create a solid, syncopated rhythm on the kick that will sound great. The constant more steady rhythm of the right hand left hands will highlight this offbeat rhythm further. The double '34432' rhythm looks like this:
To apply to a groove you are going to follow a similar process to the level 0 Rhythm First construction method. See if you can put a common time groove together yourself before looking at the example below using the method presented in that lesson. There are two ways I will present this. First of all one where the kick isn't played when a snare appears and the second where the kick keeps playing regardless of what the snare is doing, as with the level two lesson linked above. These two ideas are shown below for a straight common time version of this idea:
Spend some time getting comfortable with this pattern, focus on that double 33334 syncopated rhythm on the kick and make that the prominent point of the part. When you have the groove at a comfortable tempo, start changing both the right hand rhythm and orchestration. You could also try applying this part to half and double time patterns. Some different construction ideas following some of these ideas are shown below. In all, that syncopated rhythm should be the focus of the groove.
Example 1
Example 2
Example 3
Example 4
Example 5
Example 6
TASK
- Learn the grooves above up to a tempo of at least 120bpm.
- Experiment with different placement ideas and orchestrations.
- Use the concept as part of a phrased example.
- Try constructing longer patterns based on this rhythm, such as two or four bar grooves, where the syncopated rhythm continues through the whole phrase.
- Try constructing a groove based on a shorter version of this phrase.