My good friend and fabulous drummer Martin joins me here for a fun jam with some live drums. I really like the groove we're getting into towards the end.
One of the difficulties, I find, with working on a groove box or in Ableton, is that the design assumes a groove based on sampled drum loops, synthetic drum patterns and mostly a set tempo. So, composing is naturally channeled towards drum grooves and building up from there, even if it is just a metronome. By working with a drummer, when we already have sequences, snapshots, clips and maybe even drum patterns ready to go, we leave the drummer with little to do. Even though rhythm programming as early as the first Cubase allowed ritardando, the kind of expression that is possible jamming with instruments which are not in sync with a computer pulse is rarely used. I am unlikely to have the opportunity to work this way because I work in isolation.
I know exactly what you mean. When working with machines we somehow always have to decide wether we want to follow a set tempo or be completely free. Anything in between usually brings along all sorts of problems and in my experience leads funnily enough to even less flexibility. In many cases the opposite of what I would like. I think it's just one of the disadvantages of making music with computers instead of people that we have to live with. I disagree though that working with clicks and programmed drums leaves the drummer with little to do. Keeping a steady beat is not the drummer's sole purpose (or at least it should't be). especially when the tempo is fixed dynamics, timbre, textures, micro timing and sometimes even the drummers mistakes become all the more important. I don't see any significant differences there between a drum set and a piano, or a flute for example.
