How to improve your rhythm 

this is a scam, the guy that adam is talking to is just adam in black and white but standing in another spot!

My band director says that he had a freshman student (percussionist) with absolutely terrible rhythm. Even entrances on upbeats were tricky for them. But the next year, they came back to band with much greater ability, along with an amazing sense of rhythm. When my director asked the kid how they were able to improve so much, the kid said, "Well, it became a lot easier when I tried counting to 4 while I played."

> By counting while you play All wind instruments just died a little inside

Adam: "Were you *rushing* or were you *dragging*?" Also Adam: "I-I don't know."

My drum/percussion teacher had this thing where he'd think of a weird phrase (i.e. "the maths department stole my mug, oh what a shame") and then come up with a fairly complex rhythm which fit with the words. It's incredible how much easier it made learning long rhythmic parts

When I was training as a paramedic my instructors were always confused as to how I managed to maintain such a relentlessly precise rhythm of 110/minute chest compressions... even under the stress of real resuscitation. I never got on with the tempo of "Staying Alive"... I used the morbidly appropriately titled Rammstein song Ich Tu Dir Weh (literally translated as "I hurt you"), the first song I ever mastered playing as a brand new guitarist by sheer brute force. Very fitting, given that textbook CPR fractures the ribs from the sternum almost immediately, resulting in an extremely painful recovery for the tiny percentage of cardiac arrest patients who regain some form of consciousness. Three people survived to hospital discharge during my 4 year career, with me literally miming the guitar rhythm in my head... wonderful non musical application for good rhythm! (From a technical perspective, the heart needs a fairly precise tempo of chest compressions to allow the upper chambers of the heart to passively fill with the maximum amount of blood, for the most efficient artificial circulation of blood. Certainly worked OK for a few lucky people :D Ich tu dir weeeeeh! Tut mich nicht leid!) Perhaps it was more the aggressive resucsitation... I hated the "Nah mate, don't bother trying too hard, no one survives cardiac arrest" mentality of some oldshool paras. Fuck that. 50 year old heart attack? I don't care how many thousand pounds the air ambulance costs to turn out... the words "What the fuck happened... why does my chest hurt" are worth every second, and every hour of hard guitar practice :D

TFW you play a wind instrument so you can't count out loud and play at the same time

There's no end like low end.

The papyrus font for the "meditation" was hysterical. I love all your little humorous nuances, Easter eggs and inside jokes. Its really great when coming back and rewatching videos I notice things I haven't in the past. Your internet speak is on point

using your a pic of yours to picture "humans" may be the most basic, yet best joke I have ever witnessed in such subtleness

The notes Galileo sung were the lick right?

This is quickly becoming my favourite channel. Reignited a love of theory in me and has actually got me *studying* my craft again. So yeah, thanks!

"Who knew practice was actually work ?! Oh my gooood."

Hi Adam! Great clip, as usual! I just wanted to touch upon Patel’s ‘vocal learning’ theory, which you reference around minute 4:00. This is a highly enticing theory which has its roots in the field of music cognition, particularly in the realm of beat processing. Yet, as with every theory, it must be taken with a pinch of salt. As you aptly point out in the video, the theory revolves around the ability to vocalize complex sounds, which is shared by a select number of animal species, including humans. In essence, Patel focuses on the fact that all animals capable of entraining their body movements to an external rhythmic source also seem to be capable of learning and reproducing complex vocal patterns from their peers, and to use these patterns in a communicative and adaptive way. This convergence would seem to point to a causal, perhaps even evolutionary, link between these two seemingly disparate abilities. However, in a more recent paper by Pattel himself (2014), the author cautions the reader by explaining that the ability to synchronize to a beat has also been verified in sea lions, which are animals that do not happen to express complex vocalizations, nor vocal learning. This does not necessarily mean, however, that the theory is irrevocably flawed or incorrect. In fact, Patel goes on to explain that, although sea lions do not exhibit vocal learning characteristics, the other members of the sea lion’s evolutionary lineage (namely seals) do express this ability. Thus, it is possible that sea lions inherited the brain structures needed for vocal learning and beat processing but only expressed the latter, due to particular evolutionary constraints affecting this species alone. If this turned out to be true, the ‘vocal learning’ theory would remain intact. A radically different but plausible explanation would be that these two abilities are typically expressed concomitantly, but are in fact functionally and evolutionarily independent from each other, which would explain why sea lions exhibit one but not the other. If this second explanation turned out to be true, the ‘vocal learning’ theory would be in jeopardy. In any case, we will never know for certain unless we peek into the sea lion’s brain and ultimately compare it to the brain of other vocalizers (and beat tappers!). For now we can neither prove nor disprove Patel’s theory and, thus, must wait for more evidence to come our way. I hope you found this information interesting! Here’s a link to Aniruddh D. Patel’s 2014 paper, titled 'The Evolutionary Biology of Musical Rhythm: Was Darwin Wrong?': journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.1001821

Notification from Adam Neely: the day is saved

The timing of this video is impeccable! I have been focusing on my piano rhythm and have become so frustrated I was going to ask this for a Q&A. Thank you!

6:50 Friends and relatives wonder why I never dance at parties even when they so kindly insist. Little do they know, I'm actually protecting them from myself.

As a wind player, I can't count out loud, but we do subdivide continuously in our minds, always. My teacher had an exercise for training our subdividing chops to make it more natural, consistent, and effortless, so that our artistic brain can go elsewhere without sacrificing rhythmic integrity. The exercise is to clap sixteenth notes (with a metronome on slow quarters) while speaking fluidly, out of rhythm (or in different rhythm, perhaps). Basically, holding a conversation without letting your clapping rhythm falter. As you get better at this, your ability to subdivide while playing improves. This is the inverse of what you are proposing - we are not taking advantage of the innate rhythm of speech. Maybe we could flip the exercise over, and subdivide out loud with the voice while doing something arrhythmic with the hands - writing, doodling, playdough, or something.

Holy crap! I have been playing guitar for 8 years now and singing for longer. And for almost all of that time I have struggled with rhythm. Tons of people have told me to count before, but I always over think it and try to MAKE my counting rhythmic, causing my counting to be off. But, the way you explained how we naturally count in rhythm, made a lightbulb go off. I just picked up my guitar and started counting how I would naturally, and I have never been more in rhythm in my life. THANK YOU!

As a vocalist, I can tell you that the great conductor Robert Shaw required all of his choirs to learn their pieces through "Count Singing." Under his method, the words to every song is the subdivided beats "One-ee-and-uh two-ee-and-uh" and so forth. "Three" is pronounced "Tee," "Four is "Fo," "Five" is "Fie" and "Six" is "Sic." He pointed out that you could use the same method to zoom in and subdivide subdivisions if that level of precision is necessary. As an example, a symphonic choir may be performing the last movement of Beethoven's Ninth in eight weeks of rehearsal. Robert Shaw would ban words for the first five weeks of the rehearsal process, forcing the choir to learn the musical language for its own sake before adding the actual language of lyrics. Only when there was three weeks to go in the rehearsal process did he give the choir precisely one phoneme at a time, which was filled in at the specific spot formerly occupied by the subdivision name. By substituting this way, each singer knows down to the 16th note where to place an ending consonant. It's revolutionized the way I learn sheet music as a singer.

this was brilliant! Thanks!

"AdAaaam Neelyyyyy's Count LesoooOooons!" Another interesting video mate, sweet :)

And now I'm practising counting unmetronomically, just because I can.

spoiler: its the same thing your music teacher tells you

Wow! This is one of the best music education videos I've ever seen. Mind blown! I will definitely start implementing counting out loud into my metronome practice. Thank you 💜💜💜💜

Now I'm not a cognitive scientist or a music teacher. I actually study language and play music and I'm doing research on aesthetics and neuroscience. It's great when findings like the ones you shared can be such eye openers for different disciplines. This was really helpful, Adam. Thanks so much. My brother and I really enjoy your videos.

My music teacher actually told me to count myself without using a metronome to improve timing,I didn't really pay much attention now I can't wait to try it out.Thanks Adam

I'm glad you've returned to having the intro song! Anyway, I very much agree that vocalization really helps. I know that working on singing has really helped my ear but it's also made my improvisation a lot stronger in terms of feel and time, too.

EXACTLY the thing I have been looking for! Thanks Adam!!! You rule!

cognitive scientist here. as of the Matthew subject, my suggestion is somewhere between lack of contextualised learning and/or lack of sensorial integration (which is surprisingly important in learning beyond stimulus pairing). I suggest you take a look. Keep up the good work!

I love this video because I’ve always felt my rhythm sucks and this speaks to tapping into an inner awareness we aren’t aware of but possess.

"violin players even more-so." I fucking love you Adam

Brilliant! I always teach my students to count out loud and play, this explains on a much deeper level WHY this works, thank you Adam!

Thanks, Adam, for putting out a public video explaining exactly what I try to explain to every person that tells me they have no "talent" for music. Been two years since I've been working with music education and I got to that conclusion by watching how people learn and what difficulties they have and how to solve them without saying "MUSIC COMES FROM THE SOUL" nor "REPEAT THIS EXERCISE UNTIL YOU GET IT" Even the ruler analogy is pretty basic to show what rythm really is. I think every music educator should work by standards like this, being "down to earth, objective world" oriented.

Man you should definitely check Ekrem Jevric's "Kuca poso" out. This guy sings 7/8 over 4/4 time and he seems to be doing it so spontaneously and fluently! Might be another example of what you mentioned at the end of the video.

Who needs rhythm with dance moves like that

I like how he just assumes his average viewer has more confidence than a cockatoo

The concept you touch on at 5:20 is gold! This is how I approach “independence “

After watching this video, I do believe that I am suffering from beat deafness. Keeping up with rhythm is a big struggle for me despite practicing guitar for almost 10 years. It is really frustrating to me since it hinders me from my passion to music.

Loved the ruler analogy. One of the best things my band teacher ever told us was that constant subdivision isn't just helpful for playing fast passages. It's also the only way that you will come in on time after a rest or change on time after a held note. Thinking about that helps me so much when I play, and I think that ruler analogy illustrates it really well. Thanks man keep it up!

Can you do a video about what you've learned from Carnatic music and/or other non-Eurocentric music? Just any cool history facts or pieces developed outside our standard thinking that might inspire? Not all of us can take a Berklee class on the subject but you must have learned a lot of interesting things.

Thanks Adam! This is a timely video as I was just looking for ways to improve my rhythm.

The training of rhythm sense through vocalization is a major part of Konnakol, the 'spoken percussion' system that's part of mridangam training in Carnatic music but is also totally its own thing. If anyone hasn't seen or heard it and is intrigued, there are a ton of fascinating training videos on youtube - some great names to search for are Henrik Andersen, Bernhard Schimpelsberger and Manjunath BC. I just love it and I very much recommend checking it out. :)

*it don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing* ;)

"Now I'm not a cognitive scientist, but I am a music teacher" lol let there be memes

This is a crazy useful exercise. Thanks for sharing it Adam!

Everything you say makes perfect sense. I guess I believe it by I can't explain why I've heard audiences of several dozen people be so out of sync with each other while clapping to a song that it sounded closer to an applause than a rythm. With at least a third of the people so far off-beat in different places it's hard to imagine that it wasn't intentional (but it wasn't).

Adam: count while you play Me: a sax player *Credits start rolling*

ye counting while you play just changes everything, once you get used to count in 4/4 try goin odd 5/4, 7/8 etc, or mixing it playing grooves with triplets in it

The perfect combination between passion, information and entertaintment. One of youtube's finest channels

>humming All-Star >Mouth Sounds fucking great dude. This is what i subbed for. Lessons with a spice of interest.

Hi Adam, interesting idea. Q+A question: I've heard you mention a few times that you found rhythm especially challenging as a beginner/intermediate player and that you had to work really hard to correct it. As a bass player who also struggles with this I was wondering if you could elaborate on how you overcame it? Is it just down to metronome exercises and practicing? Or was it changing your mindset and approach to rhythm that made the real difference (like the concept featured in this video)? I'd be grateful if you could also speak on how your weakness with rhythm affected your ability to play professionally with others? In other words how accurate is a bass players rhythm generally expected to be? Is there any margin for error or are you likely to loose your gig to someone else who has it down completely?

Counting to 4 - With Adam Neely

I tapped my foot while Adam was talking and I found that Adam's talking stay very well in sync the whole time.

I truly believe this "Bass Rhythm" effect to be true. When I played tuba as a part of the Memphis State University (now University of Memphis) marching band, the tubas were always fussed at most for tempo issues. May have been our playing due to having to "fill" a large instrument with air (which means we had to think ahead of the beat) or the director could hear our tempo variations more due to this :Bass Rhythm" effect.

*counting backwards with adam neely*

I'm wondering about the ear's ability to divide notes into time periods. Notes less than 100 hertz have much fewer divisors than notes in the range of lead guitars and violins. Therefore we need bass notes to be more regular so that they harmonize in our audio memory. High notes, on the other hand, can be just about anywhere in the beat and find a vibrational match with previous note placements. I hope you get what I'm saying. It's like how our brain remembers the first note in a scale and requires the last note to match it, even though it's been seconds since you played it. If you could see my hands right now I'm completely demonstrating this in the air.

What a fantastic video!! As a teacher of music and dance, this is an issue that I deal with daily. So many people believe the false reality that they have no rhythm. Fact is that there is nothing in the known universe which does not duplicate some form of rhythm. Deep stuff. Any way, this really struck a chord for me ;-)

I have a handful of internal phrases I sometimes say in my head while swing dancing "step, step, triple, step, step, triple" for 8 count basic or "step, step, triple, triple" for 6 count basic. I'm more likely to use them when I'm dancing as a lead than a follow though. Some Lindy Hop dancers use the technique of vocalizing a tricky rhythm with nonsense sounds to coincide with fancy footwork or other movements.

Camels are natures camels.

"Meditation" with Adam Neely "Counting Backwards" with Adam Neely Hahahah.

How did you know I needed that video? 🙀 (preparing for the upcoming entrance exams, last year they told me I need to work on my rhythm amongst other things, and the exam is happening by the end of this month, again) thank you.

I love this RU-vid channel, Adam goes into every hypothesis and theory about certain (mostly complex) areas of music and it's extremely fascinating and insightful, this channel is like the Vsauce of music, btw Adam got some sick dance moves

Could you make a video in which you dance to different pieces of music? 😅😅😅

Hey Ad (if I may) Great video. The all-too-quick Shatner reference - can you say more about 23rd-century speech cadence and its impact on rhythmic competence? Thanks, Ez (if you like)

Hey Adam, watched this video like 3 years later after the post. I was a musician for a while and I am also a stuttered with a very hard time talking in rythmn. I am pretty fluent but, still, if you put along with a metronome you can notice how I lack rythmn on my speech. It was something my therapist pointed out from the begining. I eventually improved to the fluency I have today but all I am saying is, some people lack this internal clock you mentioned midway through the video and, at the time, it affected my rythmn as a musician too. Nowadays, I am pretty fluent but can still feel this lack of natural rythmn if I am not concentrated on it.

Love that painting above the fireplace!

adam: count while playing wind players and singers: aww man

My band used to have a drummer who just couldn't count to four, it was so frustrating. He could never keep a 4/4, always used fills that dragged over to 5/4 and never even noticed it. The funny thing is that people who didn't knew him thought that he was such a technical player because he went through so many different rythms XD

Excellent example of "Communication (or education in this instance) is ALL about the message received" not given. Thanks for re-phrasing and the connection...

That counting while playing the Journey song exercise is so helpful! Thanks, Adam!

1:59 HAD ME FOOLED OMG

How to improve your rhythm: don't be a classical musician. Right, Adam?

Going to dance classes before I learned music meant that counting came naturally. It makes sense that it helps I have actually managed to accurately measure time by tapping a 60 BPM beat and counting taps in my head which was quote cool Also there is a reason why the instructions of singing stayin alive works so well for CPR

Thank Heaven - a guy who knows his subject AND ( yes and, folks,) knows how to talk about it. Clear even though fast, easy to follow even though so much is said. Thanks. Bad speakers drive me insane, and your speed is certainly better than mine. John Windsor-Cunningham

Hi Adam, you seem to reference academic studies quite often in your videos. I was wondering if there were any academic music journals you would recommend subscribing to?

Christ I lost it when you showed the image of William Shatner LOL

I have been binging your videos. This one is my favorite. I am inspired to pick up clarinet again and to keep trying with ukulele. I played clarinet all through middle School and high school, but didn't keep it up because I didn't think I was very good. I am in my early thirties now and wanting to connect with something that would make my dad proud. He's the sort of guy who can't read music but can literally play anything on anything. I think that this is something I can do between practice and way you explain things. Thank you so much for offering your insight. It is valuble and did not come easy. It's obvious that you have put in a great deal of work and passion to get where you are. Thank you.

Dude, you totally made my day, keep making videos forever, please.

Captain Kirk reference nearly had me choking to death... :D

Christ i cant even keep up with seven nation army. I tried the counting thing but i still couldnt get it after 30 mins. Should i trade my instruments for a triangle?

THe drummer Garu Chester talks about this in his book: ´´Ability to hear and feel the quarter note. One of the first things you have to sing is the quarter note, along with the metronome, as you sight-read. The quarter note is the daddy of the bar; singing it really helps you hear exactly where the quarter is, and how everything you play relates to it. This will result in better time feel and better execution.´´

I absolutely love the 'conversation' you have with your 'dumb you' in those videos. It helps to really understand what you're explaining.

Hey, Adam, I love your lessons, but I don't really play a lot of jazz and I worry that all the music theory is only really applicable if I were to play jazz or classical music, which I largely don't play. Does advanced music theory really have a place in other genres? Am I right in thinking this or am I being ignorant? Sorry for my bad English by the way, it's my first language

is there a full version of the outro song?

Adam is brilliant, can't get enough, real teacher, real integrity, thank you Adam you are genuinely helping people. BASS!

figured this out years ago, it was really eye opening, anyone who i play with who i coach into counting while playing improve their rhythm chops noticeably in just a couple weeks, counting is key and i would also recommend vocalizing, use your mouth sounds to map out melodies and harmonies you want to make or just count aloud, that can really help with subdivisions (one-ee and-ah two-ee and-ah three-ee and a four-ee and-ah)

Galileo: there's gotta be a better way to measure time than humming freaking songs all the time *invents pendulum*

Could you do an analysis on the rhythm in Meshuggha's music? Particularly in 'New Millennium Cyanide Christ' and 'Bleed'

I think I would love to have the opportunity to spend a few days going through your book collection. I don't have any education in music, but I watch your videos and pick up valuable information that is quite helpful. Having the ability to simplify complex concepts AND provide examples outside of the focused target of thought is rare, and you are really, really good at it. Thanks for all the videos. As I am just starting my musical journey I think I have found someone is confident (Competence breeds confidence IMO.) enough speak of music without having to figure out ways to conceal inadequate knowledge and experience. Great job!

Great video. Amazing how much time and effort you put into your production...

But isn't our rhythm feel linked to our heart rate as well? I mean most people consider a regular old 4/4 rhythm around 70-95 bpm as "normal", while 120 bpm would be considered fast, and 40 bpm slow. A normal (ie. non-pathological) heart rate would be from 50-100 bpm with the average being around 60 bpm. The normal, steady R-R interval on an ECG also makes the heartbeats tick along like a, slightly unreliable, metronome, giving an innate time feel. There must be a link right?

My native language (czech) is in my opinion more useful for counting than english. Let me prove: Czech language (CZ) and English language (EN) have both words for numbers for feeling quarters/fourths, EN - one, two, three, four CZ - raz, dva, tři, čtyř (čtyř and raz are shortened forms of jedna and čtyři) Ok... Good enough for fourths but what about eights? English doesn't have useful (or I have never heard of) words for counting it. CZ - (counting eights) prv-ní, dru-há, tře-tí, čtvr-tá... Czech language is generaly richer in vocabulary. Well, in fact it's not that different, it's just one interesting thing in my language. Greetings. :D

Studying African music in Grad. school it was amazing how some cultures just breathe music and rhythm..!

Been dancing around this channel for awhile. This was spot on for me, gives me hope for getting better rythm, SUBSCRIBED.

So this is anecdotal as hell and only tangentially related to the video itself, but a former coworker of mine trained his bearded dragon to bob his head in time with metal tracks. Maybe domestication in general can make animals more able to perceive rhythm.

hellooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Wow recently I discovered the same idea accidentally during practice. I am using an app called Melodics to learn to plays drums. Last nights I was playing one of the lessons which includes a strange timing between 3 of my limbs, I just couldn’t get it. I couldn’t consistently play it, my timing was off, and it seemed that the song was too fast for me to keep up with - like it was above my ability. I decided to try again and only focus on counting, in my head voice I vocalised 1 through 4 with the and beats being felt more than vocalised. This worked remarkably well, to the point that I started to have the opposite problem - halfway through the song using the counting method I started to find it a little too easy and kept speeding up if I didn’t keep focus on the timing of my counts. I’ve been playing around with a similar method for a little while now, but yesterday was the most extreme results I’d got in one go. In the moment it kind of feels like stepping back and letting go a little, “trusting my limbs to know their parts”.

This channel has been the best discovery in a while, even for someone like me who has minimal music knowledge (basic stuff from teaching myself how to play the drums). I just love the way you presents your videos and the stuff you expose is so damm interesting. Keep it up!

the Niel Ciecierega reference lol