Research on "Losing the One"?

[bobroden]

I don't know what the technical term is for it, but there is this phenomenon of "losing the one," that seems to come up most often in a jazz setting. You're playing along, someone is improvising, and suddenly somebody does something that tricks the brain into thinking the beat has changed, and the players have different feelings for where "one" falls.

I just encountered an instance of this that I happened to catch on video. My quintet was playing "Blues in the Closet" and the sax player was just completing his second time soloing over the form. At that moment the drummer attempted a fill that just didn't work out, and something in the way he did it triggered the sax player so that he unknowingly jumped forward a beat, and from that point on he was thinking he was on "one" while rest of the group was actually on "four" of the preceding measure.

It's a thing that just happens occasionally, but when I step back from it, it's just really interesting that we seem to respond pretty much involuntarily in this way to certain kinds of aural input.

So my question is: has anyone done any research about this phenomenon, or written anything about it? I'd be very interested to know what is known about it.

[Wilktone]

It doesn't need to be a drum fill, it can be any moment where the musician is resting or playing a long note and isn't keeping track of the beat. It's actually more important for you to feel the time when you're playing a long note or rests than it is during a rhythmically active passage.

This sort of thing happens all the time with student groups I direct. Often the drummer playing the fill gets excited and (usually) starts to rush, but because they are playing such an active fill the beat gets obscured. If you're paying close attention to the time during the drum fill you're often left wondering if you should put the downbeat where it's supposed to be or where you think the drummer is feeling it.

I don't know off hand of anyone that's done any pedagogical research on this topic, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's out there.

Dave

[hyperbolica]

I've heard that called turning the beat around. I've heard people do it frequently when all you have is a 2&4 sort of beat, like snapping fingers or clapping, and then someone tries to play a solo over that. Very often the soloist turns 2 or 4 into 1. It's not scholarly, but it's an observation that I think might be easy to reproduce with less experienced players.

[Doug Elliott]

I've done it myself and not known for sure why it happened. I think it can be either internal rushing to the point of getting ahead a beat, or interpreting something the drummer plays (or somebody else) the same way.

Or interpreting an anticipation as the actual beat.

[JohnL]

I've heard it referred to as "losing time".

I call it "that sinking feeling when you realize that you're in the middle of musical train wreck."

[Kbiggs]

It happens to me more often than I care to admit, and usually during drum solos. (Damn drummers! Always messing with the beat!)

It’s worse when it happens to several band members simultaneously because then panic sets in: Do we go with what we think is one? Is your “one” my “one”? How do we know? Do we go with the drummer? What if the band leader motions for us to enter before the soloist is done? What if the leader is also unsure?

Oy, what a mess.

[Doug Elliott]

Leaders... of course I'm one myself now.

My definition of a band leader is someone who hires himself because no one else would.

[Kbiggs]

Yeah, that’s kind of like Groucho Marx’s quip: “I refuse to join any club that would have me as a member.”

[Wilktone]

It's never happened to me and it never will. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it!

But seriously, what I truly hate the most is when I'm the only one in the band who turned the beat around and hit it a beat early. I could have sworn that was count 4.

[AtomicClock]

I was sure a "Losing the One" thread would be about the horn that got away!

[GGJazz]

Hi all.

In my opinion , of course we have to train our rhytmic feel , listening a lot of music , trying to count off drums solos to see if we are in the right beat when the head ( or the trade off bars) comes again , ecc .

For what concern drums solo in our band performances , I think that we have to persuade drums players to work FOR the band , not AGAINST . So , at the end of a solo , a drums player have to play the last four bars ( or even eigth bars) in a super- clear way , to establish where the beats actually are placed , so that also a ten years old kid could come in... This also prepare the transition between a solo and the final head ( or anything else) . Would be nice that also bass player , at the end of a solo , take at least the last four bars returning on a regular walkin bass line , for the same reasons mentioned above.

Regards
Giancarlo

[harrisonreed]

I was under the impression that "losing the one" happened about 2 months after you sell a trombone.

[BGuttman]

Losing the one happens about 5 minutes after starting to sight read a complex piece trying to fit the rhythms.

Happened to me today.

[tbdana]

Happens to me, too. I think I do it when I mentally give responsibility for maintaining the beat to someone else, rather than myself. We have all developed an inner metronome, and when we're resting or holding a long note that's when it's more important for us to maintain fidelity to it. For me, if I get lazy and rely on the drummer or someone else, that's when I can "lose one."

It has also happened when I played an improvised solo and thought I'd be cool and play something a-rhythmical and screwed myself up.

[OneTon]

If Charlie Christian got hacked off about something he’d turn the beat on purpose, in performances. No mercy.

[bobroden]

Great comments, thanks.

What's particularly interesting to me is how our sense of "one" can be triggered into a different space, instantaneously and apparently completely involuntarily, by something someone else plays or does.

At least, as horn players, we have the luxury (assuming we're not playing a prescribed part) of just not playing for a short time and seeing how things settle out. That's my first response. If that doesn't work, then my second response to is play something a little assertive that makes it clear to everyone else where my understanding of "one" is.

[Doug Elliott]

That's exactly how I handle it. Stop, listen, and wait for it to settle.

[Kbiggs]

If Charlie Christian got hacked off about something he’d turn the beat on purpose, in performances. No mercy.

I don’t understand that kind of attitude. It’s okay to be angry, pissed off, hacked off, etc., but it’s not okay to trick the band into losing the beat. Live music is difficult enough. Having one member of the band express anger and then mess up the show is mean, stupid, and selfish. But that’s just me…

[JohnL]

That's exactly how I handle it. Stop, listen, and wait for it to settle.

I think of it as "waiting for a consensus to emerge". The level of groups I play with, that can take some time.

[BrassSection]

Happens to our band on occasion, sometimes a drummer, but more often the cause is a singer. We use a click track, different members rely on it and some turn theirs off. Personally I’m close enough to the caged drummer he comes thru fine even being off in my in-ear. Our wrecks usually start with the singer(s) followed by the guitars and/or keyboard. Never got bad enough to stop, click is killed and MD counts us back in thru talkback and we finish the song without the click. Congregation rarely even aware of it. Personally I keep bass guitar up most in my mix, last 15 years or so the bass players we’ve had can carry the group, plus some play back and forth well with the brass player.

[hyperbolica]

When I was a freshman at Ithaca College, I was playing next to a couple of very wise grad students. I was fresh right out of the woods, and having trouble playing a long string of offbeats. The grad students told me to just turn the beat around so that the rest of the band was on offbeats and I was on the beat. It worked a charm, and somehow I was able to get back on the beat after my offbeats. After having a couple of decades to think about it, they were probably joking around, and I was stupid enough to take them seriously. That's the only time I ever used that technique. I guess I matured musically to the point I didn't need to do it after that.

[AtomicClock]

I did something similar when playing Short Ride in a Fast Machine in college. My mental measure had a different number of beats than the conductor's. The syncopation really messed with my mind.