Each note value can be thought of as some division of time. Two key concepts come into play when someone is attempting to understand the fundamental differences between each note value. When a pianist strikes a key, a small hammer strikes a string inside the piano, thus producing a sound. The immediate sounding is called the attack of the note. Attack can be described as how quickly a sound is produced. Notice also that a note sounds for as long as the key is held down. That is, the note has a duration occupying a certain amount of space in time. How long it takes that note to quiet down and eventually silence is called decay.
In addition, we must establish an important distinction between note values, and notes. We will define notes as tones played on a drum or cymbal, and note values as the duration of those tones.
Now strike a snare drum. Notice that the drum has a very sharp attack, and a very quick decay. That is, as soon as you strike the head a sound is produced, and that sound silences a fraction of a second later. Drums on average have very quick attacks and very quick decays. This leads to a problem when transcribing drum set music: any two notes played on the same drum can sound identical if no note succeeds them. For example, a quarter note will sound exactly like a sixteenth note given that no note is played after either one. To remedy this problem when writing drum score, careful attention should be paid to the space between the notes. To do this in a comprehensive manner, we will use one of the most important tools available to a drummer: counting.
More to follow...
No comments:
Post a Comment