Music 128 2024
Transcription 5: syncopated and polyrhythmic patterns the Afro-diasporic music
5 questions, 2 pts. each
In this assignment you will transcribe syncopations and polyrhythms (like those in video 5.3) from music by the one-and-only “godfather of soul” James Brown (1933-2006), the Afro-Bahian jazz ensemble Rumpilezz that you heard in lecture 7.3, and the wonderful Cuban a capella group Vocal Sampling (week 7, discussion question 4). I encourage you to read up on these groups using their sites or Wikipiedia, etc. Learn the rhythms on the recordings one at a time. Sing each rhythm and clap its tactus. Make sure you feel the subdivision properly. You will not be able to do this if you don’t!
1. Polyrhythm in James Brown’s “I Got You (I Feel Good)” (recording in the Transcription 5 module. There are many versions of this on Youtube so please use the one I uploaded.)
Transcribe the rhythm only of the saxophones when the song begins. Ignore the pitches but remember to include those few solo low notes of the baritone sax as part of the rhythm. Do the bass rhythm also. The sax rhythm repeats four times before changing to something else. Write two of them below, once in each grid. You need to do this because the bass rhythm is twice as long as the sax rhythm and will fill both grids. The Xs in the tactus row are the prominent “backbeat” played on the drums; in this kind of music they are felt more strongly than the others. The sax rhythm has some “swing” to it so its fastest beats are not exactly equal.
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Tactus
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X
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Saxes
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Bass
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Tactus
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X
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Saxes
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Bass
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2. Transcribe the rhythm of the solo saxophone at :37. It is played twice but transcribe only the first one.
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Tactus
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X
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Sax
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3. Letieres Leite and Orkestra Rumpilezz: “A Grande Mãe” (The Great Mother)
( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Ty4ZCkVWWw )
The music starts at 1:08. At 2:46, the drummer with the cymbals (who has just come on stage) starts playing a rhythm on his metal bell. It consists of only two kinds of duration, a long one and a short one of half the length. Learn the pattern and figure out how many fastest beats there are. Make a grid with that many boxes across and transcribe the rhythm.
At 3:30 the tubas and other bass instruments come in with a simple 3 note melody that repeats every four bell patterns. The first note of the melody lands with the beginning of a bell pattern and the third note lands at the beginning of the next one, then they rest for two more bell patterns. Make a new grid row and mark where the two tuba notes fall in the first bell pattern. How does this divide up the cycle, and what kind of subdivision do we have—binary or ternary?
Space for your grid:
4. Vocal Sampling “La Negra Tomasa” (Black Tomasa)
( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DcrO2CTWkY&list=RDX-xvhFbYWWg&index=2 )
Enjoy the song and then pay attention to
· the guy in the gray shirt who begins with the tang-to-teng melody (but just learn the rhythm, which repeats even though the melody changes)
· the guy in the orange shirt stage left playing a rhythm with his hands
· the guy to his right going ch-k-chk
The underlined chk is your tactus. Your grid needs three rows and only needs enough columns to write the orange shirt rhythm. The tang-to-teng rhythm sometimes varies a little—use the version he sings right when everyone enters at :10. He uses that one twice before varying. Write out these rhythms in proper alignment to one another, repeating the ch-k-chk as needed to fill the boxes across the rows.
Space for your grid:
5. A longer polyrhythm. This one is done with software so the rhythms are as clear as can be. I provide the grid below.
It has these features:
Fastest beat: binary (4 fastest beats per tactus beat)
Meter length: 8 tactus. The first beat is marked with a lower pitch (L) and the fifth beat with a higher one (H).
Pattern length rhythm 1: 4 tactus (so it repeats in the 2nd half of the grid)
Pattern length rhythm 2: 8 tactus
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Tactus
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L
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H
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Rhythm 1
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Rhythm 2
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