Metronome Marks

[MusingMuso]

I blame it all on vibrations!

 

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There are some people who tell you to go left when they mean to go right. There are people who put their left-foot first: others who break their teeth sipping a glass of beer.

 

My problem is far more fundamental. I am one of those people who just doesn't know the difference between a tic and a toc.

 

Is the tic meant to be on the beat or off the beat?

 

Same with the speed-markings.......

 

As people keep reminding me, if something is marked 50, I'm usually doing 80. (Digital photographic evidence on file)

 

Of course, when no-one is listening, I have been known to double the speed of things.....twice the speed = double the practise.

 

As for doing 152 on the M6 back in October 1977, that is just an ugly rumour for which there is not a shred of evidence.

 

 

 

MM (Where did the crash-helmet go? My favourite moticon!)

[jonadkins]

I wonder if anyone can make any suggestions about what I should do with the metronome I have at home. It seems a friendly, unassuming little thing and, once the key has been wound and a tempo set, it seems quite happy to tick away at a regular pulse. However, problems start the moment I begin to play the organ along with it. The thing keeps changing speed! Some bars it gets faster, other bars slower, and it rarely keeps in time with me. As soon as I stop playing, in order for me to reprimand it for not keeping a steady tempo, it returns to a regular tempo straight away! It's quite happy to continue this little game all day long. Other organists have complained to me that their metronomes malfunction similarly, but those belonging to other musicians seem to behave rather better. Does anyone else here have any experience of wayward metronomes, and why they seem only to misbehave for organists???

 

Few posts have made me laugh as much as this one! I have one of those metronomes as well.

 

The John Scott Aides-memoire are also wonderful, but I'm sorry that I was never in St Paul's cathedral when he played Happy Birthday or Col. Bogey. Now I'll never get the chance...

 

My teacher once said that there are two types of metronome markings: Too fast, and Too slow.

[Frank Fowler]

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What is a metronome?

 

MM

 

I always thought it was a little fellow with a bushy white beard and a pointed red hat who lived in the Paris underground system.

 

FF

[headcase]

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What is a metronome?

 

MM

 

Didn't someone with your initials have something to do with it, MM ?

 

H

[innate]

My teacher once said that there are two types of metronome markings: Too fast, and Too slow.

I played through a fugue from the "48" this morning with the metronome at quite a fast speed. I forced myself to keep going and it wasn't half as bad as I expected. I think we are possibly more capable than we normally allow ourselves to be; all that unused grey matter etc.

[gazman]

I played through a fugue from the "48" this morning with the metronome at quite a fast speed. I forced myself to keep going and it wasn't half as bad as I expected. I think we are possibly more capable than we normally allow ourselves to be; all that unused grey matter etc.

 

Yeh, but it's often much harder to play something more slowly than racing through it, for some strange reason!

[Guest Cynic]

Yeh, but it's often much harder to play something more slowly than racing through it, for some strange reason!

 

 

Once something is really learned, your subconcious will often get you through if left to itself. The moment you try concentrating, particularly when you slow it down, it no longer comes as automatically. Some of this fluency is down to a 'muscular memory'. Scales are an example of where a student will often do better fast than they will slowly - playing fast there is no time to think and no time to get muddled.

[gazman]

Once something is really learned, your subconcious will often get you through if left to itself. The moment you try concentrating, particularly when you slow it down, it no longer comes as automatically. Some of this fluency is down to a 'muscular memory'. Scales are an example of where a student will often do better fast than they will slowly - playing fast there is no time to think and no time to get muddled.

 

Good point!