1/5/23 Don't Worry, I Won't Follow You!

That is how I was first greeted by legendary conductor Gustavo Dudamel before our rehearsal of John Adams’ “The Dharma at Big Sur” with the LA Philharmonic.  

He was referring to an email I had sent him with some notes about the piece, recommending that he should feel free to ignore me and not follow me if I slow down or speed up a little—to not do exactly what most soloists want the conductor to do, which is to be a good accompanist and follow their every move.

Slowing down or speeding up the tempo works great for Tschaikovsky and Brahms, but the groove of “Dharma” has more in common with rock and jazz, where the singer might fall behind the beat or lean in front of it, but the drummer keeps it straight.

With groove-based music, the melody works against a consistent beat instead of the tempo changing to match the melody.

If the drummer tried to follow every nuance of Billie Holiday or Mick Jagger, the groove would fall apart. You could never dance to it. The melody would lose its rhythmic tension and the groove would lose its impact.

This is a different paradigm for most classical musicians because they often feel that if they keep the tempo straight for too long, it will be boring and unexpressive—that it will be mechanical.

Classical musicians are taught their whole lives to make the music as expressive as possible—that’s one of the main goals of playing a string instrument: to be expressive.

But the power of a groove comes from doing exactly the opposite—the consistency of the groove is what gives it strength and any variation from it weakens that power.

That’s because a groove represents eternity.

A great groove feels like it will never stop—that it started before the big bang and will outlast us all 

The melody can still be expressive on top, but the tempo—the groove—should be rock solid, no matter if it’s in Rock, Jazz, Celtic, Bluegrass or Hip Hop.

So, if you’re working on your groove playing, don’t treat it like a melody. Give the melody something to work against. Keep it steady. For all eternity.

Groove on!

--Tracy