time teeping troubles

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Rocknwolf

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hi!
I've got some problems in keeping the right time while playing a song.
Can you give me some hints to improve myself?
 
Practice is the best way. Get a cheap drum machine or something to keep time with and play along with that often. A metronome will work as well..
 
Scott has said it best.
Practicing with a drum machine or a metronome, is the only way to correct any timing issues that you may have.
Remember to practice at a S-L-O-W speed, and gradually work your way up to the tempo of the song/riff/exercise that you're trying to play.
If you are not able to execute a part cleanly at a slower speed, there is no way that you will be able to play it correctly at a faster speed.
Good luck!

Take care,
Tony
 
Here's a really fun trick if you have a delay.
Set the delay long enough to repeat what you play by either measure or beat. That will take a bit of fiddeling but then you can play with the delay and hear when you are right on beat because the echo will dissappear and just sound louder due to the note building. It's a really fun way to play and you can play around with letting the echo come just a bit before your next note and drift back behind you.

I'm telling ya, hours of timing improving fun!
 
Rhythym is something that seems natural for some and not for others-I couldnt tap my foot and play at the same time when I started-and even after I was pretty accomplished and thought I was hot-stuff I joined a band with a guy who was a great rhythym guitarist-made me realize my rhythym was still not that good.


So practice! Get that up and down strumming going on-use a drum machine and play along-play along with cd's-watch great rhythym guitarists (Pete Townsend-Pete Buck(REM)) and pick up little tricks. You don't even have to be playing notes or chords-just mute the strings with your left hand and use the guitar like a percussion instrument. But practice will make you better for sure.
 
YEARS AGO..........maybe 25.......I played in a acoustic duo. The guy I played with had a real problem keeping time. He was a great songwriter, but the poor sumbitch couldn't keep time if his life depended on it. After a few months, I had to call it quits! It was literally embarassing to get on stage with the guy. Some people just don't have a natural rhythm.........hope you haven't been cursed like that. Try a metronome or something with a click track and practice a lot.

bd
 
I'm working on my timing too and I find that its a kazillion times easier if I have drums to play to. I also have the songs I'm learning right now on CD so I can play them and practice with the song if I feel that way inclined. Its all really just a matter of training yourself I think, cause I'm sure as hell pretty awful right now but I have improved a lot from where I was at the beginning.
 
if you can keep anything resembling a beat, by playing with a metronome or similar, you should be able to discipline yourself to it in time. being a solo acoustic/vocal musician largely, i find that slowing down and speeding up the song at the right times is actually beneficial, so it's not much of an issue with me. but throw me in with a drummachine and a band, and i have to run a tight ship to keep everything in sync, because i'm used to automatically changing tempos just a bit at different points in a song-and i actually have pretty decent rythm!
 
I like to make a 12 bar drum and bass loop with fruity loops and play along with that. It's also a good way to learn new rythem patterns.
 
All good working ideas. Learning to pat your foot in time is good. Or hear a click in your head.
 
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