metronome with fiddle tunes

[drewgrass]

ok i am very used to using a metronome, i took a ton of music classes in college and spent hundreds of hours with a metronome. so i dont think its me but maybe im wrong. when practicing fiddle tune with a metronome it just feels stiff like i cant get that grooving fiddle bowing like shuffle. take the metronome out and its fine. is that normal is it better to practice them without a clicker if you've got pretty good command of rhythm

[billhay4]

syncopation?
Bill

[Avi Ziv]

If you set the metronome such that it clicks less often, you will have more rhythmic "breathing space" between the clicks. I don't mean slow it down. I mean fewer clicks per measure.

Avi

[DSDarr]

For me it's easier if I think of the metronome on the 2nd and 4th beats. I think this is because I am used to thinking in terms of chopping on the offbeat and this is what sets my rhythmic feeling. Less busy sounding than every 1/4 note too. Some people find it harder but I found it more natural than trying with the metronome on the 1 and 3.

David

[JEStanek]

I agree with slowing the metronome down. On recordings of OT music I enjoy, I often hear a foot tapping on the off beat... maybe I think of it as the off beat, my first instrument was French Horn and everything was on the off beat :grin:

In lots of these fiddle songs I'm hearing 2-4 fiddle notes per tap of a foot. I'm listening to Walt Koken and Claire Milner's album Just Tunes as I write this. I hear a similar beat when I hear a foot tapping on Sadie Compton's CD Trouble Come Calling.

Jamie

[Bob Stolkin]

Hmmm, don't know.

One of the jazz greats said "Nothing swings like a metronome!"