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Thread: What is Groove?

  1. #26

    Default Re: What is Groove?

    I wanted to start the discussion to get some other ideas. Some of the question came from reading Victor Wooten's book where he says groove is all important but never is totally clear what it is. And the rest came from talking with a playing partner who was looking for ideas of how to get more together in the groove. And I thought to myself well what the heck exactly is the groove. How do we find it if we do not know what it is we are trying to find.

    A couple of thoughts that I came up with. Of course rhythm and timing are all important to it but not the whole of it. You will never have a groove if your timing sucks but you can have perfect robot timing and no groove.

    Part of it seems to be dynamics, especially where in the measure the accent falls, blues and swing grooves accent beats 2 and 4, bluegrass accents beats 1 and 3;. The amount of the accent in the measure seems to be part of it, blues is usually more heavily accented than jazz or swing though they tend to emphasize the same beats; country is less heavily accented on 1 and 3 than bluegrass. These are generalizations and there are exceptions to all of this.

    And where you play in relation to the beat, as several people have said slightly ahead or behind or squarely on the beat.

    Thank you for your ideas and I am still interested in any other ideas people may have.

  2. #27
    The Amateur Mandolinist Mark Gunter's Avatar
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    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Have you heard athletes speak of being "in the zone"? How do they define that?

    Have you ever been practicing a melody, or an exercise, repeatedly, in time, and you get into a very enjoyable "zone" - and before you even realize it, you've begun to drool?

    Have you ever heard musicians speak about "magic" that takes place when they play with certain others? They get into a zone where something happens we might call great music which appears to be a value greater than the sum of the parts?

    The scientists among us may balk at the idea but there is a transcendent sort of "groove" that a musician can get into that's something more than just great timing, it's great music. You can get into the groove of a song playing solo as well as with others. You can play the same thing in 50 sessions, but in one session or so it just grooves. I can't define what that means to me, but I do sense that sometimes, and I suspect many or all of you do as well.

    You can be more or less "in the groove" from time to time, and you can even be fully immersed "in the groove" sometimes.

    Okay, I'm weirded out now. Time to let this one go.
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    Registered User Eric Hanson's Avatar
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    Default Re: What is Groove?

    I know what is NOT from listening to a Bluegrass group that was sponsored by the military. They played the notes extremely well. They were all in place. But they tended to seriously lack a flow that made it pleasurable to listen to. It was far too structured, without deeper feeling. Ever get a hug from someone who really didn’t have a strong emotion toward you? Or, just wasn’t that kind of person. That was the sense of what I heard in that recording.
    I find it being in touch with the surroundings. The feedback from those to whom you are playing. Being in the moment and letting your emotions interact with the notes. Not just the notes being played. Also, being in touch with the others with whom you are playing. Each having a sense of where the other will next go, and the two (or however many) of you just go there together, sometimes without ever even looking at each other.
    The Flecktones. Dizzy Gillespie. Stevie Vaughn and Double Trouble. The Punch Brothers. The Birdland Allstars. To name a few, are ones I have seen that are totally “In the groove” as they play.
    Interestingly enough. I once saw The Flecktones at a show early in their tour schedule. The first set was OK. They took an intermission, then BAM!! IN THE GROOVE!! Super cool to see what happens when each member relaxes just enough to work again with each other.
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  6. #29
    but that's just me Bertram Henze's Avatar
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    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Quote Originally Posted by Eric Hanson View Post
    I know what is NOT...
    Same here. I was in a session two days ago where I was the only melody player - that's not a problem, I've had good groovy sessions with just a bodhran player for accompaniment. But here was this guitar player with a serious timing problem who tries to adhere to the time he hears but cannot really produce it on his own, so it was more of a forced sync, not a voluntary one. And groove just won't happen this way.

    So I guess groove is the result of the inner rhythm of every musician being in sync with the outer, common rhythm.
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    Registered User Ranald's Avatar
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    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Quote Originally Posted by T.D.Nydn View Post
    I don't think groove is really timing,it's two different things,it involves timing,but "finding the groove" is deeper,like when your whole body and soul is one with the tune..
    I sometimes have difficulty with musical terminology. Definitions are important as we don't want to be talking about different things while using the same terms. Still, music came before definitions of music; "groove" isn't a term invented in the academy to refer to some particular technique. More likely, it comes from reefer-fueled jazz bars where everyone knew when they were "in the groove." I heard a blues musician on the radio, talking about Howlin' Wolf playing his regular gig in a Chicago club. He said that before any songs started, the band would "play a groove" for about twenty minutes, by which time, the crowd would be quiet, with everyone fixated on the band, moving heads and bodies to the music. I find this easy to imagine when I listen to the Grisman and Wooten videos above. As T.D. says, everyone's "whole body and soul is one with the tune." I've heard musicians speak of "laying down a groove", basically meaning playing a repetitive pattern -- again, they're attempting to get the band on the same wavelength musically, then improvising around the pattern. I suppose I'm partially defining "groove," but to some degree, I'm of the opinion that, to use the OP's words, in music, "I know it when I hear it" is sometimes valid.

    Now can anyone tell us what "on the same wavelength musically" means? No, please don't.
    Robert Johnson's mother, describing blues musicians:
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    Innocent Bystander JeffD's Avatar
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    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Quote Originally Posted by farmerjones View Post
    Groove and pocket are nice notions, but you're either playing in time or you're not.
    l.
    True enough, but that says nothing about whether your notes are directly on the beat or not.

    In casual ensembles and folks I haven't played with before it is true that this way be monsters. If the ensemble slows down because I am playing slightly behind the beat we are all screwed. But in an ensemble used to playing with each other, with practice, this can be a real good technique. Contra dancers, knowingly or not knowingly, tend to love it, and may refer to it as lilt, or drive, when actually the tempo has not changed a bit.
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    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Quote Originally Posted by JeffD View Post
    True enough, but that says nothing about whether your notes are directly on the beat or not.
    In casual ensembles and folks I haven't played with before it is true that this way be monsters. If the ensemble slows down because I am playing slightly behind the beat we are all screwed. But in an ensemble used to playing with each other, with practice, this can be a real good technique. Contra dancers, knowingly or not knowingly, tend to love it, and may refer to it as lilt, or drive, when actually the tempo has not changed a bit.
    Exactly, bluegrass pushes the beat, that is how I know if it's BG or not. People say BG is fast and some of it is but classic Country Gentlenen and Flatt and Scruggs, as well as a lot of other bands, sounded fast even if they weren't. If it don't push the beat it has no "drive" and is not bluegrass bin my opinion.

  13. #33

    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Whatever you want to call it, I'm cool with it. I spend more time grooving than I do melodicizing I'm sure - i won't deny it's all those things. Here's to it https://youtu.be/xGSUO8ieLIk

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  15. #34

    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Quote Originally Posted by Mandoplumb View Post
    Exactly, bluegrass pushes the beat, that is how I know if it's BG or not. People say BG is fast and some of it is but classic Country Gentlenen and Flatt and Scruggs, as well as a lot of other bands, sounded fast even if they weren't. If it don't push the beat it has no "drive" and is not bluegrass bin my opinion.
    Also, much of Bluegrass' urgency and energy is from a banjer fitting three's within 4 or 8.
    My comment was from experiencing too many that go to swinging, or poly rhythms when they should be solid on boom-chuck, first.
    Really there is no problem unless there's a desire to have somebody follow and play along.

    Groove may be this "envelope," but you still can't cheat. Here comes that 16th bar, will you be there?

  16. #35

    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Groove is about body response to the music.
    Makes you need to move, dance, sway,

    This is not in the context, strictly, of bluegrass, just music.

    How do you get groove?
    Dennis Chambers articulated groove:
    and, its really the snare (2/4) and kick drum (1/3)function.
    mando is the snare for our purposes

    [I]Timing
    being dead on the 1 and 3;

    a very slight (to what degree) DELAY on the 2 and 4.

    this creates an anticipation of the dead on2/4 beat.
    that's the "back beat", that's where the groove comes.
    [/I]


    Find a tune that you think grooves, one that just makes you need to move, and listen. see if you agree.

    This doesn't contradict straight solid rhythm, but, straight time gives a different sound, as do jazz triplets give swing. Kinda Bach versus Brubeck.

    Its not an either or thing, its simply about one type of timing.

    As for timing, its fluid. (that DOESNT mean it isn't in sync. it doesnt mean youre not at the 16th bar when its time, it might mean, you arrive with a huge anticipation of and resolution to the 1 when you do. Not unlike the wind up in A Day in the Life. Listen to Billy Holiday, she's right on timing wise , but almost always behind the beat.)

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  18. #36
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    Default Re: What is Groove?

    I did not mean to imply that only BG has a "grove" it is just one grove and the one I understand best. Any music except commercial music has a groove but they are different. Someone really in the bluegrass groove would not sound right playing jazz or blues. That's what I think is wrong with Americania music, it ain't in any groove next thing to commercial music.

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  20. #37

    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Quote Originally Posted by Mandoplumb View Post
    I did not mean to imply that only BG has a "grove" it is just one grove and the one I understand best. Any music except commercial music has a groove but they are different. Someone really in the bluegrass groove would not sound right playing jazz or blues. That's what I think is wrong with Americania music, it ain't in any groove next thing to commercial music.
    Oh, I only meant to say it's ALL good/only meant *cheers!* The vid - I just thought was exemplary deeply grooving music/players.

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    Registered User Randi Gormley's Avatar
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    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Writers (or the ones I speak with, self included) talk about getting "in the zone," which is a slightly different thing from music since it's wholly a single-person reaction but i think it does have some carry over. When I'm "in the zone," then the world disappears and it's just the art. I'm unaware of the physical act of typing (fingering), or of breaking down the output of the typing (the individual notes) into words (music/tune). The distractions vanish. There's a direct connection between what's in my mind and the final product/story (music). it's as if what I'm producing exists by itself and i'm just giving it form. I can both appreciate it as it's being created and appreciate it as if I were standing outside of it reading/listening. With a story, I'll surface sometimes an hour or 90 minutes later and not realize how much time has passed because being in the zone is timeless. Good music is similar; when the people I'm playing with and the music we create is "in the groove" then time (as an abstract, certainly not timing!) vanishes and it's just about the music and getting lost in the art.
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  24. #39
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    Default Re: What is Groove?

    I'm reading my birthday present, Kingdom of Zydeco, a well-researched and entertaining book by Michael Tisserand. Today, I came across the following, regarding the music of the Hi-Rollers, with the bass player, Chuck Bush, and the rubboard player, Wifred "Caveman" Pierre:

    "If you don't like somebody, you can't play with them," says Bush. "I don't care how good you are, you're not going to get that groove."
    "You're looking at them all the time, thinking, well, you did me wrong. I'm not going to join what you're playing," agrees Pierre. (p.277)

    Clearly, they're not discussing a matter of technique that trained musicians can explain in terms of beats or whatever.
    Last edited by Ranald; Sep-22-2018 at 4:46pm. Reason: punctuation
    Robert Johnson's mother, describing blues musicians:
    "I never did have no trouble with him until he got big enough to be round with bigger boys and off from home. Then he used to follow all these harp blowers, mandoleen (sic) and guitar players."
    Lomax, Alan, The Land where The Blues Began, NY: Pantheon, 1993, p.14.

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  26. #40
    The Amateur Mandolinist Mark Gunter's Avatar
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    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Hmm, that's interesting, on many levels, especially if you think of musicians with a history - made great and groovy music together for many years, then had a falling out. Could be not that they can't get "into a groove" together, but more that they don't want to.

    An analogy in that case with long-time lovers, perhaps, who find themselves on the outs with one another. Also reminds of an earlier post (John Kelly perhaps?) about whether a groove can become a rut. The affection gone, but familiar patterns can be fallen into for the sake of the audience (or the in-laws).
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  28. #41

    Default Re: What is Groove?

    I’d love to hear a mandolin orchestra version of this Groove song: https://youtu.be/0Bu-S1Tpkg8

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  30. #42

    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Quote Originally Posted by Dave Bradford View Post
    I’d love to hear a mandolin orchestra version of this Groove song: https://youtu.be/0Bu-S1Tpkg8
    Would be especially awesome if the more-spry members of said mandolin orchestra did choreographed dance steps *while* playing, like in the video. Would that be a first? Has that ever been done before, with mandolins? hmm... Anyway here's the embedded version of the quoted video link, music starts about 0:20



    IMO that song definitely has groove, although I don't really know "why", other than the bass line. And I suppose also the kinda syncopated guitar work gives it a bouncy energetic feeling too.

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  32. #43
    but that's just me Bertram Henze's Avatar
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    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Quote Originally Posted by Ranald View Post
    "If you don't like somebody, you can't play with them," says Bush. "I don't care how good you are, you're not going to get that groove."
    "You're looking at them all the time, thinking, well, you did me wrong. I'm not going to join what you're playing," agrees Pierre. (p.277)

    Clearly, they're not discussing a matter of technique that trained musicians can explain in terms of beats or whatever.
    Yes, groove is an extreme act of socializing. You don't want to march in line with an enemy army.
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  34. #44

    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Quote Originally Posted by CarlM View Post
    How do you define groove? The more I look at it the less I can come up with a clear definition. It seems like one of those I know it when I hear it situations but it seems like there should be a way to define or at least describe it.
    When you feel the energy rise during the song. I like playing with people who I can groove with! I get bored with jams that produce no energy.

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  36. #45
    Registered User Cindy's Avatar
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    Default Re: What is Groove?

    If you get it you know it.

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  38. #46
    The Amateur Mandolinist Mark Gunter's Avatar
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    Default Re: What is Groove?

    The Wiki has some ideas about groove https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groove_(music)
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    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Mark Levine gives a good definition in his Jazz Theory Book;
    “groove The “lock” between members of a rhythm section playing well together” .

    I like that definition as it reveals why it is possible for a soloist to play against or with the groove and for the ensemble to still be tight together.
    A tight rhythm section makes so much difference by providing the space in which the rest if the action happen.
    The really good ones become so indelible you still hear their groove in your head for a while after they drop out.
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  42. #48

    Default Re: What is Groove?

    I think groove is sort of like lift in Irish music. It's when you get the flow and the tempo and the timing just right that it sounds right.

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  44. #49

    Default Re: What is Groove?

    Patterns - phenomena apprehended in time/space dimension - are to be perceived in multiple modalities in biota, nature, mind...so of course "grooves" (our experience of aesthetic or significant patterns) consist in innumerable forms - harmonically, mathematically, et al.. Groove, and aesthetics of all manner, can be experienced and used palliatively, educationally, and whatever else we wish to pursue. https://youtu.be/x8UMFMM7pww

  45. #50

    Default Re: What is Groove?

    ...I mean, as an example of aural harmonic principle (groove) - exemplifying multiple modes or categories of... but it's 6 hours in...FWIW

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