What Is This Thing Called Swing” Meets “She Blinded Me W

[SSmith1226]

What Is This Thing Called Swing” Meets “She Blinded Me With Science”
Yesterday a scientific paper was released in the “Communication Physics” section of Nature.Com titled, “Downbeat delays are a key component of swing in jazz”.
Most people on this site would agree that in order to “Swing”, a musician extends the duration of their downbeats — every other eighth note — and shorten the beats in between to create a galloping rhythm. But the technique on its own doesn’t explain swing. The scientific analysis presented in this study concludes that listeners judge music as more swinging when the soloists’ downbeats were minutely delayed with respect to the rhythm section, but not their offbeats. This conclusion is instinctively, or subconsciously known by many successful jazz musicians, but is not consciously known by many musicians,
The full link of the article is below. The abstract reads as follows: “To which extent and how do jazz musicians synchronize their timing to create swing?” Swing is a salient feature of jazz music, yet its main psychoacoustical and musical components have remained elusive—save the obvious long-short subdivision of quarter notes. In particular, the possible role of microtiming deviations for swing has been a subject of long-standing controversy. Adopting an operational definition of swing we present a study which ultimately demonstrates a positive effect of certain microtiming deviations on swing. We manipulate the timing of original piano recordings to carry out an experiment with professional and semi-professional jazz musicians measuring the swing of different timing conditions. Thereby we prove that slightly delayed downbeats and synchronized offbeats of a soloist with respect to a rhythm section enhance swing. Analyzing a set of 456 jazz improvisations we find that many jazz musicians do use minute downbeat delays. These results show that systematic microtiming deviations in the form of downbeat delays are a key component of swing in jazz.”


Full Link
https://www.nature.com/articles/s42005-022-00995-z

CONCLUSION: 
It Don’t Mean A Thing If It Ain’t Got That Swing and stagger your timing. 

https://youtu.be/B80aQ0wS9LQ

https://youtu.be/V83JR2IoI8k
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Steve Smith

[kehaulani]

Good Lord, Jazz is an aural art, more connected to the physicality and rhythms of a basketball court than to a scientific micro-analysis.

You listen, get the rhythm in your bones, and, in the words of Clark Terry, "Imitate, Assimilate, Innovate".
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[cheiden]

Sounds interesting.

I can't help but point out for giggles that "She Blinded Me with Science" was mentioned in the post but neither the song nor the artist are mentioned in the article. But that Thomas Dolby coincidentally has a song titled "The Ability to Swing" on his Aliens Ate My Buick CD. Clasic stuff.
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[SSmith1226]

[cheiden]

[MrOlds]

They measured laying back. The relative delay/on time-ness of the downbeat varied from era to ear and from artist to artist. But they missed the forest of swing for a particular tree.

Apologies in advance for the following Capt Kirk-ish tome…

My observation is that artists internalize the rhythms of their surroundings. Monk said his music sounded like NYC.

Prior to the industrial revolution musical rhythm often sounded like horses or marches. It even survived into the early 20th century. The beginning of Mahler 5 is a funeral march. Sousa was all about pretending to be an army marching to glory with horse-mounted flag bearers leading the way. Arban page 28 #20 sounds like horses (ping gallop-ing gallop-ing…).

Swing coming from the early 20th century sounds more like train cars crossing joints in the track where the wheels at the end of one car are the upbeat and the wheels at the front of the next car are the downbeat followed by a space equal to the length of the car.

You get lots of train inspired imagery from early blues (rhythm and lyrics) which is part of the DNA of jazz.

Then you have regional and decade differences in swing. Earlier NY swing was bouncier or more vertical than later more laid back swing. Listen to Duke’s “Rockin’ in Rhythm” from 1933. In Duke’s piano intro you could imagine being jostled around on a crowded sidewalk and hurrying down the stairs into the station then boarding the subway and bouncing along the tracks as the rest of the band starts to play. Then try Miles’ “So What” from 1959. Miles was more laid back but still the first 3 notes of his solo are two train cars crossing a joint in the tracks.

Thinking about regional differences consider Basie’s One O’Clock Jump and the differences between Kansas and NYC. Less densely populated. Long trains carrying goods across the country. Imagine yourself sitting at a rail crossing waiting for a long train to pass. With One O’Clock Jump you get the whole steam train experience. The even huffing and puffing of Freddy Green and the bass and drums playing the role of the steam engine. The mixture of heavy accents on 3 - 1 - 2+ - 4 as the heavier cars cross the joints in the tracks and the underlying dank-spank-a-dank of the dozens of cars as they pass by while you wait to get to the club to dance with your friends.

Anyway. Interesting study. Not about swing.

Best,

[Halflip]

In some informal analyses of the styles of various jazz musicians, I've seen the heavy use of "minute downbeat delays" referred to as the "junkie beat".
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