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Okay - in the last video we heard what the vanishing click sounds like, and so that is
what we are going to learn how to play so precisely in time with the metronome click
that the click vanishes.
But before doing that then I just want to talk a bit about the equipment to use, so
this short video segment is about the equipment that we can use. So for this it is recommended
in the books and is clearly a good way to start then we are going to start as percussionists.
So whatever musical instrument you play, start with percussion, because percussion has this
very clear precise sound so you can clearly hear if you are in time or not and because
it's also a quite loud percussive sound so the vanishing click as well, you can hear
it very clearly, you can clearly hear if you are on the click and if you are slightly off.
So, it is good to get yourself a pair of drumsticks, it is not going to break the bank for most
musicians, and if you haven't got a pair of drumsticks, anything else, a wooden spoon
does as well. And a good thing about the drumstick is this natural bounce action, like that.
And the wooden spoon as well to some extent as well. So that helps you to play a steady
rhythm. And it also has this very relaxed feel to it. So, like that.
When you move your hand like that, depending on your speed, your hand might actually be
temporarily in free fall, so very relaxed and anyway a very relaxed thing to do. So
then as for what you hit, then you even if you are a percussionist, you don't want to
go for your nice full sounds or your hi-hat or your kick drum or anything like that. Go
for the most clear precise sharp sound you possibly can to start with. So stick hit is
good, one stick hitting another. Claves is good, and also - what I've got here, stones,
that is a good thing to. Stone, very sharp clear sound. And I've got some other examples
you'll find lying around, here, slates from the roof, broke before they put them up, wooden
bowl turned upside down, and ceramic things, and so on.
So now we come to the metronome. And on the metronome we want the crispest clearest sound
you can get there as well, so here on Bounce Metronome I have got it set to claves. So
Claves, that is a good sound to choose on your metronome. If you have for instance studio
drummer, which you can use with Bounce Metronome - if you have studio drummer, then you have
stick hit, so stick hit or claves, they are good sounds to use.
And if you have the option, then you want to set it to the most dry sound you can, so
on studio drummer, I use bold and dry, and if you have got one of these sliders where
you can set how wet or dry it is, you don't want any reverb, as little as possible reverb
as you can have for this exercise.
So now the next thing definitely I'm going to recommend that you get Bounce Metronome
if you possibly can if you haven't got it already. And the reason for that is because
it has got the natural bounce action, so I was talking about how you have this natural
bounce action, how relaxing it is, so if you set Bounce Metronome going with this natural
bounce action, now if you just follow the bounce on the screen then now if you hit something,
you will already be pretty much at the vanishing click just by following the visual bounce.
However, to get that to work, after you downloaded bounce metronome, I should just say where
you can get bounce metronome from. So, you get Bounce Metronome from bouncemetronome.com,
and when you first install it on your computer, then this screen will come up which tells
you - it's got a button you can use to buy - that is because there is a commercial version
of it for more advanced metronome technique and for complex rhythms.
For this we just need the free taster, so it is completely free, there is no nag screen.
So this window that comes up you will find a couple of check boxes at the bottom, you
can click those to dismiss it if you want to use the free taster. So be sure to do that,
you can click and just get rid of this. This is just to help people who want to buy, to
buy it very quickly when they first download it.
So if that's not what you want to do straight away. just uncheck those two buttons. And
many people use it just as the free taster, there is absolutely no obligation to buy.
So now sadly Bounce Metronome is only available for Windows. It won't run on Windows Mobile,
it will run on these little netbook things, got a little netbook most of these will run
Windows 7 Starter and that is also fine. Windows mobile is no good but Windows 7 starter it
can run. Pretty much all versions of the full windows, that are still current these days.
So and including Windows 8. So that is Bounce Metronome but sadly it won't run on Android,
it won't run on iPad, or Mac or Linux. Also unfortunately it can't run in a web page.
I would very much like to create the equivalent of these on-line metronomes but with the bounce
action. o that is on my "to do" list. I probably won't get to it until some time next year
and I don't know how easy it will be to do, but sadly this program that I wrote, it is
intricately involved with the Windows operating system, it calls things in the Windows operating
system all the way through, and there is no way that I can port it to another operating
system sadly.
So it is for Windows only and I will have to start a new program when I get to other
operating systems. However what I can provide for you are the videos on youtube. So there
are many rhythm videos made with Bounce Metronome, and I will make some also especially for this
talk, so do use these videos.
And you can ask me for new videos, if there is something that you particularly want, just
ask. And I should say, if you are blind, there is a new feature in Bounce Metronome called
the pitch bounces, and that is an audio version of these video bounces that I have just been
talking about. So this is in the latest version of Bounce Metronome, and it is an experimental
new feature, so I am very interested to hear how you get on with it, and if it works. It
may well be helpful for blind musicians. It is just new in the latest Bounce Metronome.
It is an audio version, it goes up and down in pit5ch in the same way the visuals go up
and down visually, and with the sensitivity to sound that blind musicians have, then I
imagine it might possibly be quite useful.
So, anyway that's Bounce Metronome, and I just want to show you one thing, when you
download it, so this is just for a few seconds for users of Bounce Metronome - then when
you first download it, then I'll first show you, when you first install it the chances
are that it will play the sounds on this instrument called the Microsoft GS Wavetable Synth.
This is part of Direct X, it comes with Windows, and this is what it will normally be playing
the sounds on. So this is, it's actually - a synth that was developed by Roland, and it's
the same basic synth with some variation - same basic synth is the basis of the sounds in
Quicktime which is used on the Mac, and it's also, another version of it is bundled with
Band in the Box, and so this a really ancient version, the one that Microsoft licensed,
and it's simply has never been changed since then, it is exactly the same as it was at
the end of the twentieth century. And it is an excellent synth - the sounds are pretty
good, they were very good in their day and they are still reasonably good, especially
for a metronome, and the timing is excellent, and its great if you have a very fast rhythm,
you won't lose a single beat with the Microsoft GS Wavetable synth, and the timing is absolutely
precise. But the only thing that is an issue with it is latency. So latency is like an
echo if you don't know what latency is. It's like you hit the sound and you get the actual
sound delayed by a fixed amount. It is like an echo, you only hear the echo. You hit the
sound and you only hear the echo. So that is like the latency, a fixed delay of so many
milliseconds or whatever. Normally on a modern computer, latency is going to be practically
nothing. But with the Microsoft GS Wavetable synth, I think simply because it has never
been changed since way back then, it has this massive amount of latency on many computers.
And you will gasp it was huge even in those days. It has latency of 200 milliseconds,
a fifth of a second. That is an absolutely huge amount of latency by modern standards
- that's on most computers. On this computer it is more like 140 milliseconds. And on some
computers there is no latency at all that is noticeable, I had one computer like that.
And there just doesn't seem to be any kind of pattern, I haven't found any explanation
of any way of understanding how it is going to work on your computer, whether it will
have latency or not. There is a method of fixing it, so you can set its latency down
to zero, but it is flaky, it will stay fixed for a while and then it will suddenly pop
back up again. So I don't recommend that you try to fix the latency on it, and it is actually
a little bit technical to do that anyway - but instead in Bounce Metronome, we are not actually
playing this as musical instrument, we are just interested in synchronising it with the
Bounce.
So in order to do that we just go to the Bounce Options window and choose "Set a Bounce Synchronization
delay" and you can set the delay in milliseconds, so I have set it to 140 milliseconds, and
you will find instructions there as to try to help you and guidance as to how to set
that field.
So, that's what I wanted to tell you, because that is quite important for this exercise.
You mightn't always want to synchronize, you might even want to have it played even more
like an orchestral player following a conductor, and the conductor is often way ahead of the
orchestra, but for this particular thing, it is good to have it completely synchronised,
to help with synchronizing of the vanishing click. So that's the main things I want to
say about the equipment, so that's the Bounce, and setting the synchronisation delay, set
the clearest, most precise sounds you can on your metronome, and the same playing yourself,
and so you are playing with the most precise sounds you can access which you have available
to you. So now I'll press on with starting talking about the technique itself, and how
you can bring this relaxation into your metronome technique of achieving this vanishing click.
So on to the next video segment.