Chords for Offbeat Triplets (the "un-performable" rhythm)

So how do you play this rhythm?
It's a lot trickier than it might seem.
Winky guitar shredders can play a [G] million notes per second [E] completely out of [Am] time.
I bet you can't play this.
But I guarantee you [G#] none of them could accurately play this rhythm in time.
Why would it be so hard?
It's just quarter note triplets.
Dah dah dah dah dah dah dah.
That's all that rhythm [D] is.
Is it?
I mean, yeah, look, [F] quarter note triplets.
It's just, you know, kind of like off-center a little bit, but that's all it is.
Well, I have a question for you then.
Where does the second quarter note triplet land in relationship to beat two?
In other words, if you were going to start playing from the second quarter note triplet, when exactly would you start playing? _ _
Accidentally.
_ _ _ Yeah, it's kind of tricky.
The actual consensus in a drum forum about this very rhythm was [G#] that it's one of those things that [F#] you can't think about too much.
That's not really helpful.
And it's not like this rhythm just does not occur out in the real world.
It occurs in this salsa tune by Isaac Delgado, and it's actually also over the bar line, which adds another [Gm] wrinkle to this whole [Cm] thing.
If you feel like you're gonna break the beat, you know it's high enough.
[Gm] Don't be afraid to give it.
[G] If you feel like you're gonna break the beat, you know it's high enough. _ _
This rhythm and this recording came up in a discussion in the Music Engraving Tips Facebook group.
There was a lot of hearty discussion about how to write the rhythm and how to perform the rhythm, including one comment which suggested,
After a moment of trying out different solutions, I came to the conclusion that the [G] triplet is pretty much unperformable at a slow tempo.
[F] Well, that sounds [C] like a challenge. _
Now in [F#] most rhythms, we can start playing from any note within the pattern since we know [E] its relationship to the underlying pulse.
For example, in this rhythm, [F] this note falls [E] on the and of one.
We [C] can't really do that [F#] with the offbeat quarter note triplets.
So in order to sort of break them down, we're going to need to learn a little bit about music preparation, how music is written.
There's a tremendous amount of subtle [E] psychology used in how music [D#m] is laid out on the page.
Consider these two ways [C] of writing the same piece of music.
When performed, both examples produce the same [D] piece of music.
However, the second example is a lot more confusing for the performer.
On a simple glance, you cannot definitively point to an eighth note [F#] like this one and say how it might relate to the underlying beat.
In [G] the first example, [C] however, you can see that relation to the downbeat.
[C#m] This 16th note here acts as a [F] reference placeholder to [G] show you where the beat actually is.
The [C#m] reference shows the pulse.
Even though you're not [E] playing that 16th note since it's been tied [D] over, you're feeling it.
And the eye has a reference for that feeling.
We don't have that sort of visual reference for the offbeat quarter note [B] triplets.
We can't visualize [F] the rhythm as it relates to the pulse, so we can't feel the rhythm as it relates to the pulse.
All right, hold up there.
Because on regular quarter note triplets, you still can't see where beat two is.
The quarter note triplet goes through it.
And yet, we don't consider it that difficult.
[F#] So what gives?
Well, that is very true.
So let's break down quarter note triplets so that we can see how they relate to the pulse.
Now, [Em] by definition, three quarter note triplets take the same amount of time as [G] two regular quarter notes.
Just the same way that you can break down a quarter note [E] into two eighth notes,
you can break down a quarter note triplet into two eighth note triplets.
[F#] So with that knowledge, quarter note triplets could be written like this.
As tied groups of two eighth note triplets apiece,
we now have a visual placeholder for where the beat lies right [B] here.
All right, so we'll just break down the quarter note triplet into groups of two eighth note triplets,
[F] and then just move it over a beat, right?
That'll work.
Well, unfortunately not, because these groupings of eighth note triplets actually fall off the beat.
This grouping of eighth note triplets, for example, falls on the and of two,
so we still aren't able to visualize exactly where the pulse is.
However, we are very [F#m] close.
Just [G] the same way as you can think of a quarter note triplet as [E] two eighth note triplets,
you can think of an eighth note triplet as two [G] sixteenth note triplets.
If we do that, we can break it down again.
[E] Now, each quarter note triplet has been broken into four _ sixteenth note triplets,
and now we can visualize where beat two is.
It's right here.
When we reduce down some of the tied sixteenth note triplets to eighth notes,
the final rhythm looks like this.
It looks fairly complicated, but now we have a framework for actually practicing it.
From here, we can tease out a simpler [G] version of the musical notation
without actually changing the music itself,
and this will be useful for when we go back and practice it.
First, we're going to double all of the note values.
[G#m] When we do this, it's the same music, but [C] it's just twice as slow,
so we're going to make up for that by doubling the tempo.
We can simplify it even further by slowing down all the note [D] values by a factor of three.
This turns all of the eighth note triplets into quarter [G] notes,
and it turns the single quarter note rest into three quarter note [E] rests.
In order to make up for the slower note values, we're going to triple the tempo,
and then [D] when we reduce all of the rhythms down,
the final product is going to look like this.
So these three rhythms are the same, but look very different.
We wrote, or prepared, the music three different ways for different purposes.
The first way conveys the idea of the music, offbeat quarter note triplets.
The second way aids in performance to show where the beat [G] lands.
And the third way simplifies things so that it might be easier to conceptualize for [N] practice.
_ _ Wow, that was a lot of work just to learn how to play a rhythm that I probably won't ever use.
I mean, at least now I understand it.
[F#] That's great, and honestly, that's the most important thing, _ conceptualizing it.
Many people don't think it through, for one reason or another.
The practice of faking tricky music, just sort of approximating it,
is widespread, especially among classical orchestral musicians.
In June 2006, the Strad published a now infamous expose on the practice of faking difficult
passages in professional orchestras, and gave a somewhat tongue-in-cheek list of
all the tips necessary in order to fake.
Aim for the first of every grouping, triplets, quavers, and so on.
It's amazing how often the fiddly notes in between [F] will find themselves
if you give them a sporting chance.
Whoa, I'm gonna stop you there.
[C] Chill out on ragging on the classical musicians.
Just, you know, last time you did that, you got in trouble.
All right, all right, yeah, you're absolutely right.
Might as well, you know, play the rhythm [F] that we've been talking about now anyway,
just to prove that I haven't been making this whole thing up.
What does the rhythm actually sound like?
[C] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ Well, there it is.
That's the rhythm.
The process here [G] is the important part, breaking down rhythms to their component [Em] parts,
and then understanding them in relationship to an underlying pulse.
[G] Even really hard rhythms like this one, the offbeat quarter note triplet,
can be understood and performed, [A] even at slow tempos. _
Hey everybody, thank you so much for watching.
My name is [G#] Adam Neely.
I have a new video coming out every Monday.
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because it's through [F#] my patrons over at Patreon that I'm able to do this every [G] week.
So thank you so [C#] much for watching, and until next