As you can imagine, at one point in any drum student’s journey the concept of time keeping is spoken about. Also, sooner or later most people tell drummers how they are tasked with keeping the tempo. Their main responsibility is to keep a steady beat, to not slow down or speed up and there’s also the idea that they are meant to be followed always. And I gotta tell you, that as a drummer, this is not something I agree with. Of course us drummers are tasked with rhythm and that implies repetition and a steady tempo as much as possible but the idea that it is only up to us is very unmusical. The entire band has to at the very least be aware of the tempo and contribute to the overall auditive picture we’re trying to paint.
This is a very simplified way to explain it but some people know where the tempo is and they play a little behind… some people play on top of the beat and some right on it. The trick is being aware of what we are doing and have intention behind that. A lot of this depends on what instrument you play, what kind of song it is, if there’s a singer or not, the genre, etc etc etc. The point is that everyone contributes. It’s a collective. It’s putting a lot of energy into ONE thing and it becoming something else. In music this has to be present and it also needs to manifest itself in harmony, melody, dynamics, articulation and many other dimensions, ideally all at once, as often as possible.
Sports like golf, tennis and skiing for example, tempo and rhythm are OUR responsibility, in the sense that they are usually individual sports. Such as a soloist… up there on stage by themselves, virtuoso or not, but there. Alone, exposed, vulnerable. Kind of like a penalty taker, come to think of it.
Rhythm and tempo in football are an integral part in and of themselves but its more of a collective of every other players’s tempos and rhythms. It’s wild. Ironically, in football aka a team sport, there’s usually a narrative of one player dictating the rhythm, pace and drive. I’ve said this before about Lia Walti and how I think how she plays, the whole team plays. But there’s layers to this. If she, for whatever unheard of reason, isn’t passing the ball well, this should not have any impact on how other players pass the ball.
I feel from time to time us fans, pundits and journalists lose sight of how much of a team sport this is. There’s usually a fixation on one player and their form, which is understandable for editorial and narrative issues, without a doubt. I also feel its unfair to have the focus be on someone’s absence instead of other’s presence. I understand it and I can also have some apprehension. I love the idea of players “taking over a match” but no matter the scenario they never do it on their own. There’s always other people aka it’s not about them and it’s not about us, in anything we do. We need people and we need to appreciate what they do and what they don’t do too.
d ❤
THAT ARSENAL WOMEN PODCAST on:
A very subjective look into AWFC 
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