Eight- and sixteen-bar segments of a large number of historical jazz recordings were timed with a stopwatch, and summary statistics were calculated from those measurements. A variety of aspects of the control of tempo were analyzed. Tempo is normally distributed when calculated in terms of metronome markings, but not when calculated in terms of durations. Jazz performance is very stable, even for solo performers. However, systematic patterns in the small variability observed indicate that it can serve expressive purposes, as evidenced by positive intercorrelations among alternative versions of the same tunes, as well as other factors. It was also discovered that when the bands execute a rapid "double time," the ratios among the tempo changes deviate systematically from exact doubling. Many of the effects can be summarized by hypothesizing that there are two (and perhaps more) preferred tempo ranges.
For years musicians and critics have made statements about the nature of swing in jazz in general and the playing of Louis Armstrong in particular, based on the evidence of their ears. In order to quantify these issues, precise timing analyses of two mid-tempo solos by Louis Armstrong were analyzed, focusing in particular on stop-time sections. Two key elements of swing were analyzed; placement of the downbeats, and the swing or triplet ratio. For these solos, Armstrong played fairly close to on the beat, with a swing ratio of about 1.6 to 1.
Fae away in the South Seas, a hundred years ago, more or less, the humane British Government was engaged in making a social experiment that had an issue undreamt of by its benevolent originators. It sent out to the newly discovered wilds of New South Wales successive contingents of its convicted felons, not only from the natural desire of getting rid of its worst citizens, but also with the hope of reforming criminals who could, by no possible chance, be reformed in England. The design succeeded beyond the hopes of its promoters, but far less through the measures taken by them with that end in view, than as an indirect result of unforeseen occurrences. While its representatives at the Antipodes, the rulers of the new British colony, were planting out so many of its " exiles " on farms near the settlement or employing the more skilled among them in works of public utility, an altogether new development
INSPIRED BY A STUDY of old jazz recordings, experiments were performed in which musicians and nonmusicians attempted to alternate between two tempi in the ratio of 2:1. In contrast to the historical recordings, the musicians were able to do this with reasonable accuracy. However, there was a tendency to compress the tempo range, as if gravitating towards an attractor tempo. When nonmusicians attempted to double a target tempo, they were able to jump back and forth between two apparently arbitrarily chosen tempi with reasonable consistency. This ability to alternate between two tempi unrelated by a simple integer ratio argues that people can simultaneously maintain at least two tempi in short term memory.
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