Black Atlantic Rhythm: Its Computational and Transcultural ... · gospel, reggae, rock, candomblé , cumbia, hip-hop or whatever, seems to have widespread capacity to facilitate dance,

Music PerceptionSpring 2002, Vol. 19, No. 3, 285–310

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Black Atlantic Rhythm1: Its Computational andTranscultural Foundations

J E F F P R E S S I N G

University of Melbourne

The “Black Atlantic” rhythmic diaspora, be it realized in jazz, blues,gospel, reggae, rock, candomblé, cumbia, hip-hop or whatever, seems tohave widespread capacity to facilitate dance, engagement, social interac-tion, expression and catharsis. This article examines the reasons for this.Black Atlantic rhythm is founded on the idea of groove or feel, whichforms a kinetic framework for reliable prediction of events and time pat-tern communication, its power cemented by repetition and engenderedmovement. Overlaid on this are characteristic devices that include syn-copation, overlay, displacement, off-beat phrasing, polyrhythm/polymeter,hocketing, heterophony, swing, speech-based rhythms, and call-and-re-sponse. Using an evolutionary argument, I point out here that nearly allof these have at their heart the establishment of perceptual multiplicityor rivalry, affecting expectation, which acts as either a message or a mes-sage enhancement technique (via increased engagement and focusing ofattention), or both. The causal path for the remaining devices is based onadopting structures shared with speech, notably prosody, conversationalinteraction, and narrative. Several examples illustrate how, particularlyin jazz and jazz-related forms, extensions and relatively complex creativeadaptations of traditional African and African diasporic rhythmic tech-niques are a natural consequence of a culture of questioning and reflec-tion that encompasses maintenance of historical reference and accom-modation to innovation.

BLACK Atlantic rhythm is taken here to be rhythm that has significantlinks with temporal features common in the music of West Africa and

the West African diaspora. (Hence, the term “African and African diasporicrhythm” will be used interchangeably hereafter.) This music, prominently

1. “Black Atlantic” refers to geographic and cultural origins and persisting influence,and is not meant to be an excluding racial phrase in contemporary society. This term will beconsidered equivalent to the cumbersome but more precise phrase “African and Africandiasporic” throughout this article.

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influenced by the drum ensemble and harp player/singer griot traditions,came to the Western Hemisphere under conditions of extreme coercion. Itwas there suppressed and transformed, later blossoming in conjunctionwith European and eventually American elements into many variants overmany decades of social, cultural, and geographic dissemination. Still later,in the postcolonial era, infusions have persisted in both directions be-tween Africa and the West, creating worldwide populist traditions basedon aspects of Black Atlantic rhythm that have become uniquely influ-ential. The pervasiveness of this influence suggests that there is some-thing special about such rhythm—something intrinsic, apparently go-ing beyond the historical linkages of the music to U.S.-based capitalistaudio product dispersal.

This leads to the central questions of this article:

� What is it that is so special about Black Atlantic rhythm?� What are its specific effects and how does it achieve them?� In what general and specific qualities of the human organism areits effects grounded?

In addressing these questions, I will take two parallel tracks: African andAfrican diasporic music in general, and jazz in particular, in as much as it isarguably the structurally most sophisticated African-American music builton Black Atlantic rhythm.

Rhythmic Effects

There are evidently structural and psychological reasons that BlackAtlantic rhythm has this inspirational capacity. Had history been dif-ferent, it is difficult to imagine a similar commercial global impact basedon, for example, the layered structures of Thai court music, or thehocketing of Guillaume de Machaut, whatever the political or culturalimpositions involved. The Black rhythmic diaspora, be it realized injazz, blues, gospel, reggae, rock, candomblé, cumbia, hip-hop or what-ever, seems to have remarkable capacity to facilitate dance, engagement,and expression. There also seems to be a cathartic quality to this rhythm,making it viable in achieving a personal sense of release or relief. Lastbut not least, it is effective in underpinning solidarity in social gather-ings like ceremonies.

Black Atlantic rhythm is not unique among musics in its facilitation ofdance, engagement, expression, group interaction, and catharsis; but whatis sought here is an explanation of how it specifically achieves these effectswith characteristic impact and near universality.

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Rhythmic Techniques

Before attempting an explanation, it will be essential to sketch thenature of the phenomena. First of all, we may classify Black Atlanticrhythm as being founded on two main sources or approaches to time:groove (or feel, discussed further later) and speech (monologue, con-versation, narrative). Speech alone may drive the rhythmic design, as inthe traditional U.S. field holler. Feel alone may form the basis, as in therhythm section parts of nearly all 20th-century dance-oriented African-American musical styles.

Quite often, both sources are at work. Three examples follow.

� In Yoruba Dundun (talking drum) ensemble music of Nige-ria, the rhythmic patterns relate to an apparent central groove,visible in the dance steps, but the same parts actually alsoexpress spoken proverbs or other sayings, by systematicallymimicking their Yoruba speech rhythms and tonal contours(Euba, 1990).

� In the hands of jazz singers such as Billie Holiday, Jimmy Scott,Betty Carter, Sarah Vaughan, Cassandra Wilson, and many oth-ers, speech rhythms can float above the regularity of the underly-ing rhythm section, giving aligning reference to it only at certainpoints. In other words, synchronization of certain chosen noteswith selected rhythm section pulses or accents is maintained, tothe accuracy of human performance capacity, but interveningnotes are driven by speech timing predilections that do not trans-late into natural rhythmic interpretations. Hence, this is a typeof rubato.

� In contemporary rap/hip-hop, the lead vocal line often cuts acrossthe phrase and accent structure of the underlying repeating in-strumental groove, driven by the motoric designs of speech toeffect heightened semantic impact.

GROOVE/FEEL

The rhythmic devices of African diasporic music typically rely on thesupport of a firmly structured temporal matrix, typically called a “feel” or“groove.” Hence it is useful to provide a considered discussion of this phe-nomenon. It should be noted that while the term groove is normally re-served for the phenomenon under discussion, feel is also used in a some-what different sense—to suggest sensitive rhythmical nuance in note deliveryby an individual musician, as in the in the phrase, “he plays with a nicefeel.” This sense is not intended here.

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A groove or feel is taken here to be a cognitive temporal phenomenonemerging from one or more carefully aligned concurrent rhythmic patterns,characterized by:

1. perception of recurring pulses, and subdivision structure tosuch pulses,

2. perception of a cycle of time, of length 2 or more pulses, en-abling identification of cycle locations, and

3. effectiveness in engaging synchronizing body responses (e.g.,dance, foot-tapping).

Simply stated, a groove is the temporal foundation of readily danceablemusic; thus, it is by no means confined to African and African disaporicmusic, but occurs widely. Yet its constituent rhythmic patterns have at-tributes that allow Black Atlantic grooves to be distinguished from those ofother dance forms such as the waltz or sarabande. In general, they showrelatively high levels of syncopation, as discussed further later. They alsoemphasize a metronomic approach to timing, without rubato. And BlackAtlantic music overwhelmingly favors equal pulse durations, whereas sometraditions, such as those of Macedonian dance music, use unequal pulselengths widely (in additive meters such as (3 + 2 + 2)/8).

The pulse stream of a groove may be stated directly, or induced (“beatinduction”) by the cognitive effect of one or more concurrent rhythmicpatterns. More than one pulse stream may be simultaneously produced asan outcome of the rhythmic patterns, as is common in West Africanpolymetric drum ensemble music, especially that with a cycle length of 6,12, or 24 time units (e.g., Ghanaian Ewe drum ensemble music, Locke,1979, Pressing, 1983a; Asante ensemble music, Euba, 1990, further ex-amples in Pressing, 1983b); but also note that ambiguity or multiplicity offundamental beat occurs in both rock and jazz music (as in double-time/half-time feel in both, or the hemiola style jazz waltz). Normally the timecycle exhibits a fixed tempo, with the most common exception to this rulebeing a very gradual accelerando in tempo over many minutes (e.g., Ketemusic of the Asante, Magill & Pressing, 1997), typically acting to heightenintensity in accompanying ceremony and dance.

Points 1 (first part) and 3 above I take to be so commonly dispersed indance music that evidence of the aptness of this definition is not required.With regard to the second part of point 1, it is worth emphasizing thatgroove beat subdivision is based on a strong cognitive predilection towardsimplicity—division of durations into 2, 3, or 4 parts. Subdivisions of greatercomplexity are produced hierarchically by subdivisions of subdivisions,yielding partitioning into 6, 8, or 9 parts. These numbers are all composite(6 = 2 ´ 3, 8 = 4 ´ 2, 9 = 3 ´ 3), or nonprime. For example, a triplet sub-subdivision of triplet subdivision is used in some very slow gospel tunes,

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where each beat is effectively divided into 9 parts. Division into 4 has dualpotentials: it may be conceived of without further subdivision, or as com-posite (2 ́ 2, as often implied in the standard reggae doubletime backbeat).

Higher prime numbers (5, 7, 11) violate this predilection for simplicity;accordingly, grooves based on subdivision of 5 are extremely rare, and thoseof higher prime numbers nonexistent to my knowledge. Thus, groove designpresents a prioritization of rhythmic subdivision distinct from that generatedby such attitudes as asymmetric Romantic expression (e.g., Chopin’s pianomusic) or intellectual numerical extension (e.g., multiserialist techniques stem-ming from 1960s Western composers; Yeston, 1976), and generally relies onhierarchical application of elements of length 2 and 3 to achieve complexity.

The time cycle of Point 2 above is commonly demarcated by rhythmic ormelodic patterns that repeat exactly, or with variation. The perceptual de-marcation of cycles is also aided by recurring patterns of phrasing andarticulation, and where harmony is present, chord changes. Cycles andpulses must be divided into at least two parts to create the effect of hierar-chy. The provision of perceptual locations by the cycle allows the listenerto distinguish groove from undifferentiated pulse, and is nearly always pro-vided by meter in harmonically based African-American music such as jazz.In West Africa itself, or in certain older South American neo-African forms(e.g., Bata drumming of Cuba, the Latin clavé pattern), this may be pro-vided by a timeline, a central recurring rhythmic pattern in relation to whichall others are conceived (Jones, 1959).

In all cases, production can be considered to present a figure-groundrelationship (Pressing, Summers, & Magill, 1996), with the rhythmic pat-terns the figure, and the ground defined either by pulse, meter, or timeline.A metric ground may be based on either equal (e.g., common Western met-ric traditions) or unequal pulses (e.g., additive folk rhythms like (3 + 2 + 2)/8) of smaller time units. Timelines always feature unequal groupings ofsmall units in their central pattern and are distinguished from purely addi-tive metric constructions by their invocation of isochronous rhythmic pul-sations underlying their recurring cycle (Pressing, 1983b; Magill & Press-ing, 1997)—hence, they must have cycle lengths that are composite numbers(that is, not prime). The classic example is the 2212221 timeline found widelyin West Africa, which engenders cycles of 3, 4, 6, and 8 pulses in the overallcycle length of 12, which exist in multiple forms based on displacement (seeFigure 1). Other variants and examples are discussed by Pressing (1983b).

Repetition (literal or varied) is an essential ingredient in the achievementof all three points above, for it limits the burden on memory, achieves in-tensification of engagement and attention, and promotes automaticity. Thisheightens the groove’s potential for emotional impact, reinforcing the powerof imposed communal rhythms to establish behavioral coherence in massesof people (Roederer, 1984).

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The regularity and arousal qualities of the groove also allow heightenedattention to, and perceptibility of, performance microstructure (e.g., Clarke& Windsor, 1997; Pressing, 1987), increasing the potential emotional im-pact of small shifts in timing and dynamics widely used to achieve expres-sive performance (Berliner, 1994; Iyer, Bilmes, Wright, & Wessel,1997;Magill & Pressing, 1997). In addition, the regularity and bodily entrain-ment have the capacity to reduce anxiety. From the performer’s perspec-tive, when the groove is well-tuned, improvisers experience a sense of re-laxation and surety that facilitates expression and imagination (Berliner,1994); this supports the feeling of automaticity, where so little consciouscontrol is required that the instrument can subjectively appear to play it-self.

How is one groove or feel distinguished from another? The attributes offeel are listed in Table 1, which also provides some examples. What makesone groove more effective than another? Effectiveness of a groove from thestandpoint of reception is assessed by its ability to engage human move-ment and attention. With respect to movement, this means that it is effec-tive in calling up multiple motor schemas (engaging different motor con-trol resonances) that are widely dispersed among people, and that theseschemas are compatible—they are nonconflicting and pleasurable whenconcurrently engaged (hence the predilection for energy-conserving simplerelations). Such schemas are multiply sourced: partly inherent (based onforce response properties of the body, intrinsic dynamical predilections ofdifferent movement subsystems, and environmental constraints such as grav-ity), partly constructed in relation to personal and cultural goals, and partlylearned in development.

Fig. 1. A common 12/8 African timeline and prototypes of its implicit pulse streams. (a) 3-cycle, (b) 4-cycle, (c) 6-cycle, and (d) 8-cycle. Note that each pulse stream may exist inseveral forms (not indicated here), displaced by an appropriate small unit. For example, the4-pulse stream has two other alternative forms (shifted by one or two 8th notes to theright). The 3-pulse stream has three other alternative forms (shifted by one, two or three 8thnotes to the right), the 6-pulse one other, etc. These cases are all explored in West Africanmusic.

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291Black Rhythm

Effectiveness of a groove from the standpoint of production is attestedto by the surety of the framework it provides for the placing of improvisedand composed rhythmic patterns and melodies. In jazz groups and in manyothers, the congruence of timing conception essential to an effective grooveis most critically shaped by bass and drums/percussion. Next in importanceare other members of the rhythm section. Success relies on shared or at leastcompatible conceptions of timing and accentuation by the performers.

At the level of musical timing, an important further factor is the degreeof metronomic exactitude used in the parts generating the groove. In quan-titative terms, metronomic exactitude is achieved by stationarity of tempo,exactitude of location of the targets for note placement (minimization ofbias relative to a cognitive template), and the suppression of performerproduction variance (minimization of noise). Machine rhythmic produc-tion can achieve a level of exactitude that humans cannot, and this createsa potentially different type of groove, as can be easily heard and felt incomparisons of quantized and unquantized versions of MIDI files. Suchexactitude has more potential for aesthetic success in certain Black Atlantictraditions, such as Afro-Latin percussion, than in others (e.g., straight aheadjazz).

HIGHER LEVEL TECHNIQUES

Building on the groove or feel are a number of African and Africandisaporic rhythmic devices. These include syncopation, overlay, displace-ment, off-beat phrasing, polyrhythm/polymeter, hocketing, heterophony,swing, speech-based rhythms, and call-and-response. These are discussedfurther later. At this point, it is sufficient to note that virtually all entail the

TABLE 1Technical Attributes of Groove/Feel

Attribute Presence Example(s)

Tempo Essential MM = 88, normally stationaryCycle length Essential 4 beatsCycle location identifier Essential 4/4 meter, timelinePulse Essential 1/4 of cyclePulse subdivision Essential Duplet subdivisionSubdivision subdivision Optional Triplet 16th within duplet 8th notes,

yielding sextuplet feel in pulsePart alignment (macro Essential Relation of bass notes to pulse-defining and micro) parts of the drum kit in jazzMotives/parts Essential Percussion patterns, bass lines, lead

lines, chordal vamps in jazzAccents Optional Swing feel lines of Oscar Peterson

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placement of notes with timings that present a perceptual challenge to theunderlying pulse of the feel or to the rhythmic patterns defining the feel.Hence we target, as a foundation of explanation, the rivalry or cognitive/perceptual multiplicity that these techniques create. To do so, I will take asubstantial detour to develop criteria of explanation appropriate for thispsychological concept.

Level of Explanation

An explanation of the why or how of a phenomenon constitutes a causalmodel, and causation, in human affairs, is a complex matter: it is oftenbased on multiple sources and often consists of a chain of probabilisticcausal links ranging from distal to proximal. For example, aspects of musi-cal style can often be given alternative cultural explanations on the basis oftheir importation from different social groups or societies or historical pe-riods, on the basis of their reflection of a dominant aesthetic or belief, oron the basis of effects of individual creative effort.

If, as desired here, we are to make general psychological and transculturalclaims, the ultimate causal sources must be relatively distal from specificmusical details and intrinsic to nature (Wallin, Merker, & Brown, 2000).Hence I attempt to base explanation on two distal sources: the nature ofthe physical world, and natural selection processes, noting the utility ofthis approach in the work of Diamond (1997), which aims likewise to ex-plain cultural predilections, though on a vastly larger scale. The perspec-tive is firmly epigenetic; genes require expression to have their effects, andare in a dynamic dance with environmental pressures. From this perspec-tive, if Black Atlantic rhythmic techniques have profound psychologicalimpact on humans, our first step should be to recognize that they are likelyto be a concomitant of such evolutionary developments as auditory per-ception, rhythmic movement, cognition, and emotion, which seem the es-sential ingredients enabling musical effects.

These four ingredients can be immediately separated into two groups oftwo. The first two, audition and regular movement, are well-developed innonhuman animals that do not produce or respond to music. A number ofanimals show larger hearing ranges than humans (Sekuler & Blake, 2001),and except for the concomitants of the opposable thumb, many animalsshow commensurate or superior movement skills. Music does not requirean opposable thumb, since many traditional societies have predominantly,some even exclusively, vocal music. Hence these two skills are of a moregeneral, foundation character and cannot explain musical aptitudes inhumans. In logical terms, these ingredients are necessary but not suffi-cient.

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In the second group fall emotion and cognition, which provide starkercontrasts with other animals. Many nonhuman animals have limbic sys-tems, the neural foci of emotion, and share some apparent emotions withus—or at least behaviors that look similar to those we exhibit with thoseemotions (e.g., fear, anger, satisfaction). Other emotions appear restrictedto humans, such as envy, guilt, aesthetic or spiritual feelings, and some ofthese evidently have an important role in music. Yet recent neurosciencework confirms that the pleasure centers for music are in or near the limbicsystem, coextensive with regions linked to pleasure in sex and food (Blood,Zatorre, Bermudez, & Evans, 1999).

Emotion in music can be ascribed in part to the sensory experienceof sound, and in part to the propulsive entrainment of rhythm; but thebest developed stream of theory focuses on a third approach, the linkbetween emotion and cognition, specifically via the phenomenon ofexpectation (Mandler, 1984; Meyer, 1954; Narmour, 1992). But notethat the first two paths to emotion show significant parallels to theexpectation approach. Rhythmic entrainment must naturally invokesympathetic resonance in body oscillators, providing a time scale forjudging, predicting, or effecting action (Large & Kolen, 1994). Like-wise, the periodicity detection apparatus of the inner ear, associatedsubcortical pathways, and auditory cortex forms a significant founda-tion of the sensory experience of sound, and this has the same potentialfor oscillator-based regulation. Oscillator entrainment is one founda-tion upon which expectation (and prediction) can naturally rest—thoughcertainly not the only one, in my view.

If the link between cognition and emotion is broken, certain kinds ofpathological “estrangement” from music can occur. This constitutes a formof amusia in which music is subjectively reported to sound like “noise,” orbe “flat” and uninteresting (Wilson & Pressing, 1999). The functional prob-lems behind this condition have not been definitively identified, but it isapparent that likely candidates are faulty auditory input processing (sen-sory amusia), or breaks in communication between auditory cortex (per-ception) and limbic lobe (emotion), or between frontal cortex (cognition)and limbic lobe (emotion). Note that a similar apparent dissociation be-tween emotional associations and cognition also occurs in vision, notablyin Capgras syndrome (Hoffman, 1998). Patients with this rare conditionhave normal perceptual capacities for face identification, but apparentlydo not have a connection between visual and emotional centers of intelli-gence, which they typically interpret by claiming that close friends andloved ones have been replaced by visually identical imposters, who don’t“feel” authentic.

Thus, expectancy is a central aspect of musical rhythm (Richman, 2000),is significant in major theories of musical influence on emotion, and is

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particularly important in the emotion-cognition loop. Hence it is naturalto ask: How does expectation figure into cognition itself?

Cognition appears to have evolved in humans because it enhances the 3 P’s:

1. Perception: how well the animal notices changes in its envi-ronment

2. Production: how well the animal operates within and upon itsenvironment

3. Prediction: how well the animal predicts future events in itsenvironment (Dawkins & Krebs, 1978).

The “environment” as used here includes the natural world, other organ-isms, and other parts of the self extrinsic to the acting control center, takingnote of the heterarchical nature of nervous system control of the body.Cognition enhances perception and production by the discernment, stor-age, and retrieval of organizing patterns (of sensation and action). Enhance-ment of all of these abilities will enhance the chances of survival of theanimal and hence will be favored by evolutionary processes.

The physical environment will shape sound perception, via the nature ofthe resonances found in natural objects and spaces, and via the need toidentify and locate sound sources that may be dangerous or useful for sur-vival. Yet neither such perception, nor the actions taken to deal with suchnaturalistic perceptions, appears to be critical in understanding the impactof rhythm. Rather, the crucial component for rhythm is prediction (whichis a foundation for expectation). There can be little doubt that predictionhas value in survival: our ideas of causation and planning are cruciallylinked to it, ideas that dominate purposeful human communication andthe formation of models of the world.

The value of prediction suggests several evolutionary pressures:

1. Cognitive control structures that enhance prediction will befavored.

2. Correct predictions will be reinforced by amplification circuits(emotion).

3. Situations of high predictability will achieve special status (behabitually constructed, sought out, exploited, etc.).

It is these pressures that we aim to link with the evolutionary genesis ofbehavioral rhythm.

A Rhythmogenesis Proposal

Biological oscillations are found throughout the human body, and overa great range of time scales (walking, breathing, heart rate, limb resonance

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frequencies, electroencephalography, cell refractory times, etc.; Winfree,1980). Yet rhythm that provides musical engagement via cognition is notexplained by these oscillators; at best, they provide raw material for thedevelopment of engagement on the time scales of human thought.

My hypothesis is as follows. Musical rhythm arises from the evolvedcognitive capacity to form and use predictive models of events—specifi-cally, predictions of the timing of anticipated future events. In evolutionaryterms, musical rhythm is an “exaptation”—it arises via a feature in onecontext (event prediction) that is subsequently exploited in another (audi-tory cognition) (Tattersall, 2002).

Note that there are two aspects to prediction or expectation: what isgoing to happen, and when it is going to happen. Each of these is indepen-dently important, depending on circumstances, but typically the two as-pects show important relationships. The claim here is that rhythm devel-ops from cognitive structures that produce predictions of timing of eventswhose character is largely known. Like nearly all cognitive evolutionaryclaims, this one has to primarily rely on plausibility, consistency, and ex-planatory power to make its case, for direct historical evidence is lacking.

To develop an appreciation for the claim, we first note that music fitswell with all three evolutionary pressures just listed. Next we consider theconsequences of point 3. What situation might maximize predictability oftiming? Evidently it must be a situation that has the simplest possible tim-ing structure, with ready perceptibility and the most consistency in produc-tion. The elements in this situation must therefore involve rapid event on-sets (since our perceptual systems are attuned to register change; Sekuler &Blake, 2001) and be discrete (for efficiency of demarcation of time points).The consistency constraint can be shown mathematically to correspond tothe situation with the lowest entropy relative to alternatives and that isfulfilled by a regular recurring pulse. Hence expectancy will be best servedby a special situation featuring a regular isochronous stream of rapid-onsetevents. The facilitation of prediction by evenly paced time marking in mu-sic has been noted before and linked to the coherent performance found intraditional ceremonies that facilitates social cohesion (Merker, 2000). Notethat such regular time demarcation also allows complex events or pro-cesses to be more accurately timed in relation to it.

In what sensory domain should this recurring pulse reside? There areonly two natural candidates for registering action at a distance: vision andaudition, as the other senses lack essential qualities of speed or reliability.Now, if both these senses are to be able to locate items in both space andtime, it turns out that audition must have a much higher time resolutionthan vision, because adequately accurate localization in space requiresinteraural time differences as small as tens of microseconds to be assessed(e.g., Sekuler & Blake, 2001). Hence, the need for spatial localization willautomatically guarantee greater temporal resolution in the auditory system

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than the visual. As a consequence, rhythmic representation can preferen-tially use audition to provide greater accuracy, this preference ultimatelybecoming normative over the time scale of evolutionary change. In addi-tion, unlike visual images, sound radiates automatically in all directions,reaching all members of a social group within hearing range, without theneed for attention, facilitating communication.

Hence, a combination of the practicalities of the radiative properties ofsound coupled with our physical dimensions on the one hand, and themathematically demonstrable criterion of maximal cognitive predictabilitycoupled with evolutionary constraints on perception on the other, leads usto the conclusion that regular auditory events must have special cognitive,emotional, and behavioral utility for humans. In other words, for an or-ganism with sufficient cognitive sophistication, evolutionary considerationssuggest there will be special situations where regular auditory pulses willfeature as foundations to impose order, reference event occurrences, andengage motor activity. Mostly, we call this rhythm, and it forms a founda-tion for music.

This explanation of the origin of regular pulsation extends naturally toan understanding of feel. For given the foundation pulse, what will furtherimprove predictive capacity of temporal placement? Clearly, minimizationof those factors that limit expectation accuracy: Such things as loss of at-tention, lapses of memory, instability of tempo, and crudeness of resolu-tion (events not near pulse locations are less accurately gauged than thosethat are near). Each of these limitations is curtailed by the use of feel orgroove, according to its definition provided earlier. Since a groove is arous-ing and engaging, lapses in attention will be reduced, which will also di-rectly reduce memory lapses; stimulation to movement will also enhancememory by providing multiple coding of timing relations (acoustic andmotor), in line with standard learning theory. Multiple coding will alsoenhance accuracy of representation. Local stability of tempo is a wide-spread human capacity and has been successfully modeled as due to a stablerandom variable (e.g., Vorberg & Wing, 1996) or oscillator entrainment(Large & Jones, 1999); whereas pulse subdivision, like ticks on a clockface, provides a framework for enhanced accuracy of prediction. Precisemodels of subdivision processes in accord with this function have beensuccessfully built and empirically tested for a range of repeating rhythmicpatterns (Magill & Pressing, 1997; Pressing 1998a; Vorberg & Hambuch,1984; Vorberg & Wing, 1996).

In summary, the claim here is that rhythmic feel arises from refinementsto special conditions of heightened cognitive prediction of time. The timescale of the elements of feel must, under this interpretation, be those rel-evant for human action and prediction. This is in accord with experimentalfindings, which show a correspondingly limited time scale range in whichtemporal patterns engage human rhythmic responses (Fraisse, 1982). Fur-

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thermore, while many species of animals move rhythmically, and synchro-nized group rhythmic activities are found in certain cases such as groups offireflies and the signaling of certain primates, only humans can effectivelyentrain their movements to an external time keeper (Wallin et al., 2000);this supports the idea that humans are unique in forming predictive timingmodels of regularly recurring events, and in complexly timed forms of be-havioral imitation.

Productive Aspects

The idea that evolutionary pressures might favor certain cognitive con-trol structures is unconvincingly abstract unless there is evidence that ac-tion processes in bodies actually exist to naturally implement them. As itturns out, there is considerable experimental and theoretical work in mo-tor control theory in support of this position. The two strands of mostdirect relevance are the generalized motor program approach (e.g., Keele,Cohen, & Ivry, 1986) and the dynamic systems approach (e.g., Kelso, 1995).The generalized motor program approach states that control is implementedby “programs” with tunable parameters, naturally encompassing the ideaof adaptability to context, and of controlled variation processes, as foundin music performance. The dynamic systems approach shows that the gen-eral outcome of any nonlinear control system such as that available in thehuman body will include wide domains of regular oscillation or pulse, aswell as phenomena with some relationship to music, such as bifurcation,suggestive of metrical modulation, and phase locking, suggestive of musi-cal polyrhythms.

An elaborated integration of these approaches called Referential Behav-ior Theory has been given by Pressing (1998b, 1999a). This has shown,inter alia, that criteria of cognitive complexity and performance difficultyemerge convincingly from a consideration of the control attributes in rhyth-mic production (see also Pressing, 1999b). In particular, control is gov-erned by a control function, and higher harmonics in its expansion natu-rally generate the processes of musical pulse subdivision, providing anexplicative link between the cognition implicit in widespread musical prac-tices and mathematical perspectives on dynamic control (Pressing, 1999a).

The view on rhythm given here subserves a related general characteriza-tion of music. Music is not merely an auditory perceptual phenomenon,but a control structure expressed in sound. Hence music encodes not onlythe resonant properties of objects, and the cognition of their organization;significant effects are also based on the encoded motor control informationlatent in the sound production, and on the attentional and motor controlthat the sound can engender in the listener’s body and mind. Thus listenerscan respond on the basis of basic sound quality (timbre, consonance/disso-

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nance), as in meditative immersions; on the basis of structural prediction,in which case expectation theory provides a path of explanation; on thebasis of dynamical patterns of affect, producing emotional impact; or onthe basis of groove, inducing movement and dance. The transmission ofinformation in music about sensory, dynamic, motor, and emotional func-tions associated with its design and production is essential in engenderingmusic’s social effects, which are often considered primary in explaining itsorigins (Roederer, 1984). Music’s social functions can be considered to pro-vide release from the epistemological solipsism of the individual’s construc-tion of meaning from sensory and action experiences (Freeman, 2000), andshared models of temporal prediction, based on such things as a commonperception of groove, figure significantly into this release.

Once musical effects attain a certain currency, they form a part of cul-tural evolution, which proceeds nongenomically from generation to gen-eration. This yields an altered auditory environment, which in turn influ-ences development in children, due to their high cerebral plasticity. In otherwords, cultural and epigenetic effects interact via a positive feedback loop,converging on context-specific musical styles.

Rivalry and Multiplicity in Perception and Action

Given that pulse and groove form a natural carrier framework for predic-tion and expectation, we now need to examine how they are used in practiceto communicate sensation, emotion, control, and cognition. Essentially, thisoccurs by the meaningful placement of events in relation to the framework. Toexamine this meaningful placement, and the processes that engender it, weturn to the twin related concepts of perceptual rivalry and multiplicity.

The most common usage of the term perceptual rivalry is in the area ofoptical illusions, where it refers to a cluster of related phenomena thatfeature competition between different perceptual interpretations of a sen-sation, stream of sensations, or external scene. This may take the form ofalternations or phase transitions between two interpretations of a picture,as happens in bistable perceptions like the Necker cube and the vase/facessilhouette picture.

Another form of perceptual rivalry is where two interpretations that arein contradiction are maintained, creating an anomalous, energizing per-cept that can be clarified by reasoning, but not banished. An example is theFraser illusion, where a perception of a twisted cord on a converging check-erboard background seems to be that of a spiral, but closer investigationreveals that the spirals are actually circles, in as much as a finger tracingaround the contours eventually returns to its starting point. Despite suchan investigation, which provides a cognitive explanation, the experience ofperceptive anomaly remains. A dynamic example of this is barber’s pole

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illusion, which shows apparent monotonic vertical motion that contradictsrecursive perception of the overall figure.

In the auditory domain, the best known case of illusion by contradictionis the Shepard illusion (Risset, 1971; Shepard, 1964), in which the over-tone distribution of a specially constructed tone is systematically altered tocreate a repeating cycle of pitch at long time intervals, whereas all localmotions of overtones are uniformly ascending or descending. In this case,the perception of smooth ascent or descent created by the motion of per-ceived fundamental pitch is in contradiction or rivalry with the perceptionof cyclic recurrence, creating the sense of perceptual anomaly. Again, it ischaracteristic that analytical knowledge of the structure of how the effect isachieved does not extinguish or even notably diminish the experience ofperceptual anomaly. Here as elsewhere, perceptual rivalry is an arousingprocess, because it is based on a kind of cognitive dissonance, a contradic-tion between interpretations.

Rivalry and multiplicity also exist in behavior, taking the form of severaldifferent action options, which are prepared and retained in parallel foraction until one is chosen. This provides preparedness, and is common inmany situations, including speech and competitive sport. For example, intennis, simple choices about returning a ball down the line or cross courtmay be held in motor memory before one is finally chosen for execution,with the delay in choice used to adaptively ensure aptness and decreasetime given to the opponent to infer the choice (by reading body language).

Origins of Perceptual and Productive Rivalry

There are two views of the origins of perceptual and productive rivalry(multiplicity) that are germane here. The first comes from neuroscienceand is that of functional brain organization. It is well known that neuralsubsystems, notably audition and movement control, contain many pro-cessing centers with partly overlapping functions. Cells and groups of cellswith specialist functions create multiple “views” of any stimulus. Likewise,in production, the motor system is both hierarchical and heterarchical, cre-ating multiple competing centers for control, some relatively more auto-matic, some relatively more intentional. These rival centers compete andcooperate to yield our experience and actions (Kandel, Schwartz, & Jessel,2000). Evidently this perspective suggests that competition between differ-ent brain regions may lead to perceptual and productive rivalry, with mini-mal or no need for any supervising homunculus.

The second view comes from computer science and is agent-based. Inthis view, complex systems like minds, internet communities, and percep-tion/action systems arise most naturally from collections of autonomous,yet partly interdependent, agents (Minsky, 1987). Speaking perceptually,

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the mind is seen to consist of a large range of agents, each tailored to one orpossibly more particular perceptions; these agents interact by competitionand collaboration, resulting in both conscious and unconscious percep-tions. There are analogous agents for action, which are close to what havetraditionally been called schema. Such perceptual agents or schema may beexplicitly set in motion by other agents, or instigate due to signals providedby the environment or other schema when their inputs reach certain thresh-olds or relevance criteria. Agents may be created, maintained, edited, com-bined, and deleted. Agents may exist to coordinate other agents. Accord-ingly, the mind is a seething adaptive conglomeration of agents, andperceptual/productive rivalry is an expression of agent rivalry. The utilityof this perspective has been supported by many models and simulations(e.g., Arbib, Érdi, & Szentágothai, 1998; Ferber, 1999; Minsky, 1987).

The two views are complementary, in that the neurophysiological view(supported by empirical anatomical work and positron emission tomogra-phy and functional magnetic resonance imaging) supports agentlike local-ization of function, and the pure functionality of conception of the com-munity of agents view reminds us that agency need not neatly resolve intononoverlapping cortical regions to exhibit emergent properties.

Techniques of Perceptual Rivalry in Black Atlantic Music

Perceptual rivalry and multiplicity are established foundations of Afri-can rhythmic design and take a number of forms. Examining West Africandrum ensembles, Pressing (1983b) showed that the design of Africantimelines can be simply and naturally derived from the group-theoretic prop-erties of the appropriate cyclic groups (e.g., C

12). This is based on the sym-

metries inherent in cyclic objects.These time lines can be shown mathematically to “sample” the different

cyclic structures in the time cycle with maximal uniformity, making themsimultaneously maximally perceptually ambiguous and versatile (Pressing,1983b). An isomorphism was found to exist between standard generativemathematical processes on groups and the cognitive, emotional, and mo-tor potentials of the resulting patterns. Further support for this notion isshown in specific analysis of drum ensemble patterns by Pressing (1983a)and can be observed in other published studies of drum patterns (e.g., Jones,1959; Locke, 1979), wherein overlays or successions of different pulses areapparent in the design.

Turning now from this specific African case to Black Atlantic rhythm ingeneral, we are in a position to examine the functionality of the varioustechniques. The primary devices are taken to be syncopation, overlay, dis-placement, off-beat phrasing, polyrhythm/polymeter, hocketing,

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heterophony, swing, speech-based rhythms, and call-and-response. Nearlyall of these have at their heart the establishment of perceptual multiplicityor rivalry, which acts as either a message or a message enhancement tech-nique (via increased engagement and focusing of attention), or both. Thecausal path for the remaining devices is based on the music-language link.

The first eight techniques present clear effects of perceptual multiplicity,and simple examples are given in Figure 2. Syncopation (Figure 2a) estab-lishes a tension between the accent structure of the meter or underlyingbeat and the accent structure of the syncopated line. The degree of synco-pation indicates the degree of cognitive complexity or dissonance set up bythe pattern-ground relation. Pressing (1999b) has described a quantitativeprocedure, based on Pressing and Lawrence (1993), to calculate cognitivecomplexity of rhythmic patterns based on a categorical classification ofdifferent types of syncopation on multiply perceived rhythmic strata. Thisindex of complexity is claimed to arbitrate stability of pattern productionunder difficult (e.g., speeded) conditions and is supported by preliminaryexperimental work (Williams & Pressing, 2001).

The overlay (Figure 2b) subverts the meter by temporarily establishing arival accent or phrase structure not congruent with the metrical structure,before eventually returning to it. Overlays are of two types: in-time andout-of-time, with the former retaining a common time unit between groundand overlay, and the latter moving (normally for rather limited periods) incomplete independence from the ground meter, as in displays of vocal rubato.The example given is an in-time overlay.

Displacement (Figure 2c) takes a motive and presents it at alternativelocations with respect to the meter or timeline, generating multiplicity ofphrasing. In jazz, this has been brought to a fine art by such artists as DukeEllington, Thelonious Monk, and Joe Henderson, in both improvisationand composition.

Many significant jazz singers such as James Scott and Betty Carter “drag”entire phrases, inflecting notes as necessary to fit chord changes as theyreconstitute the durational structure of a melodic line.

A special subcase of this is what may be termed the “fake 1” technique.This refers to the use of displacement to “turn the beat around” so thatsome other point in the cycle appears to be the “1” (starting point). Thiswas achieved via consistent phrasing displacement over the course of achorus by bop master Charlie Parker, and by reversal of the usual positionsfor the “oom-pah” left hand components by stride piano players like JamesP. Johnson and Earl Hines. The effect also appears by shifting the standardrock backbeat structure by one or two sixteenth notes in relation to theharmonic elements, as performed by jazz-rock drummer Dave Weckl onthe CD Hard Wired (“Displace This”). Such examples have a psychologi-cally disorienting effect on listeners, musicians and nonmusicians alike.

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Off-beat phrasing, the preponderance of off-beat starting and endingpoints for phrases (Figure 2d), sets up persistent tension between the phraseaccents and the metrical accents. Polyrhythms (Figure 2e) set up tension byintroducing two (or possibly more) pulse streams of significant perceptualviability. Hocketing (Figure 2f), traditionally associated with African xy-lophone traditions, distributes a single line among two or more parts,thereby creating interlocking syncopations that heighten the projection ofenergy, since each part contains much more temporal variance of event

Fig. 2. Simple examples of African and African diasporic rhythmic devices. (a) syncopation,(b) overlay, (c) displacement, (d) off-beat phrasing, (e) (4:3) polyrhythm, (f) hocketing, (g)heterophony, and (h) notation suggestive of swing.

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location than the composite emergent line, which typically has little synco-pation. Heterophony (Figure 2g) refers to the simultaneous presence ofmultiple variations of the same line, as in gospel choir embellishments orfreer large jazz ensembles, for example John Coltrane’s Ascension (1965).These concurrent variations are improvisational and can create secundaldissonances that convert the single focal line into a fuzzy phenomenon ofperceptual multiplicity.

Swing is a phenomenon primarily confined to jazz, though aspects of itare found in other genres and eras (e.g., the unequal durations of Frenchnote inegale). The phenomenon has an extensive literature, some of whichis noted more for passions of belief than clarity, and our treatment will bequite limited. Several aspects are central. First, swing represents an indi-vidual approach to time and articulation, one that projects a view of move-ment characteristics in time and emotional characteristics in pitch/time space.Second, it is based on an unequal subdivision of the fundamental pulse,with the ratio of durations varying systematically with tempo, perhaps ap-proximating 2:1 onbeat:offbeat for slow groove tempos (MM = ca. 60–80)for many players and styles, and varying toward less equality at slowertempi and toward more at faster tempi, with values in the range 1.3–1.6:1common in most tunes. It is possible—in fact normal—to selectively swinga particular rhythmic level of a hierarchy; in swing jazz it is the 8th note,but in jazz-rock beats the 8th note may be even while the 16th note isswung.

Third, it is based on frequent accenting of off-beat positions locatedbetween main pulses. Fourth, swing includes selective “pushing” of phrasesahead and behind their metronomic position for expressive effect. Thus,swing has much in common rhythmically with both groove and emphaticspeaking patterns and has much in common in terms of phrasing with nar-rative.

Figure 2h gives notation of a blues phrase from which an experiencedjazz player will readily produce a certain kind of swing. The notation can-not show the full range of effects, and in fact only the third aspect of swinggiven above is explicit.

Speech-based rhythms, as noted earlier, in genres varying from talkingblues to hip-hop, superimpose timings organized by oral articulatory pre-dilections on a foundation structure that has divisive and metrical proper-ties. As with overlays, these may exist in-time, merely adopting the accentor tonal structures of speech, or out-of-time. They may draw on variouscontexts for use of speech: solo, conversational, narrative.

Languages are also not uniform in their organization of prosody: En-glish is largely a “stress-timed” language, whereas French is “syllable-timed”;Yoruba is tonal and Pitjantjatjara is not. Hence language-specific effectswill affect the musical settings. Space precludes elaboration here.

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Ensemble Properties of Black Atlantic Rhythm

Some of the effects already discussed are ensemble techniques, notablythe groove itself, heterophony, and hocketing. Also widespread is call-and-response, which refers to two repeating antiphonal phrases, the first (thecall) being answered by the response, which either copies the call, or comple-ments it. In practice, when the response does not copy the call, the responsetypically has an invariant form and involves several to many singers orinstruments, whereas the call is often solo and is more likely to featuresubstantial variation and improvisation, for example, vocal melisma.

Call-and-response permeates African music, both vocal and instrumen-tal. Instrumental compositions and improvisations by lead drummers areoften set up as the call to the support drums’ response (Arom, 1991;Pantaleoni, 1972), so that lead drum phrases end at the point in the cyclejust before the response, even if they are more than one cycle in length. Injazz, call and response is characteristic of classic big band sectional writing(often reeds provide the call, brass the response). The ultimate source forthis process is not perceptual multiplicity, but conversational speech.

Many issues of ensemble timing are linked to form and pitch relations,which are beyond the scope of this article. But two larger time frame issuesare notable. First, the narrative aspect of speech—the telling of a story—isa widely adopted metaphor for how improvised solos can be effectivelypaced, and this is hence another aspect of how speech contributes to jazzrhythm (Berliner, 1994). Second, there exists an interesting tension betweenWestern-style linear counterpoint and the groove structures set up by bassand drums in African-American music. It is in jazz (among the Africandiasporic musics) that we find particularly skillful blending of these ratheropposed predilections. In early jazz, the trio front-line sections put a guid-ing main melody in the hands of one instrument, typically the cornet, withtwo other parts (typically clarinet, trombone) improvised in relation to it,all of this above a highly patterned rhythm section. In later jazz, with therhythm section becoming generally more contrapuntal, and paraphrase fall-ing from favor, this format became far less viable, yet contrapuntal tonalapproaches were apparent in the cool predilections of Lennie Tristano andGerry Mulligan, and in the hot polyphony of independent lines associatedwith avant-garde traditions stemming from Free Jazz (e.g., Ornette Coleman,Cecil Taylor, Anthony Braxton, late John Coltrane).

Creative Manipulations of Black Atlantic Rhythmic Traditions

Any set of standard musical devices can be combined, extended, ma-nipulated, negated, generalized, or otherwise altered, in line with the ex-

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ploratory and creative nature of musical expression, and these develop-ments, if successful, will inevitably be reified, as part of the process of cul-tural accretions, to become new standard techniques, a process that canrecur repeatedly. The influence of such developments is typically closelylinked to their simplicity and potential for adaptation. An example of theeffective combination of displacement and polyrhythms has already beennoted in the caption to Figure 1.

Dean (1992) has given many examples of such extension processes inpost-1960 jazz, including, with respect to rhythm, a focus on nontradi-tional meters (e.g., John McLaughlin, Don Ellis) and complex percussivesubdivisions (e.g., Tony Oxley, Elvin Jones). Here for reasons of concision,I will confine examples to examining extensions to two techniques: theoverlay and polyrhythm.

The overlay technique has featured prominently in jazz of all eras andhas been particularly developed in modern jazz, notably in its two seminalhistorical ensembles, the John Coltrane Quartet and the Miles Davis Quin-tet (especially of Wayne Shorter vintage). In both these groups, the rhyth-mic influence of specific pianists (McCoy Tyner and Herbie Hancock, re-spectively)—supported by drummers such as Elvin Jones and TonyWilliams—was critical. Their most common uses of overlays were place-ment of 2- or 4-cycle patterns over 3/4 meter and placement of 3/4 or 3/2patterns over 4/4 meter. In the hands of these sophisticated groups, suchoverlays might extend in the latter case over an 8- or even 16-bar phrase,establishing a subsidiary metric feel to a degree sufficient to generate over-lay cycle-based subdivisions with a quite distant relation to the main meter.The end structural effect recalls layered subdivision techniques of late 13thcentury French motets (e.g., those of Petrus de Cruce), but its generation,by spontaneous subdivision within layered grooves, appears to be via aquite distinct body-based psychological process.

Pianist Bill Evans was a master of the rhythmic overlay, particularly theuse of cycles of 3 overlaid over cycles of 4. For example, this is found inextended fashion in later improvised sections of the solo piece Never LetMe Go (Evans, 1968), and Dean (1992) points to his use of novel subdivi-sions within overlays in the piece My Romance (Evans, 1961), where 3-cycles are embedded within overlaid 3-cycles. Overlays of longer cyclelengths are seen in compositions of Chick Corea (e.g., 5 beats in InnerSpace and Litha in Corea, 1968), and various works by Steve Coleman,Horace Tapscott, Joe Henderson, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, and Andrew Hill.

Figure 3 shows two excerpts from the piece Lesser Trocanter (1981)(Pressing, 1998c), built around cycles and overlays of length 5. There is asingle fastest note value of the 16th note, creating a cycle length of 20 = 5beats of four 16ths each. Division of the cycle into 5 parts is emphasized bythe drum kit. Figure 3a shows the central time-line pattern, played on an

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African bell (gankogui) based on phrasing of the form (3 + 3 + 4)/8, creat-ing a nearly equal division of the cycle into 3 parts. The accompanyingsyncopated bass line consists of a 2-note rhythmic cell of duration five16ths, which divides the cycle into 4 equal parts. Hence the cycle is dividedinto 3, 4, and 5 parts simultaneously. Figure 3b shows the bass part in alater section of the piece, which exhibits pitch and rhythmic cycles of dif-ferent lengths in the same line. The pitch cycle, supported by phrasing (seebrackets in figure), defines a cycle of 15/16 which repeats 4 times in the 15-beat main cycle (3 bars of 5/4). Rhythmically, the pattern defines the 4:5polyrhythm of case (a), recurring three times in the 15-beat main cycle.

An even more novel use of polyrhythm is given in Figure 4, in the pieceDigestivo (1997) by Mark Dresser, a New York-based bassist and composer(Dresser, 2002; Dresser & Helias, 2000). The bass line from bars 9 to 20 is thearea of focus here, as it forms the basis for improvisation. The chord structureis that of a 4/4 twelve-bar blues in B , and the piece breaks down into three 16-beat phrases, as is customary. But the structure is, unusually, sequentiallymultimetric and polyrhythmic, for while every bar has exactly four regularbass notes, their polyrhythmic design creates walking bass lines at distantlyrelated tempi; the structure contains a sequence of metrical modulations be-tween grooves at 5 different speeds, with pulses of duration 1, 3, 4, 5, or 6sixteenth notes. The excerpt given is one of five such 12-bar structures used inthe improvisation section, the last of which uses double time feel. This case is

Fig. 3. Main bell pattern and two bass lines for Lesser Trocanter (1981) (Pressing, 1998c):(a) a 5/4 cycle showing division into 4 exactly equal phrases (bass) and 3 approximatelyequal phrases (African bell gankogui); (b) differing pitch and rhythmic cycles embedded ina single bass line later in the piece.

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a highly extended example of linear polyrhythms within the same line, a rec-ognized African tradition (e.g., Chernoff, 1981).

It is of course true that Black Atlantic rhythmic devices are far from the onlypath to temporal multiplicity, for complex metrical modulations are endemic

Fig. 4. Digestivo (1997) (Dresser, 2002, reprinted with permission). The focus here is on theinnovative linear polyrhythmic designs of the bass line in bars 9–20.

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in the work of Elliot Carter, complex subdivided strata are found in the worksof Brian Ferneyhough, and polytempi and polyrhythms of unperformable com-plexity are commonplace in the music of Conlon Nancarrow, to single out afew cases of Western composers. The clearest psychological distinction be-tween these musics and those of the African and African diasporic traditions isthe continued adherence to a relationship with the simple, direct experience ofgroove in the latter, with, it may be argued, concomitant heightened power toevoke emotion and affect in the nonspecialist.

Concluding Remarks

This article has detailed the generic properties of African and Africandisaporic rhythm and claimed that their origin is linked to two phenom-ena: (1) cognitive models of prediction and (2) speech. Groove or feel formsa kinetic framework for reliable prediction of events and time pattern com-munication, and its power is cemented by repetition and engendered move-ment. Various characteristic rhythmic devices achieve their effects in rela-tion to it. They do this by manipulating expectancy with techniquesproducing perceptual rivalry and multiplicity, using direct temporal ma-nipulations of musical materials, and by adopting structures shared withspeech, notably prosody, conversational interaction, and narrative. Percep-tual rivalry creates arousal and has emotion-generating power, helping toaccount for African and African diasporic rhythm’s effectiveness in engage-ment in general and its capacity for facilitating impact in consciousnessalteration, communal ceremonies, social cohesion, communication of emo-tional patterning, movement expression, and catharsis.

Finally, it has been noted that, particularly in jazz and jazz-related forms,extensions and creative adaptations of traditional African and Africandiasporic rhythmic techniques are a natural consequence of a culture of ques-tioning and reflection that encompasses both maintenance of historical refer-ence and accommodation to innovation.2

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