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A Definition of Swing Music

To start with, swing is found in the rhythm section. The melody and soloists are allowed to take liberties with the rhythms and phrase their melody as they see fit. (They don t always do that but you can find enough exceptions to make your point). Dancers do the same thing. So forget what the melody does.

Not all swing music is written in 4/4 time, much of it is written in 2/2 time, sometimes 6/8 or 12/8, so forget about triplets, straight eights, etc. for now. Sometimes a particular song can be found in 4/4 time in one book and 2/2 time in another. Especially faster songs. I will try to get it across without using time signatures. For the people who know what swing is, but have come up with different numbers, we are sometimes talking about the same thing but using different time bases.

Forget about specific components of the rhythm section such as the ride cymbal, snare, hihat etc. the swing thing is a whole rhythm section approach. Sometimes different instruments (all working together) additively make the swing rhythm. Also, the swing notes are not the only ones played, other notes are added that either compliment or contrast the swing feel.

If this crazy on-line medium was equipped for sound, I could demonstrate this swing thing without any misunderstanding, but it is not so I will do the best I can. My Harpers Dictionary of Music is no help here, it defines swing as: A style of jazz popular in the 1930 s so named by Duke Ellington.

I have done more research, I have listened to scores of swing records, I have analyzed a few commercial MIDI sequences I have purchased over the years, I have discussed this with a few other professional musicians, and I have analyzed the swing feel feature of a couple of drum machines and professional sequencing packages. The main thing I found in common with ALL of these was the two major subdivisions of the beat was first on the beat and second between the second third and the third quarter of the beat. What note we are talking about depends on what note gets a beat. Could be an eighth, quater, dotted eighth, etc..

Without any musical jargon do the following:

• Start tapping your feet in a steady, walking speed beat. Be sure the beat is steady.
• Count 1,2,3,4,1,2,3,4,1,2,3,4 etc. while tapping your foot, on all the beats that your foot is tapping.
• Now keeping the 1,2,3,4 in the same place, insert the word and in between them. You should be saying 1,&,2,&,3,&,4,&etc. This is two sub-divisions per beat.
• Now insert syllables between them so that your foot is still tapping the 1,2,3,4, but you are counting 1,E,&,a,2,E,&,a,3,E,&,a,4,E&,a,etc. It should sound a little like an old fashioned wrist watch. You now have 4 subdivisions to the beat.
• If you keep the placement of all the notes the same, and accent the 1 a,2 a,3 a,4 a, you get a beat that is the upper limit of the swing.
• If you now count 1,a,ly,2,a,ly,3,a,ly,4,a,ly etc. you have three subdivisions to the beat.
• By accenting the 1 ly,2 ly,3 ly,4, ly you have the lower limit of swing.
• It is between the two examples. How much in between depends on the song and the people playing the song.

All professional MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) sequencers Master Tracks Pro, Band-In-A-Box, Cubase, Performer, Composer, etc. all let you apply a swing feel to a point in between 66.7 and 75% of the time period between the beats you are adjusting the swing to. As do the drum machines made by Korg, Alesis, Roland and other professional musical sequencing programs, professional hardware sequencers and drum machines (The names being dropped are for those who require that authority be called upon).

Since the Music Dictionary defines swing with Duke Ellington , listen to Satin Doll, Perdido, Take The A Train, I Let A Song Go Out Of My Heart, I m Just A Lucky So And So, Love You Madly, etc. I played all of these tunes in the jazz band when I was in school. The basic beat s subdivision is the same swing I defined.

Someone mentioned Benny Goodman, How About Sing, Sing, Sing? The beat is subdivided the same way I described.

Glenn Miller, In The Mood (here the melody itself is a classic example of the swing thing), Tuxedo Junction, Chattanooga Choo-Choo

Some one else mentioned Bop tunes. Most Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie tunes swing exactly as I described Conformation, Groovin. High, Ornithology,

Someone else mentioned the blues (Not usually considered a swing rhythm but it often does) St. James Infirmary, Baby What You Want Me To Do, Kansas City, Night Train (here again, the melody itself is a classic example of the swing thing).

In all these tunes and thousands in my collection, if you clap your hands both on each beat and somewhere between 2/3 and 3/4 of the beat, you will not conflict with anything in the rhythm section because you will be swinging.

The professional level musical products, the swing bands, and other examples all support my original definition of swing. We can t all be wrong. If you want to use different terminology to describe the same thing, it is OK. If you want to subdivide the beat in any other way, you can still make music, but you won t be swinging.

For those of you who still don t get it. In the words of Louis Armstrong, If you gotta ask, don t mess with it. [[there are a few variations of this quote, it might not be correct but it's meaning remains true to the original]]

Addendum by Editor: Another version of the quote is: "If you have to ask, you'll never know"

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