 Hi everyone, this is Jason here from Nathaniel. In this lesson, we are going to look at something really important for piano players and musicians in general, subdivisions. So the beat is there for everyone to count 1, 2, 3, 4, but then we can divide that particular beat into how many ever subdivisions we would want, be it 2, be it 3 or be it 4. So what I'm going to do in this video to kind of explain subdivisions because we've done it in a lot of ways on the YouTube channel so far, but always with chords, always with an arpeggio or something like that. Today I thought, let me explain subdivisions with just 3 notes. We've used 3 notes in the past just for things like chord embellishment or accompaniment, but what if we just take 3 notes over and over, create a pattern and then learn subdivisions along the way. So I hope this lesson will be very good even for the newer pianists out there or the newer musicians. I would encourage you to try this on anything. If you play the bass or the guitar or the flute or whatever, you could try it on pretty much any musical instrument. I don't think this is a very piano centric lesson. So in this lesson, we are first going to look at a melody, then we are going to look at what the left hand should do which is very simple, holding the pulse and then I've prepared a lot of exercises for you on all the subdivision grids which are available. The 8th note grid, the triplet grid and finally the semi-quaver or the 16th note grid. So I will be giving you 5 exercises for each of that and I'm going to break it down in this lesson and for further learning, for further practice, it's all available on our Patreon. It will be available as a downloadable PDF for you to get your hands on. So also consider going to Patreon and your support will be also great for our channel. So let's get cracking. The 3 notes under interest right now are going to be, well I'm just going to hand pick 3, just D, E and F. So you go D, E, F and I'm going to play it first of all on my pulse. So if I count 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2. So what did I do there? I came back D, E, F, E, D, E, F, E, D. So that's your basic melody. Now if I have to make this melody more interesting, the best way to do it is to figure out how much inside the beat I want to go. Now as you know, a beat is a finite time container. It's a finite container where you can have as much musical information as you would want. So a beat could last for a specific amount of time. For example, if the tempo of the song is 120 BPM or beats per minute, the length of the beat will be what? Half a second. If it's 60 beats per minute, it's going to move like the clock you have in your house or a watch. It moves exactly at the rate of one second per beat. But however, musical time is more customized. We choose the time based on our feeling or based on our genre, based on our desire to make the music we are making. But every beat which flows by 1, 2, 3, 4 doesn't have to only be counted as 1, 2, 3, 4. It can have subdivisions. So you go 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and if you want to divide by 2, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and so that immediately gives you the license to explore those subdivision beats. You can do something like 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and right and so on and so forth. You did not have that. It would just be 1, 2, 3, 4. You may not know that you can actually go inside the beat sort of like a measuring tape. Someone uses a tape to measure the distance or length of a room for example and says it's X amount of feet. But then it could also be feet maybe 10 feet and 3 inches or something like that. That would make the measurement of a person's height, the length of a room or if someone's trying to design a door for your house even more important to get an exact measurement where even 1 inch or sub inch would be extremely critical in that particular job. So you go subdivision number 1 will be where you divide by 2. Also what we call as quavers and great to say it as 1 and 2 and 3 and 4. Now you don't have to play all of these. That's what this lesson is about. I'm going to only take 3 notes but we don't have to play so many hits, just 4 hits but I can choose specific notes. For example 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 because I had the end of the 2 available I'm playing on the end of the 2. If I did not have that it would end up being no ends, no division. So that's quavers or dividing by 2. Now you can even divide by 3. And 2, and 3, and 4, and triple, it triple… you thumb, throat…. right? so na na na na… Now if you go, just these notes D, E F E, repeating E… N, A F E 1 N Now you can make something at the N 1, N 2, N, 2 N, 3, N Still a very simple melody from the mechanical point of view it's just that the beats are getting really embellished now right and you now have three units for every beat so one and a two and a three and a four and one and that's how we count the triplets earlier we did one and two and three and four and triplets one and a two and a three and a four and a one and a two and a so I decided to play the E at the end of the two otherwise earlier if I don't know it existed it would be one and one two three four I only have four slots now I have what is four threes are four threes are 12 slots so I can choose four notes or four hits over a span of 12 divisions so I can exhaust all my notes like one and a two and a three and like this one and a two and a three or you can space it out one and a two and a three and a four and a one and a two and a three and a four or one and a two one and a two and a three and a four and one and a two and one and a two and right stuff like that can happen now I have more divisions okay the last division system which I wanted to share with you in this lesson by the way the lesson is going to go on after this towards some exercises where I've printed the notation for you to read up so this is just like an introduction or a prelude to all the exercises to come so again if you need that PDF guide it's available for you head over to our Patreon and it's a subscription a monthly subscription of five five dollars a month but it'll also not only give you this lesson it'll give you every single lesson which I have ever taught in the past I guess three odd years and going to teach and my style of teaching involves a lot of my writing notes important diagrams for you to improve the understanding of the subject so it'll be great if you can head over to our Patreon and support our channel okay so now coming to the division of four when you divide by four you go one e and a two e and a three and a four e and a so now you have access to four divisions in each beat so if you're on a four by four time time meter it'll be four fours are sixteen slots for you to play your notes on so I can do one e and a two e and a three and now I'm not accessing those divisions three and a four e and a one e and a two e and a three and a four e and now if I do like something Okay, so that is like the main goal for this lesson. It's to allow us to play over all these subdivisions which are all the commonly used subdivisions by all musicians, whatever genre, whatever instrument, we just have these sort of subdivisions divide by 2, divide by 3, divide by 4. So now what we are going to do, we are going to take a bunch of exercises which I have notated for you and learn how to play them with just the same old 3 notes D E F E. So we are just going to make these 3 notes sound a lot more fancy, okay. Then I am going to give you a few more tricks at the end of that and move forward. Let's get cracking. Right, so the first goal would be take the 4th note 1 2 3 4 and kind of anticipate it. If you are doing it on the 4, you are doing it at the end of the 3, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4, completely different melody, right, 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and right. So the next thing mentions anticipate the 3, so 1 2 and of the 2 because the 3 came earlier. Let's put that arrow there, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and, now what shall we do? Let's now anticipate the 2, anticipate meaning move it before the 2, that will be at the end of the 1. Let's see how that sounds, okay. What do we have? Initially we had 1 2 3 4, now that 2nd note which is at the 2 is going to come before, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and, so what do we have so far? We are anticipating the 4th beat, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4, dum chicka bum chicka dum bum. Now anticipate the 3, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4. Sounds like that Pink Floyd song for some reason, it does kind of, yeah. Then you do the anticipating of the 2, 1 and, now we are done with the anticipating part. Now you can start moving it this side, delay. So let's start by delaying the 1, if you delay the 1 you are not going to have anything at the 1. That will be 1, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2, that's why I have written the arrow this way, that means you are taking that 1, moving it to the end, moving it to the subdivision. Now delay the 2, 1 and 2 and got that. So 1, 3 and 4 remain in their slot, so only the 2 got messed a bit. Move this side, earlier it moved that side. Now let's do something with the 3, so that will be 1, 2, 3 and 4, 1, 2, 3 and 4. So what has ended up happening, 3 went more later or delayed itself. 1, 2, ba ba, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 4 and, all different sounding melodies. Now what do we do last? The 4 goes delayed, 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4 and, now if you are getting bored with these notes, take the same rhythm but maybe take some other notes, if you know other notes which I am sure you do, but this is just to kind of focus on the divisions and get the timing right. So you can kind of explore it further, that's the same rhythm and delaying the 4, so 3, 4, keep the count going strong, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4. So I have done I think 5 patterns now where I have done all sorts of interesting combos for you. So let's try and count them, so we will count them and then play them. Let's move on to the combos. So the 8th note combos include anticipations as well as delays. That means you could have an occurrence where you may have the beat going later or earlier or you may have 2 beats which are going later or earlier. So it's just my own pattern which I think sounds quite cool. But we take pretty much the same notes, D, E, F, E, 4 notes for the whole lesson throughout the lesson. So if you take the first pattern you see there, 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and of the 2 and of the 3, on of the 4, on of the 1, so 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1. If you like playing chords, fine, play some chords, right, but now I am kind of getting carried away as I normally end up doing. So I will come back to the lesson which is D, E, F, E, D, E, F, E, D, 2nd rhythm which will be 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and 1 and 2 and 3 and, quite like that. Try to clap it first, pump, pump, pump, pump, pump, pump, pump. I have put a rest there, you can observe the rest or let it tail, let it continue if you wish. Pump, pump, pump, pump, pump, pump, okay, 3rd rhythm. This I have already taught you, delaying the 3 and the 4th one will involve clustering all the 4 and like packing them together. And what you are also probably observing as a keyboard player, I am always trying to give myself the pulse which could be the root or the sa of the song, in this case D, that gives me the timing and makes me know that, okay, I am getting it on that particular time field where I am dividing the beat by 2 and it just gets you to realize that puts you in that focus that this is what I have to do, right. So always keep the pulse in the left hand, never play the piano with one hand. It is always a bad habit. I understand some of us like to work on one hand at a time but generally as much as possible play your instrument with two hands, right. So the last rhythm printed for you which is, there we have it. As always maintain the pulse in the left hand while you do all these rhythms. So those were 5 8th note combos for you. So we have divided this lesson now into two parts. In the next video we look at triplets and 16th note subdivisions which are also called as semi quavers. So if you haven't already practiced the 8th note combos really well, you could pause the video, you could just take some time, practice the 8th note patterns improvise, come up with your own stuff and see how it goes. Another thing I would urge you to do since I am on Instagram would be you could record some of your exercises or anything you would like to do. A lot of you are doing some of my riffs on YouTube which is really nice to see, getting a lot of your videos via email and other such platforms. It will be great if you can just put it up on your Instagram, tag me, I will definitely go through it as much as I can and perhaps even share it on my handle. So do your work, whatever I do in these lessons, try to do something and interact with me via the Instagram option, right guys? And if you haven't already, it's very important we will be releasing a lot more videos including part 2 of the same one. So it's very important that right now hit that bell icon for notifications. A lot of you have subscribed who are watching this lesson, that's great if you haven't hit the subscribe button as well. So subscribe and bell and the notes, a lot of you are asking where are the notes, well it's on Patreon, look at all our descriptions and it's right there. And if you find that you are a little bit more of a beginner on the instrument, we have our virtual courses where you can learn foundational stuff with me and any instrument really, not just piano, we have guitar, violin, drums, bass, vocals and so on. So you could write to us, fill up the form, there's a form in the description, you could also consider doing our members only foundation course which you will find on our YouTube channel, just go to the home page and you will find it there. Right guys, cheers, thanks for watching, see you in the next one.