Why Rhythm is Harder to Learn Than Notes
1. Why Rhythm Gets Overlooked
In 2019, I was on the music education front lines. I spent the vast majority of my week teaching lots of students, and my music school had hundreds of students attending various music lessons each week. There were lots of students at any one time hoping to take their instrumental exams, and so each term/semester I would run mock exam sessions where I would spend the weekend examining students (both my own and other teachers’ students).
The interesting thing about running exam sessions like this is that you get to see what most students are struggling with and what mistakes they make when they have a piece almost finished. One of the most fundamental problems I noticed was that most of the time note accuracy was prioritised over rhythm accuracy. In other words, pressing the correct keys was easier and prioritised over playing the correct rhythm.
Most of the time when we sit down to practice, our first thought is: “Am I playing the right notes?”. Notes can feel like the only important thing. They’re written on the page, they’re visible on the keyboard, and we can measure success by whether we hit the correct keys or not.
Rhythm, on the other hand, often gets deprioritised and relegated to a secondary issue, when in reality it’s perhaps more integral to a listener’s experience. A piece with a few wrong notes but solid rhythm still sounds pretty good, but a piece with perfect notes and questionable rhythm will be much more disruptive to a listener’s experience.
2. Rhythm Is Harder Than Pitch
Back when I was 7 years old and first starting to learn to read music on the viola, it was pretty apparent that once I learnt the notes on the page I wouldn’t need to learn them again. Whereas rhythm appeared to be a moving target. Every piece had different rhythms.
As I went on to learn the piano and get much better at music, this became even more obvious when learning pieces such as Chopin’s Nocturnes. In pieces like these, there are some very unusual rhythms and these will always require dedicated practice.
So, it became obvious that rhythm is much harder to learn than pitch, and here’s why:
Notes are visual, and to some extent there is less pressure to find them on time. You can see them on the page, recognise patterns like scales and chords, and find them on the piano. Your eyes and fingers can work together to find the notes, and you will either press the correct key on the piano… or you won’t!
Whereas rhythm is invisible. You can’t see it in the same way you see pitch. It has to be felt, and you are relying on your internal sense of timing to work out if you are correct or not. That makes it much more abstract, and often more frustrating, particularly if you don’t know if you’ve got it right or wrong!
There’s also the problem of coordination. When both hands are playing different rhythms, or when rhythm works against the beats of the bar, your brain can panic under the time pressure and the piece will fall apart. This is why so many pianists can play the right pitches but can’t keep a consistent pulse during a performance, just like in the mock exams I ran!
3. How to Fix It!
So how do you practice rhythm to feel as solid as reading individual notes?
Count out loud leading into and during playing. If you can’t count while playing, then it is likely that the rhythm won’t be secure and you won’t know if you really know it.
Tap or clap rhythms away from the piano. Separating rhythm from notes will help you isolate the problem. Much like with any problem in a piece of music, isolating it makes it easier to focus on.
Use a metronome. Once you know the rhythm and can play it while counting out loud, try using a metronome. Then you can push this further by using the metronome only on beats 2 and 4, or once per bar to strengthen your inner pulse.
Loop small rhythm fragments. Don’t attempt a full section straight away. Take the difficult rhythm, isolate it, and repeat it until it feels natural.
Use words or phrases to represent the rhythm. Singing the rhythm with syllables (“cold cup of tea”) can help you play complex sections.
Rhythm is a fundamental component of music and isn’t something that you “fix later” once the notes are learned. It has to be practiced deliberately from the start.
Rhythm is much harder to learn than notes because it’s invisible and abstract, but it’s also the backbone of music. If you practice it as deliberately as you train your fingers or note reading, then your playing will immediately sound more confident, more musical, and more pleasing to listen to.
Matthew Cawood
(This is from my “Monday Music Tips“ weekly email newsletter. Join my mailing list to be emailed with future posts.)