Polyrhythm Metronome: Hear and See 3 Against 2

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The second number, the pulse. In 3:2 at 60 BPM the two plays once a second, and the three is spread evenly across the same two seconds. Pick 2:3 instead to make the three the beat.

3:2, then 2:3 (the same rhythm with the beat on the other layer), then 4:3 and 3:4. After those, 5:4, 5:3 and 7:4 test whether you really hear both pulses or have only memorised the pattern.

Start slowly, around 50 to 60 BPM. Mute one layer and play it yourself with the other hand or a foot, then swap. Put the pulse on the bass drum or hi-hat foot and the cross rhythm on the snare or ride. When it feels steady, mute both layers for a few cycles and unmute them to check you held it.

Because 2 divides 4 evenly: every note of the two lands on a note of the four, so you hear one rhythm with accents rather than two pulses against each other. In a true polyrhythm, such as 3:2, 4:3 or 7:4, the counts share no common factor, so the layers only meet at the start of each cycle.

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A polyrhythm is two or more even pulses played at the same time, where neither divides evenly into the other. In 3:2, three evenly spaced notes fill exactly the time of two beats: the layers start together, drift apart and meet again at the start of the next cycle. Write it on a grid the size of the least common multiple (6 cells for 3:2, 12 for 4:3, 20 for 5:4) and every note of both layers lands on a cell, which is how drummers learn to count one.

Count six even pulses: 1 2 3 4 5 6. The two plays on 1 and 4, the three on 1, 3 and 5, so together you hear 1, 3, 4, 5. Many teachers say it as "not dif-fi-cult", one syllable per note. Say it until it is a single rhythm, then split it between your hands: right hand on the three, left hand on the two. Once it is steady, stop counting six and feel the two as the beat while the three floats across it as a quarter-note triplet. 2:3 is the same rhythm with the roles swapped, so the three becomes the beat.

Count twelve. The three plays on 1, 5 and 9, the four on 1, 4, 7 and 10, and together they make 1, 4, 5, 7, 9, 10, which fits the phrase "pass the gol-den but-ter". Learn it slowly with the grid, then feel it in 3/4: the three is the beat and the four is a run of dotted eighth notes across the bar. Turn it round to 3:4 and the four becomes the beat, with the three spread evenly over a bar of 4/4.

3:2 runs through West African and Afro-Cuban music, where a 6/8 bell pattern is felt against both the dotted-quarter pulse and the quarter-note pulse at once. Jazz drummers such as Elvin Jones lay three over two and four over three across the bar line. Chopin's Fantaisie-Impromptu sets four notes in one hand against three in the other, and 5:4 and 7:4 turn up in fusion and progressive music. Practising them sharpens your time, because you have to hold two pulses at once without letting either one pull the other.

No. The free tools need no account and no download. They run in your browser, and nothing you play or drop in is uploaded.

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