Funk & R&B · hip-hop / neo-soul · 4/4 swing

Dilla swung sixteenths

88 bpm Loop: all
triplets
Kick
Snare
Hi-hat
Piano
Bass

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Dilla time — the J Dilla / D'Angelo "Voodoo" feel: a hip-hop beat whose sixteenths are swung. A straight sixteenth grid is 0, 0.25, 0.5, 0.75 of a beat; here the "e" and "a" are dragged to the triplet positions 0, 0.333, 0.5, 0.833 — the "a" lands a twelfth of a beat late, so the kicks on the "a" of 1 and the "e" of 3 lean back while the snare on 2 and 4 stays put. The hat plays every swung sixteenth so you can hear the lope; the kick plays 1, the dragged "a" of 1, the "and" of 2, the dragged "e" of 3 and the "and" of 3.

The Rhodes holds a major seventh and re-strikes it on the dragged "a" of 2 and beat 4; the bass lands on the same dragged positions.

Listen for the hat: straight sixteenths march, swung sixteenths limp. Dilla's own drag sat between straight and triplet; the triplet grid is the honest notation of it. Compare boom-bap (same drums, straight). Practice: count "1 e-and-a" with the "e" and "a" late and let the snare be the only thing exactly in time.

Sources

  • standard practice; no transcribed source

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