Irregular Rhythms - Paul Boizot

VENUE WANTED for residential Circle Dance events, particularly interested in New Year booking. Ideally Midlands/North, must have uncarpeted room which can take 20 (preferably more) in a circle for dancing and be reasonably priced. Self-catering preferred.

IRREGULAR RHYTHMS

This is an adaptation of a handout I use for my "Drumming (or Playing) Irregular Rhythms" workshop. It is fairly basic and not comprehensive, e.g. no country of origin of individual dances is given, as it is aimed at helping people play rhythms rather than at giving background information. I am also available to run workshops on beginners' drumming (darabuka or dumbek - not African drumming on djembes).

These assymetric rhythms mostly come from Bulgaria, Macedonia, Serbia, with some also from Albania, Greece, Romania and Armenia. The 10/8 is from Armenia and Turkey. In a one-off session for "irregular beginners" I mainly focus on the 7/8 Lesnoto rhythm, with maybe a quick look at the 9/8 Karsilama and the 11/8 Kopanica.

Rhythms with a count of over 13 or maybe 15 are often thought of as composites of 2 shorter rhythms, e.g Sandansko Oro 22/8 is like 9/8 plus 13/8; there are dances in 25/8 made up of 7/8+7/8+11/8.

Please note; the names given are of dances, but the same name can sometimes refer to a piece of music, or the rhythm itself, or all of those! Compare waltz, jig, foxtrot... A dance or rhythm may also have different names in different regions; and some dances are done to more than one rhythm. And some different dances have the same name. Is that clear?

SPELLINGS some accented Slavic letters may not display properly in all browsers - particularly c with caron or haček (like a little hat on top of the letter, as in "haček"!), pronounced "ch" in English, s with haček, pronounced "sh" and z with haček, pronounced "zh" as in English "leisure". It may depend on your language settings and what fonts you have installed. Or maybe it doesn't...

Transliterations of names from the Cyrillic alphabet, e.g. for Bulgarian, can vary - so Latin spelling is not always consistent.

RHYTHM	BREAKS DOWN AS;	EXAMPLES
MOST COMMON CURRENTLY IN UK CIRCLE/INTERNATIONAL FOLK DANCING
5/16	2+3	Pajduška.
7/8	3+2+2	Lesnoto, Ajde Jano, Baba Djurdja, Makedonsko Devojče, Ivanice, Dobra Nevesto, Kalamatiano, Jovano Jovanke, Tino Mori, Karamfil, Šar Planina, Sarakina Ormena (not 5/8 as previously posted).
7/8	2+2+3	Račenitsa, Geamparalele.
9/8	2+2+2+3	Karsilama, Lalica, Sfarlis, Svornato, Saxofon Kolo, Samokovsko (aka Devetorka, Šareni Čorapi),
10/8 "curcuna"	3+2+2+3	Mombar, Ooseke Gookas, Armenian Shuffle, Basamian Bar, Agir Halay, Yeni Hamam.
11/8	2+2+3+2+2	Gankino Horo, Osogovka, Kopanitsa, Krivo Horo, Krivata.
SOME OTHERS
5/8	3+2	Hora Femeilor
5/8	2+3	Joc la Sînziene
9/8	2+3+2+2	Gul Dali, Fatiše Kolo, Struga.
9/8	2+2+2+1+2	Tamzara
12/8	3+2+2+3+2	Beranče, Levendikos, Kucano, Pusteno.
15/16	(2+2+2+2)+(3+2+2)	Bučimiš
18/16	(2+2+3+2+2)+(3+2+2)	Zelenikovka/Balada Za Angele
22/8	(2+2+2+3)+(2+2+2+3)+2+2	Sandansko Oro
SYNCOPATED REGULAR RHYTHMS
2/4	3+3+2	Basic Čoček rhythm.

Fatiše Kolo; fatise, fatice (misspellings).
Geamparalele; Geampara is singular, Geamparale is plural, and the extra "le" on the end in "Geamparalele" is the definite article.
Karsilama; karshilma
Kopanitsa; kopanica
Račenitsa; račenica, ručenica, ručenitsa
Sînziene; sinziene, sânziene

LINKS TO OTHER IRREGULAR RHYTHMS WEBSITES
Balkan and Middle Eastern Dance Rhythms at Ethnic Dance Chicago. Has a few Real Audio examples. LINK UPDATED 09.04.07
Balkan Rhythms at the Planet Synteza website. Good basic explanation of the principle behind these rhythms, with some examples of names of rhythms and their associated meter.
The Bulgarian irregular beats (asymmetric measures) at Vesselka's site. Has a few links to sites where you can hear examples. LINK NOT WORKING - SITE UNAVAILABLE 01.06.05
Weird Metronome is a Windows program which beats out time using Midi hardware present in most sound cards. It plays measures of length up to 1000 beats, with totally customizable emphasis of beats. David Johnston wrote it to fill the needs of the eastern European folk music community.
See also my LINKS for general International Folk Dance - including dance notes - , Circle Dance and music sites.

OTHER DANCE AND MUSIC PAGES
MP3 SOUND FILES of Cosmo Kolo and of myself, Helen O and Bob Minney.
DANCE & MUSIC main page - inc. details of what I play, bands and workshops available.
EVENTS - details of local dance groups, dance days, residentials, etc.
LYRICS to some Circle and International Folk dances.
A collection of Circle Dance ARTICLES.

All content on this site COPYRIGHT Paul Boizot 2002-2007 unless otherwise stated, either on the visible webpage or in HTML. Use without permission for commercial gain is not acceptable.

I HAVE RELOCATED TO YORK. Mail will be forwarded and phone messages picked up from my Sheffield address. I will continue to be available to teach in Sheffield at certain times.