Matthias Rieger: Some Remarks about 'Speed'
from a Belly-Dance-Drummers Point of View

When I got the invitation for this conference about 'speed', I was first a little bit at a loss how to speak about it in front of people, who came from all over the world, by car, train, or plane. This event, so I read in the program, should give scientists, designers and philosophers a chance 'to rub their brains'.

After a while, I decided to ask my drum teacher Ali for help. He is a good friend of mine, who has a long experience as a musician. For two years now, he workes hard to introduce me into the art of belly -dance drumming. After the weekly drum-lesson, I told him, that I was invited by the Netherlands Design Institute to speak about speed in Music. I planned to talk there about the introduction of the concept of speed into society.

I wanted to use the example of the metronome to demonstrate how speed came into music. This device was invented in 1812 by the Dutch technician Nicolaus Winkler, who lived in Amsterdam, maybe just round the corner of the place where I have to speak now. The plan for the little machine, designed to give the right speed for the performance of music was stolen by a German technician, named Nepomuk Maelzel, who patented Winkler's idea in Paris and London and commercialized it in 1816. The metronome is a technical device that by sounding regular beats at adjustable speed dictates to the musician the beat he has to follow. The mechanism based on the principle of the double pendulum, i.e. an oscillating rod with a weight at each end, the upper weight being movable along a scale. A clockwork maintains the motion of the rod and provides the ticking sound, every beginner to music knows so well. By adjusting the movable weight along the axis, the pendulums swing, and the ticking can be made slower or faster. An indication in a musical score that some note-value is to be performed at M. M. (Maelzel's Metronom) = 80, for example, means that the pendulum oscillates from one side to the other (and ticks) eighty times per minute and that the note-value specified with the indication should be performed at the rate of eighty per minute.

Very interesting, Ali said. But, what do you think 'speed' could mean in music? What do those people want to talk about?

Well, I said, if I have understood them right, they want to figure out how one can reduce speed in society by creating new designs for a slower society. I guess that means something like reducing speed on highways from 120 to 90 kilometers per hour, or music, from 98 beats per minute to 60.

I explained to Ali, that I would try to illustrate the introduction of speed by the example of a discussion in the field of Musicology dealing with so called historical performance practice. This controversy started at the beginning of this century with the renaissance of baroque and classical music. Since then, opinions clash about the interpretation and use of metronome indications given by the composer. One party in this controversy argues, that classical music today is time performed too fast. They maintain this to be so because of the general acceleration of all aspects of modern life since the invention of the railroad. They suggest to cut in half the indications of the scores, from 120 to 60 beats per minute, for example. Let me call them 'slobbies', taking the cue from economists who have created the term for 'slower but better performing people'. The other party insists on performing the music in exactly the tempo indicated in the score. This is the only way to get the 'original' sound.

Ah, Ali interupted me, I understand. Porsche and beetle drivers reflecting on music. One of the first composers who gave metronome indications was Ludwig van Beethoven. He was a friend of Maelzel and tried to support the introduction of the metronome in Germany. But Beethoven was utterly shocked when he listened to the first performances of his music, following his metronome indications. M. M.'s did not work. He decided to change them several times. Finally, and he was not the only composer, he came to the conclusion, that the usage of measured tempo makes no sense in music.

But, I intervened, didn't we both use a metronome for my first belly-dance drumming performance? It was the best way for me to get the exact speed for the dancer.

Well, Ali replied, you had nearly no experience about belly-dance at that time. Otherwise you would have never agreed to follow a technical device instead of your certainty of the right, the appropriate, the good way to perform. This certainty arises out of the interaction between the experience of the dancer and your own.

As you can imagine, I was disturbed by Ali`s remarks. I decided not only to continue my two daily hours of practice. I also wanted to figure out how in the history of western music musicians found the right tempo for their performance. Thus, I started to do some research on the history of tempo in music.

One week later I called Ali and invited him for a cup of tea in order to continue our conversation. He said that he was delighted and promised to come along this time with a friend. Her name was Abla. She was a belly dancer, wo had worked with Ali for a long time. After they had arrived I prepared some good turkish tea, brought some sweets and we began to chat.

Well, Ali - I started our conversation - you really set me thinking with your remarks on the metronome and music. Therefore, I looked into the history of western music, because I wanted to figure out how musicians in the past thought about musical tempo. You can hardly imagine my surprise, when I found out that until the nineteenth century the musical tempo was always provoked by the setting, a special event, a place, a type of work or action. Worksongs are related to the rythm of the work, the tempo of dance music to the acoustic of the place and, of course, to the mood of the dancers and musicians.

The need for some kind of tempo-indication began to be felt only in the beginning of the seventeenth century. Composers started to use italian time-words like adagio ('at ease'), allegro ('cheerful') or presto ('quick'). However, these time-words did then not refer to a measured time which could be expressed by units per minute. They were at the same time indications of the mood, of the spirit or character of the piece. Carl Philip Emanuel Bach wrote in the middle of the eighteenth century in his Versuch Åber die wahre Art das Clavier zu spielen: 'The tempo of a piece, which is usually indicated by a variety of familiar Italian terms, is derived from its general mood together with the fastest notes and passages which it includes. Propper attention to these consideration will prevent an Allegro from being hurried and an Adagio from being dragged.'

I then took a look at the writings on dance. And, there again, I understood that it simply does not make sense to compare the tempi of different kinds of dances. A sarabande is not faster or slower than a menuette or a waltz. It is simply a sarabande and you should perform it like a sarabande has to be performed. They all have their own character which you cannot simply reduce to an indicated mechanical time.

The first machine to measure musical tempo was invented in 1698, long after the first pendulum clock had been built in France. This machine called 'ChronomÇtre' was invented by the french music theorist tienne Loulie and was still famous in the eighteenth century. It was very expensive and almost two metres high, and it was used only by some scientists, music theorists and few musicians. Even after Winkler had invented a much smaller and easier to handle version, the metronome was not important for most musicians. Only with the commercialisation of the metronome by Maelzel and the support by famous composers like Beethoven, the metronome became the instrument for measuring musical tempo.

Although the metronome became common in the beginning of the early nineteenth century, other non-technical ways to give hints for the right tempo. One was the use of the musician's pulse as a measure. This method was mentioned first in the sixteenth century by an italian monk named Zaccini, who gave a brief description of measuring time with the pulse in his Prattica di Musica. The then famouse flautist Johann Joachim Quantz wrote in his Versuch einer Anleitung die Flîte traverse zu spielen the following marvelous sentence: 'One would like to make certain, of this: take as a basis the pulse of a cheerful and healthy person of hot-tempered and careless disposition, or, if one may be permitted to say so, of a person with a choleric temperament, after lunch, towards evening. Then one will have selected the correct one. A depressed, sad, or cold -blooded and sluggish person might take the tempo of every piece somewhat more briskly than his pulsation.'

But all these methods of measuring the tempo were mostly used by music pupils, dilletants, people who had not much experience, like young belly-dance-drummers today. These were crutches to get an idea of the appropriate tempo. Quantz, who discribed the method of pulse measurement also wrote: 'If one has practiced this for some time , than gradually the mind will become so familiar with the tempi that it will not be necessary to consult the pulse.' And Leopold Mozart, at this very same time, went even a step further. For him, knowing the appropriate tempo out of experience, not by using a technical device, was the main qualification for being a musician.

This is very interesting, Ali said to me with a sly smile. Come on, take your drum and let us try to reflect on the concept of 'speed' with the help of Abla. Take your drum and just play a simple rythm. Abla will dance with you. See if can get the right tempo with the help of the metronome.

So I adjusted the metronome at 60 minims per minute and started to play. I immediatly recognized that something was wrong. Abla moved, but not at ease. She really had difficulties in following my drumming. Drum and dancer did not harmonize.

Stop, Ali shouted, you are wrong. Yes, I know, I said. It seems to me that Abla just started to hate me. Shall I play it a little bit slower or faster? No, Ali replied, you should not play faster or slower, you should play right. But I played exact minims=60, I answered.

I know, Ali said. Following the machine is the best way to play exact, which also means to bee always wrong. There cannot be a fit, as long as you look at Abla from the machine's point of view. If I have understood you right, Matthias, this is exactly what the people at the conference in Amsterdam have in mind, when they are reflecting on speed in society. Try it again without the metronome and just concentrate on Abla.

Thus I took my drum again and started to play. It was not easy, but after a time and with the help of Abla I found the right groove, the appropriate tempo. It fitted. I think I got it, I said to Ali with a little bit of pride in my voice.

Yeah, he said, if you continue to practice very hard for ten or twelfe years, you may still make it.

It was getting late and Abla and Ali had to go. Ali I said, I still have to speak to these people in Amsterdam. Well, Ali replied, try to look at it from a belly-dance-drummers point of view.