Salsa’s Manifestation - Ear Training

A definition for “dance”
(from http://www.dictionary.com/):

Tumbao Moderno
The word tumbao is derived from the Spanish verb tumbar meaning: “to knock out” (see http://www.diccionarios.com/), hence a conguero or conguera “knocks out” a rhythm on the drum. The tumbao moderno is commonly found in salsa, and can be loosely translated as the “modern rhythm”.

Originally Yoruban (from modern day Nigeria), the tumbao moderno is played on tall hand drums called congas or tumbadoras. The drums themselves hail from the Bantu people of modern day Congo. The modern rhythm is played by a single drummer, and was formed by the amalgamation of two older rhythms.
 

Role of the open tones

Here's a familiar scenario:
Imagine a class full of salsa dancers, learning to dance to time. Music is playing and the instructor is vocalising a count over it, indicating the dance cycle:

“One — Two — Three — Four —, One — Two —…”

Every time the count swings back to "one", the more experienced dancers cope with the beginning of the cycle, whilst the newer students struggle to hit the beat.

Why does this happen?
The new dancers are reacting to the count of “One”. They wait to hear it, process it, and then issue their bodies with the command to move. By the time movement is effected, it's late.

The experienced dancers have learned to anticipate the count of “One”. They compensate for the time lag by issuing instructions to move before the count of one.

So how does this relate to the tumbao moderno?
The start of the dance cycle occurs just after the open tones. To put it another way, the open tones of the tumbao moderno anticipate the start of the dance cycle. By listening for them and preparing to move after they sound, you are letting the open tones cue your movement.

Figure 1.1. Open tones of the tumbao moderno

The period of step inactivity in salsa is not only important for calibrating your timing, it also constitutes a crucial part of the “dancer-as-percussionist”—rhythm dynamic. Think of it as a “call-and-response” pattern: for every call of the conga in the form of two open tones, you respond with three steps.

The plot so far
At the end of our first two tutorials, we have:
 

Figure 2.1. Locating the Slap stroke

Fault tolerance
Strictly speaking, fault tolerance means an ability to cope with error, but I would like to extend it to include “being able to continue functioning under sub-optimal conditions”. Timing your second step to coincide with the slap helps you to do just that.

• Let's take as an example, three possible classes of time interval between each step: one that is accurately one beat long, one that is faster (by 5%), and one that is slower (by 5%).
• Let's also take into account whether a partner is dancing with the first step aligned with beat one, or the second step aligned with the slap stroke.
• To keep things crude and simple, let's assume that the steps are of uniform duration within each class.

Figure 2.2. Fault Tolerance

Looking at the steps aligned with beat 1, we can see that the error accumulates such that, by the third step, the error in duration is doubled.

Looking at the steps aligned with beat 2, we can see that each error is pushed to its respective edge of the step cluster, preventing them from accumulating i.e. an error in the first step is located to the start of the first step; an error in the third step is located to the end of the third step. These errors are absorbed by the nul beat of the double open tones where they cause the least harm.

If you really must know…
We can also gauge the net difference in timing (%) between partners with dissimilar step durations:

• Both aligned to 1
  Acc. // Fast: 0, 5, 10
  Acc. // Slow: 0, 5, 10
  Fast // Slow: 0, 10, 20
   
• One partner aligned to 1, the other to 2
  Acc. // Fast: 5, 0, 5
  Acc. // Slow: 5, 0, 5
  Fast // Slow: 5, 5, 15
  Fast // Acc.: 0, 5, 10
  Slow // Acc.: 0, 5, 10
  Slow // Fast: 5, 5, 15
   
• Both aligned to 2
  Acc. // Fast: 5, 0, 5
  Acc. // Slow: 5, 0, 5
  Fast // Slow: 10, 0, 10

Therefore the maximum net difference where:

1. both partners are calibrated to beat 1 is 20%;
2. one partner is calibrated to beat 2 is 15%;
3. both partners are calibrated to beat 2 is 10%.

It is the maximum net difference that's crucial. Dancers tolerate a certain amount of variance between themselves and their partner. As a matter of fact it's often desirable to have some variance since it adds colour to a partnership - try dancing to a metronome and you'll understand. So long as the net difference remains below a threshold level, a couple can re-establish dance synchrony during the double open tones. However if the net difference exceeds this level, partnerships will fail to re-establish synchrony.

Having at least one partner calibrated to the slap stroke (i.e. you) reduces the maximum net difference, and therefore increases fault tolerance. Ideally your step duration would be accurate as well, and that is a topic we shall address in due course.

Before we get underway, here's a word to the wise:
For the listening practices to follow, try to listen to the rhythm in its entirety, and try to listen without expectation.

You see, learning about clave is much anticipated amongst the most intelligent, committed, and ambitious of dancers. They understand clave's relevance in the music, and therefore in dancing. The urgency they feel, to find meaning in the rhythm immediately is often a hindrance. In looking at the details, they get so immersed that they lose perspective of the complete rhythm.

The practices below are designed to help you side-step that pitfall - as long as you free your mind from expectation. Learning and internalising clave is a process of weeks, not days, so take your time and you will be amply rewarded for your patience.

Now I hope you're sitting comfortably.

Listening Practice
 
Acclimatising to Clave

• Listen to the track son_clave_only_165bpm.mp3 (7.3 Mb)
• Keep your mind clear and let the rhythm flow over you.
• Stay with it until you're comfortable with the rhythm and relaxed in its presence.
• Take your time.

Actualising the Clave

• Now imagine there's someone standing on a stage in front of you, with a set of clave in his or her hands.
• Visualise the person on stage playing the clave, creating and producing the sound you're listening to.
• Fill in the details of the image to include the timing and movement of his or her hands.
• If the image is wearing a frown of concentration, give him or her a look of enjoyment instead.
• Imagine the person's hands reproducing the rhythm effortlessly.

Personalising the Clave

• Imagine that the person standing on the stage wears your clothes and has your face - imagine that the person is you.
• Imagine your image playing the clave smoothly, effortlessly, accurately.

Realising Clave

• Stand up and get a couple of pens or pencils (or clave if you have them), one in each hand.
• Face your image and imagine you're looking into a mirror.
• Play clave with your image, keeping in time with your mirror-self and the rhythm.
• Smile.
• Stay relaxed, and let your mirror image gradually fade away.
• Keep playing.

The rhythm will resolve itself into a pattern consisting of two close-together strokes, and three evenly-spaced slower strokes. Something like:

click-click,  click…click…click

or the other way around,

click…click…click,  click-click

(Don't be concerned if the clave pattern remains unresolved, the next practice will soon clear that up.)

Resist the temptation to find your place in the rhythm, like where the "one" should be. For now, just accept the clave as it is - a rhythmic stream in which you are floating freely and un-anchored.
 

Rhythm Principles

Clave Rhythm Stream
The clave rhythm stream that you've been immersed in has two parts, consisting of: two close-together beats (called the 2-side); and three evenly-spaced slower beats (called the 3-side), repeating in alternation.

Figure 4.1. Clave rhythm stream
(Click on the diagram for a larger version)
 

To help you resolve and understand the two parts of the rhythm stream more clearly, we're going to enlist your Latin Basic for help.

Play the track: tumbao_with_clave_154bpm.mp3 (4.2 Mb)

Paying attention to the conga pattern only, begin dancing the Latin basic.

Once you're comfortably into the flow of things, start listening to the clave.

You'll discover that on one half of the basic the clave will sound twice, and on the other half the clave will sound thrice. You'll find yourself doing one of two things:-

Thing 1: stepping forward on the 3-side and back on the 2-side; or
Thing 2: stepping forward on the 2-side and back on the 3-side.
 

The Clave Phrase
A full clave phrase comprises five beats: one dose of 2-side and one dose of 3-side. It can start with the 3-side followed by the 2-side (called 3-2 clave); or it can start with the 2-side followed by the 3-side (called 2-3 clave).

So if you found yourself doing Thing 1 above, you would've been dancing in 3-2 clave; if you found yourself doing Thing 2, then you would've been dancing in 2-3 clave.

As you can gather, a single clave phrase spans two bars (or measures) of music and salsa's basic steps and dance patterns reflect this. Whether you dance in 3-2 or 2-3 depends solely on where you decide to enter the clave stream: on the 3-side or the 2-side respectively. (See below)

Figure 4.2. Entering the clave rhythm stream on 2-side or 3-side
(Click on the diagram for a larger version)
 

Orientation in the stream
As you can see and hear, the clave phrase takes one of two possible orientations or "directions":

• 3-2 orientation / direction, sometimes called the forward direction
• 2-3 orientation / direction, sometimes called the reverse direction

The terms "forward", "reverse" and "direction" are commonly used when describing clave, but it is important for you to be aware that these words are neutral i.e. they have no positive or negative connotations attached to them - the forward direction is no more "correct" or "better" than the reverse direction.

For that reason, I prefer to use the word "orientation".

Traditional percussionists would start by teaching clave in the 3-2 orientation, but I encounter more success introducing the 2-3 clave first. Also, the 2-3 orientation predominates in salsa as of this writing. The take-home message is that you should be fluent in both orientations of the clave phrase.

Now let's proceed to get the feel of clave orientation deeper ingrained.
 

Salsa Practices

Exercise 4.1
Practice your Latin basic to tumbao_with_clave_165bpm.mp3 (4.2 Mb)

Determine which orientation you're in relative to the forward step
e.g. if you're stepping forward on the 2-side, then you're in 2-3 clave.

Notice that you're always stepping forward on the same side throughout the track. This feature of clave functions as a rhythmic compass, helping dancers back into partnership dancing after performing solos or "shines". (See Extras.)

Also notice that the 2-side and the 3-side each have distinct feels.
(The next tutorial in the series will provide an explanation for this.)

Exercise 4.1.1
Still with the Latin basic and the same track, practice entering the clave stream on different sides.

Aim to be ambidextrous - able to enter the clave stream and dance in either orientation at will.

Ask yourself, "Does the Latin basic feel different in the different orientations?"

Exercise 4.1.2
Repeat the two exercises above, substituting all the remaining basics.

Get a feel for each side of the clave e.g. how does the turn in the Single Right Turn feel on the 3-side as compared to the 2-side? That will help you with the next stage, which is to increase your feel for the effect of clave orientation on the entire basic.

Exercise 4.1.3
Practice all the exercises above to different speeds.

As a general rule, the clave feel tends to be less pronounced at the extremes of the tempo range; dissipating at lower tempi and compressing at the higher tempi.

You could get a better understanding of this phenomenon using the salsa walk instead of the basics.

Exercise 4.1.4
Change your orientation mid-way through the track.

You can do so by: holding still for one bar of music, or dancing an even number of steps in one bar e.g. stepping on pulse (2 steps), or stepping on every beat (4 steps).

This practice is especially useful in reducing your reaction time to orientation changes in the music, particularly live music. It also provides valuable insight into how salsa musicians reorientate in the clave stream.

Polyrhythmic dancers
The best dancers are polyrhythmic by nature, commanding a minimum of three rhythm streams in mind and body, for example: the standard foot pattern, pulse in the torso, and mentally phrasing to clave. The ability to maintain several rhythm streams, allowing them to interact without distorting each other is called rhythmic independence.

Why would you want that?
Polyrhythmic dancing and independence are key to timing accuracy and rhythmic phrasing, (see next tutorial). It helps you become more receptive to new music, more responsive to live music, and to express your interpretation of music freely.

The next exercise begins your development as a polyrhythmic dancer, blurring the distinction between dancer and drummer in the finest Afro-Cuban tradition.

Exercise 4.2
Play the track: tumbao_with_clave_154bpm.mp3 (4.2 Mb)
(or a slower if necessary.)

Perform the Cucaracha basic to the conga tumbao, ignoring the clave for the moment.

Once in the flow of things, start listening for the clave and determine your orientation.

Keeping your legs moving to the cucaracha, start clapping the clave. Apart from developing rhythmic independence, this is a good test for how well you've naturalised the basic. If your basics are rock solid, you'd just need to concentrate on the clave rhythm and leave your feet to get on with their thing.

If your clave timing is spot on, the sound made by the clapping of your hands will mask perfectly the sound of the clave on the track.

Practice this exercise using all the salsa basics until you can maintain clave even whilst switching basics including salsa walks.
 

Stroke Accuracy and Alignment
Below is a figure of how the son clave rhythm aligns relative to the tumbao moderno and your own dance rhythm.

Figure 4.3. Son 2-3 clave relative to tumbao moderno and step rhythm

On the 2-side:

• the first beat coincides with the conga slap stroke and your second step;
• the second beat coincides with your third step.

On the 3-side:

• the first beat coincides with your first step;
• the third beat, called the ponche, coincides with the first conga open tone;
• the second beat, called the bombó, falls in between your second and third steps, and is exactly in the middle of the first and third stokes.

The bombó is probably the most important beat in the clave phrase (for reasons that will become clear soon). It's also quite challenging to align correctly, however if you've been playing the clave 3-side with three even strokes, your bombó should be very much in place. If you have doubts or would like an exercise to ensure the stability of your bombó, there's one waiting for you in Extras.

Exercise 4.4
This one's called "Bring your own clave", and I think you can already guess what's coming next.

Using any "tumbao moderno without clave" track that you're comfortable with, dance the salsa walk and play clave. This is a great test of your command of clave and rhythmic independence.

Variations of this exercise to develop your independence and feel for clave simultaneously are:

• play just the 2-side;
• play just the 3-side;
• play four of the five strokes (your choice which four);
• play three of the five strokes (your choice again, and so on);
• play the whole rhythm accenting the bombó;
• play the whole rhythm accenting the ponche;
• play the whole rhythm, accenting one or more strokes of your choice e.g. bombó and ponche.

Exercise 4.5
This is what you've been working toward.

Identify tracks in your collection where clave is played. Most of them will be son clave, so pick those.

Clap to it. Dance while playing it. Absorb it until you can feel the push and pull of the clave stream sweeping you along the course of the song.

Enjoy it, and we'll talk more about the ebb and flow of clave in the next tutorial.
 

Core Conclusions

• Clave is a continuous flowing rhythm stream of two rhythmic units in alternation.
• The rhythmic units or "cells" are called 2-side and 3-side.
• A clave phrase contains one dose of 2-side and one dose of 3-side. A clave phrase is thus two bars long.
• The clave phrase comes in two flavours or "orientations": 2-3 clave and 3-2 clave.
• The salsa basic steps are two bars long, and are the physical manifestation of the clave phrase.
• The salsa walk is of indeterminate length and is the physical manifestation of the clave rhythm stream.

Navigating Salsa: Clave as Rhythmic Compass
Previously, I had mentioned that clave "functions as a rhythmic compass, helping dancers back into partnership dancing after performing solos". One of clave's properties is a mechanism that allows percussionists, and that includes dancers, a means to locate and orientate themselves rapidly in the clave rhythm stream. To understand how, let's look at a graphical representation of one phrase of son clave rhythm, tumbao moderno, and dance rhythm.

If we were to take the 3-side and overlay it on the 2-side:

Figure 4.4. Putting 3-side over 2-side
 

We would get:
 

Figure 4.5. 3-side over 2-side (son clave)
 

Notice that none of the beats in the clave line match up; so we can say that the two sides of the phrase are not super-imposable. Therefore hearing just one clave beat in any given bar of music will tell you which side you're in. For example if you heard:

you would know you were on the 2-side; or,

you would recognise yourself as being on the 3-side.

Having an innate feel for clave allows you, the dancer, to navigate through particularly tricky passages of music, or come back into synchrony with a partner after soloing. Once you've learned salsa's dance pattern to the tumbao moderno, aligning 4 of clave's 5 beats is fairly straight-forward. The remaining beat, the bombó, deserves a little more attention.

Bombó Stability
The bombó plays a crucial role in making salsa's rhythms as captivating as they are. It's located on the upbeat in between the second and third steps. If you're used to counting time, it's between beats 2 and 3 (the and of beat 2, written as 2+); or between beats 6 and 7 (written as 6+), depending on clave orientation. If you're not, this will become clear in the exercise afterwards.

Figure 4.8. Rhythmic location of the bombó
 

To the newly initiated, the position of the bombó on the upbeat is perceived as a point of rhythmic instability; and the general tendency when playing it, is to let it drift until it's late.

Figure 4.9. Drift of bombó to later in the 3-side cell
 

And it usually ends up coinciding with the third step...

Figure 4.10. Too late.., it's not a bombó anymore
 

The pattern is now super-imposable and the clave-literate will recognise the beat as belonging to the 2-side; generating no small amount of confusion and possibly an embarrasing tangle of legs. Bombó stability is the first mark of clave competence and can be achieved in two ways.

• Acquisition mode - dance and play to the "tumbao with clave tracks" paying particular attention to the bombó, until the sound of your clave masks perfectly that of the track;
• Learning mode - playing clave with the aid of a count (see below).
   

Learning to Play Clave
This is a hands-only practice and can be played on any flat-ish surface like a table top - my favourite is to use my thighs, as I take them everywhere. This exercise is written for dextral people, so if you're sinistral then just swap the "L"s and "R"s around.

1. The top line is the count, which you should vocalise as:
    
   "one, and, two, and, three, and, four, and, five, and, six, and, se'n, and, eight, and,.."
    
   (Note: the word "seven" is contracted to the monosyllabic "se'n")
    
2. The middle line is the clave pattern in 2-3 and has two symbols:
   the dot means play lightly with your fingertips;
   the asterisk means play firmly with your palm
    
3. The bottom line indicates which hand you should be using:
   L is for left, R is for right.
    

Things you should know
The fingertip strokes are called "ghost" strokes and act as placeholders so that your palm strokes are appropriately spaced apart. Without them, your clave strokes would tend to creep up to one another. The ghost strokes should be played more and more lightly as you become more proficient, until you don't need them anymore.

Your dominant hand plays the upbeats to draw your attention to them, and plays the bombó in particular. It gives the exercise a smooth balanced feel. Once you've done this a few times, try playing it sinistral as well. We'll be using variations of this practice again in future tutorials, so it would help to be ambidexterous. Remember to train yourself in the 3-2 orientation too.

This approach is less musical than the acquisition mode because you tend to expend more effort counting than listening to what you're playing. At least at first. Use the count as an aid, not a crutch. Develop your ear for the rhythm and move away from counting as soon as you are confidently able.
 

Seamless Dancing
…is the hallmark of the native dancer, and being mistaken for one is an outcome that many learned dancers aspire to. Learning from the ground up as we are, we have come to understand that a dance basic equates to one clave phrase. Putting clave phrases together end-to-end gives us the clave rhythm stream, right?

Nearly.

With this cellular approach, the mind still perceives an end and a beginning to a phrase, resulting in a mental hiccup or seam. A clave phrase is a single snapshot of the clave rhythm stream, and stringing all the snapshots together gives us a sense of movement but not of flow. You could try to overcome the hiccup by perceiving the seam as being in the middle of the clave phrase of the other orientation (see Figure 5) - and it works to a limited extent, although the mental overheads are high.

The elegant answer lies in placing the importance of the clave rhythm stream and its natural embodiment the salsa walk, above that of the clave phrase and the salsa basics. Thus, interpreting the clave phrase as simply a moment in the rhythm stream calls for a parallel reinterpretation of the salsa basics in terms of the walk.

For example:

The Latin basic can be reinterpreted as a forward-and-backward oscillation of the walk through a central point, somewhat like the swing of a pendulum. Likewise the Cucaracha can be thought of as a laterally oscillating walk. Retraining yourself to think in this way opens up interesting new opportunities; like the possibility of diagonal oscillations at 45 degrees or other angles.

The Single Right Turn can be reinterpreted into walking a full turn over three paces, and over four beats. No discrete angles (e.g. 90°/90°/180°; 0°/180°/180°) need be defined nor implied per step, as long as the turn is achieved. Neither does the turn need to be completed by the end of the third beat; your body can continue to turn during the conga open tones even after your third step has taken place.

The most significant advancement you can make into seamless dancing is to reinterpret mentally all your basics and combinations into the walk, and render your walk as continuous as the clave rhythm stream.

Having understood this, now is the time to return to the beginning of this tutorial and begin the process of reinterpretation.

Listening Practice
The general guidelines are to:

• learn, understand, and practice the exercises to any of the "son clave only" tracks;
• utilise the "son clave over tumbao moderno" tracks as an intermediary stage should you find an exercise hard to grasp;
• practice to salsa music once you're confident you understand and can perform the exercise well.

Have a number of salsa songs with played clave on hand, so that you can master these tutorial exercises in a real-world context: connect your ears to your feet.
 

Rhythm Principles
Previously we explored the nature of a rhythm on its own. We are now at the stage where we can explore how rhythms interact with one another using salsa's three fundamental streams: the son clave, the pulse and the dance rhythm. As your command of rhythm improves, so will your sensitivity to implied clave, and your appreciation for the role a dancer plays in establishing the feel of salsa.

This is as real as it gets - the raw essence of salsa, stripped of all its accoutrements. It's all about relationships; between one salsa rhythm and another, and you are one of salsa's rhythms.

Dancing to Clave

Exercise 5.1
Performing salsa dance rhythm to clave, acquired mode

Practice your salsa walk and your newly-interpreted salsa basics using a "son clave over tumbao moderno" track. In the earlier tutorials we relied on the tumbao moderno to dance in time, and now we want to transfer that to the clave instead.

Think of it as a set of balance scales tilted heavily toward the tumbao moderno in one weighing pan, with the clave rhythm in the other pan. We want to shift the weight of emphasis in the opposite direction to have the scales tilted in favour of the clave instead.

We can do this gradually by concentrating more and more on the clave, and less and less on the tumbao moderno; paying just enough attention to the conga to keep in time. I find that clapping my hands to clave helps. Eventually you should be able to dance to a "son clave only" track.

Exercise 5.2
Dancing pulse to clave, acquired mode

From dancing salsa steps to clave, all it takes is a minor modification to be able to dance pulse to clave as well. Using a "son clave over tumbao moderno" track, stand with your feet shoulder-width apart and mark salsa dance rhythm on the spot:

left - right - left - (open tones), right - left - right - (open tones)

Place more emphasis on the steps coinciding with the pulse:

left - right - left - (open tones), right - left - right - (open tones)

Change it to a pulse walk:

left - (slap) - right - (open tones), left - (slap) - right - (open tones)

Note: this is the reverse of how we assembled the salsa dance rhythm in "The Percussionist Dancer" tutorial.

Now start listening for the clave rhythm, deriving your timing from it until you can walk pulse and clap clave simultaneously.

Exercise 5.3
Dancing pulse to clave, learned mode

If you'd prefer to learn how to dance to clave using a count, then you'll need to familiarise yourself with the "Learning to Play Clave" exercise in Extras of the "son clave & the clave rhythm stream" tutorial.

This is the same exercise but with an additional alternating tap of the foot on pulse:

Figure 5.1. Playing son clave and pulse to a count
 

Develop the exercise by:

• lightening the ghost strokes until you're no longer playing them;
• then clapping clave;
• lifting up your feet up and placing them down again to simulate taking a step (instead of tapping);
• standing up and walking the pulse whilst playing clave.

Exercise 5.4
Performing salsa dance rhythm to clave, learned mode

Once you can step to pulse and clap to clave, create the salsa dance rhythm to clave using the same progression as in Exercises 3.4 through 3.6 of "The Percussionist Dancer".

Exercise 5.5
Alternate between the salsa dance pattern and the pulse steps, one clave phrase of each. I recommend you try the Side-To-Side basic and the salsa walks first.

This practice helps you appreciate the salsa dance rhythm and the pulse as separate rhythms, contrary to the common perception that pulse is simply a subset of the dance rhythm. It points out the effect of rhythmic dissipation - how the strong percussive feel of the pulse is reduced through the insertion of a step in-between, with a concomitant increase in flow.

Exercise 5.5.1
As above, but instead of using a whole clave phrase when dancing pulse, try an odd number of bars.

This exercise is set deliberately to throw you out of clave orientation, and for you to explore what you need to do to reorient yourself. Another variant of this exercise is to choose to dance just three of the four pulse steps in the space of a single clave phrase.

The Ultimate Clave Exercise
is such a definitive milestone of rhythmic ability that it gets its own heading.

1. Establish the clave rhythm stream through the clapping of your hands.
2. Perform the salsa dance rhythm and the pulse in alternation.
3. Test yourself by throwing yourself out of orientation and regaining it.
4. Do all of this without the use of a rhythm track.

This is the last word in 'bring your own clave' exercises. If you can do all this i.e. the changes in clave orientation, dancing and switching between different rhythms, all whilst maintaining a relentless clave stream, you can be sure your salsa timing's pretty much bullet-proof.
 

Rhythmic anticipation
happens when a beat is played before the listener expects it. A cyclic instance of rhythmic anticipation occurs when the son clave rhythm stream interacts with the pulse stream.

The regularity of the pulse, emphasised by elements in the music and the dance rhythm itself, causes a dancer's internal metronome to predict the temporal location of the upcoming pulse beat.

Figure 5.2. Point of rhythmic anticipation
 

When the clave rhythm stream is played with the pulse, the bombó occurs just before the pulse beat, causing the listener to feel as if he or she had incorrectly predicted the pulse beat as late. This psychoacoustic phenomenon creates a feeling of rhythmic tension on the 3-sides of the clave rhythm stream.

The clave rhythm stream's true nature is thus exposed as, 'a feeling alternating between tension (on the 3-side), and stability (on the 2-side).'

…tension | stability | tension | stability | tension | stability | tension…

At last we can understand the clave rhythm stream itself as a pulse stream of rhythmic tension cycling once every eight beats. Rhythmic tension is a phenomenon well recognised by Afro-Cuban percussionists, who refer non-pejoratively to the 3-side as "fuerte" (strong) and the 2-side as "débil" (weak).

And thus far, we have learned just how important it is that a dancer be able to discern clave location and orientation. So, having the same sensitivity to implied clave that a salsa musician has would be a handy little skill for a dancer.

Unfortunately, figuring out the orientation of clave is never foolproof, and even seasoned musicians get it wrong. The matter is made more complex by writers whom, like Arsenio Rodriguez, playfully try to confound the listener; or those who simply have a cavalier attitude to clave. The most practical way is to take a ''best guess-best fit' approach, which becomes more reliable the more skilled you become with rhythm:

• Locate the pulse stream
  It's a simple, internally regular pattern, and so it should be easier to find. Once you've located it, and since you know the position of clave relative to pulse, you've reduced the random chance of locating the clave stream to 1 in 4.
   
• Identify the boundaries of the musical phrase relative to the pulse.
  The beginning of each phrase should coincide with a pulse beat and be two bars long (i.e. contain four pulse beats). Identifying the eight beat phrase reduces the random chance of locating the clave stream to 1 in 2. It's now just a matter of orientation.
   
• Determine clave orientation
  I like to use the 'pocket analogy':
  Imagine there are five pockets in each phrase of music corresponding to where the clave strokes could be played, but we don't yet know whether these pockets are arranged in 2-3 or 3-2.
   
  So we take a shot, gamble on an orientation, and listen...
   
  If we're right, at least one or more of these pockets will be filled with accents from one or more instruments. If we're not sure, then we try it the other way. The pockets most likely to be filled are the first clave beat on the 2-side and the bombó, followed by the ponche.
   
  If you're really sharp, you can listen to the five pockets in a single bar for an instrument accent (principles explained in "Navigating Salsa: Clave as Rhythmic Compass"), and use the five pockets in the following bar for confirmation.
   
• Corroborate clave orientation
  Sometimes you're sure that you've got it right, sometimes you're not. At times like the latter, deduction just isn't enough. Set logic to one side, and feel for when the music pushes you earlier than expected. You'll recognise this as probably the point of rhythmic tension.

There are things that can help you to reduce the odds and get it right nearly every time. Some instrument patterns like the cáscara played on timbales are phrased, you can tell clave orientation from it. Others like the tumbao moderno, are the same every bar but have variations that are phrased to clave. That part of the story is picked up in Stage II, and more information on the instrument patterns themselves are available in the 'For Players' section.
 

Dancing a Percussive Counterpoint
You now have the skills you need to be able to produce the feel of salsa's tension and stability, simply by dancing counterpoint to what you hear. For example:

• when you hear the bongó bell beating out the pulse, all you have to do is think in clave and phrase your movements to your thoughts;
• when you feel the clave rhythm strongly, you know that you should stress pulse in your dance pattern.
   

CODA
So you've made it. Having successfully navigated these tutorials, you've finally reached the State of Independence as regards salsa rhythm. You can now recognise yourself as an autonomous dance unit, capable of embodying all three of salsa's fundamental rhythms.

If you've found these tutorials valuable, then I ask that you help others do so too, by emailing me with comments on the sections and concepts that you think could be more clearly explained.

May your new-found skills bring you years of enjoyment.

Rhythmic Triangulation
In the core section, we learned about clave's relationship with the pulse and how the rhythmic anticipation it generates contributes to the feel of salsa. And we investigated the nature of rhythmic interaction through maintaining two rhythm streams simultaneously; clave interpreted with the hands, and pulse or step rhythm through the lower body.

We're going to take that one stage further now, and investigate a three-way interaction. "What?!" I hear you exclaim (no, I haven't fallen off my trolley).

To do this, you'll need to have completed the Body Isolation: Chest, Front-to-Back exercise in the Dance-Skills Collection. The ultimate aim is to maintain the pulse rhythm stream in your chest, clave in your hands, and the step rhythm in your legs.

Figure 5.3. Three rhythm streams:
clave (hands), pulse (chest) and step rhythm (feet)
 

We build it up as follows:
[to tumbao tracks then salsa music, increasing in tempo]

• Chest interpreting pulse rhythm. Seated.
  Forward on pulse beats, backward on backbeats; then
  Backward on pulse beats, forward on backbeats.
   
• Chest interpreting pulse rhythm; hands playing clave rhythm. Seated.
  Feel for rhythmic anticipation. Once that's established, focus on establishing the tension-stability cycle.
   
• Chest interpreting pulse rhythm; hands playing clave rhythm. Standing.
  Reduce the chest action to a small 'tic'.
   
• Chest interpreting pulse rhythm; hands playing clave rhythm; legs interpreting salsa step rhythm.
  Primary goal of this exercise:
  the individual's "State of Independence".
   
• Optional:
  Chest interpreting pulse rhythm; mentally playing clave rhythm; legs interpreting salsa step rhythm.
  This is the 'real-world' context. You'd probably be dancing with a partner, and so need to have your hands free.

As you achieve mastery, you'll realise that the clave and pulse streams mutually stabilise each other, and that they in turn strengthen the step rhythm stream. I've described this phenomenon as rhythmic triangulation, where the step rhythm stream is calibrated to two interlocking reference points improving its temporal accuracy.

Rhythmic triangulation affords you a tremendous freedom to interpret the music through the use of rhythmic breaks, exclamations and interjections, safe in the knowledge that you could reassert your place in time at will.
 

You CAN dance forever
Once you can properly place the position of pulse, clave and step rhythm, you can dance forever. For as long as both rhythms continue to be central to Afro-Cuban music, they will remain as baseline points of reference. From these you can learn to dance, aided by rhythmic triangulation, to as yet uncreated rhythms - any new instrument or instrument pattern can be recognised, learned, and known.

For example, should you come across a conga player articulating a tumbao you've not come across before, so long as you can work out the clave orientation using one or more of the other instruments, you can understand and learn the clave relationship of the new tumbao. The more instrument patterns you can recognise, the more likely you are to work out the clave orientation quickly and definitely.

You can look forward to every new encounter, every new piece of music, with excitement; secure in your ability to cope with whatever Afro-Cuban music can throw at you.

Nearly. It would be good if you knew the rumba clave too.
(I love cliff-hangers)

1. Clave orientation indicated by a single drum

Listen to the track:

Tumbao moderno with clave orientation, one drum, 154 bpm (2.9Mb)

This is similar to the tumbao moderno you've been using with one exception; the pattern alternates between a double open tone and a single open tone. The single open tone emphasises the ponché of the son clave 3-side. Therefore, the double open tones are played on the 2-side, and the single open tone on the 3-side.

Figure 6.1 Son clave orientation indicated by single conga

This pattern puts a lot of rhythmic weight on the ponché, and opens up quite a large pocket to use in the absence of the second open tone. You can get a sense of how strongly the ponché is emphasised when you listen to the tumbao variation in conjunction with the played son clave:

Son clave over tumbao moderno with clave orientation (conga), 154 bpm (2.9 Mb)

The simplification gives a conguero more latitude in the rhythmic positioning of the single open tone within the tumbao. It's up to you, the dancer, to decide the most appropriate way to emphasise or not the ponché, the space immediately following it, and how you'd progress the transition into the next bar.
 

2. Clave orientation indicated by two drums

Listen to the track:

Tumbao moderno with clave orientation, two drums, 154 bpm (4.2 Mb)

One bar of the pattern employs a standard tumbao which indicates the 2-side. The other bar has a pair of open tones played on the low drum incorporated just after the slap stroke indicating the 3-side.

Figure 6.2 Son clave orientation indicated by two congas

It's clear to see the strategy behind the 3-side pattern:

• the slap stroke accents the backbeat, providing a sonic contrast to
• the low open tone which adds weight to the bombó, immediately followed by
• another low open tone, which stabilises the rhythmic anticipation through the subtlety of similarity.

The tumbao flexes back to original form by returning to double open tones on the high drum.
 

Vocalising tumbaos
As a dancer, it is not necessary that you be able to play the congas, but it is an advantage at least to be conversant with the rhythms interpreted on the drums. Rhythms have been passed from percussionist to percussionist and dancer through an oral tradition that dates back to time immemorial. We, as dancers, can use this to learn the sounds of patterns without ever having to touch a drum.

All we have to do is equate specific vocal sounds the various strokes; and since there is no standard for this, here's an example I commonly use.

• The sounds for the main tones are:
  • pak or pahk for the slap stroke,
  • gung or guhng for the low open tone, and
  • ging or geeng for the high open tone.
     
• The softer 'filler' stokes are fru or tu (heel tone) and ku (toe tone), which are rhythmic placeholder tones played with the conguero's palm and fingers respectively.
   

Examples
A standard tumbao moderno thus sounds like:

fru - ku - pak - ku - fru - ku - ging - ging

And the two tumbaos above could be:

fru - ku - pak - ku - fru - ku - ging - ging
fru - ku - pak - ku - fru - ku - ging - ku

and;

fru - ku - pak - ku - fru - ku - ging - ging,
fru - ku - pak - guhng - guhng - ku - ging - ging

Try substituting the syllables until you're comfortable with what you've got. Compare your vocal tumbao to the tracks and you should find that, as you grow competent, the vocal version begins to 'breathe' better because it's being played by a person.

Try it to the slow tumbao tracks, and also to clave only. You'll get a real feel for what happens with the conga, and find that you can be inventive too; adding your own rhythmic accents. With this ancient powerful skill in hand, we can look forward to vocalising tumbao variants in Extras and in our other tutorials.

In this section, I've put listed some more tumbao variations that you might come across. All of them are varied on the 3-side. Since there aren't any sample tracks for these variations, I encourage you to use the vocal method to play and understand them.
 

I. Variation emphasising bombó
 

Figure 6.3 Tumbao moderno - open tone on bombó

This is the standard tumbao moderno with the inclusion of an open tone on the 3-side coinciding with the bombó.

fru - ku - pak - ku - fru - ku - ging - ging
fru - ku - pak - ging - fru - ku - ging - ging

Sometimes the bombó is voiced on the low drum (guhng).
 

II. Variation emphasising bombó and ponché
 

Figure 6.4 Tumbao moderno - open tone on bombó
and single open tone on ponché

This variation is a literal voicing of the clave. Take a special note of this variation, because the timing of the bass instrument is akin to the bombó and ponché pattern of the 3-side. This will help you tune in to the bass layer later.

fru - ku - pak - ku - fru - ku - ging - ging
fru - ku - pak - ging - fru - ku - ging - ku

The bombó can be voiced on the low drum (guhng).
 

III. Variation on two drums with upbeat slap
 

Figure 6.5 Tumbao moderno on two drums - upbeat slap
between double open tones

Separating the two sets of double open tones with a slap stroke makes them more distinct. The dry accent is very much in keeping with the theme of the 3-side where as a rule, accents are played more on the upbeats to give the 3-side a smooth yet driving feel.

fru - ku - pak - ku - fru - ku - ging - ging,
fru - ku - pak - guhng - guhng - pak - ging - ging
 

IV. Variation on two drums with ponché
 

Figure 6.6 Tumbao moderno on two drums emphasising ponché

This is a tumbao with a very heavy 3-side; the already weighty low drum accent on the bombó with stabilisation hands over to a strong ponché. I call it gilding the lily.

fru - ku - pak - ku - fru - ku - ging - ging,
fru - ku - pak - guhng - guhng - ku - ging - ku
 

One step beyond
Now that you have some variations under your belt, listen for them in the music. If you've been diligent about learning the vocal skill, you should be able to pick out the conga lines; in little snippets at first, then in longer stretches. You'll surprise yourself too, when you discover yourself accidentally learning new variations and motifs, making your salsa that much richer.

Listening Practice
Rumba clave shares an identical structure to son clave except the ponché, which is displaced fractionally further downstream. Though small, this change lends the rumba clave's rhythm stream a very different feel to that of the son clave, and has significant impact on its relationships with the other rhythm streams.

Listening to the rumba clave stream itself, and you can choose any of the "rumba clave only tracks" listed in the Index of Tracks page, the first thing we notice is that it is not as simple to group the beats into two distinct clusters. The second is the lack of the three evenly-spaced beats of the tresillo. Without these bearings, we are unable to identify the location of the pulse in the manner we employed in Son clave & the clave rhythm stream.

Luckily, we still have the ability to locate pulse relative to tumbao moderno, so that's where we begin. Seat your self comfortably and listen to the track:

Rumba clave over tumbao moderno (conga), 154bpm (2.9 Mb)

Paying attention to just the conga for the moment, tap out the pulse with your foot. Then tune into the clave whilst maintaining pulse. You will find that there are two points of rhythmic anticipation when the rumba clave and pulse streams interact. Because of this, songs based on rumba clave are regarded as being rhythmically more propulsive than those based on son clave. However, the more syncopated nature of rumba clave tends to render rhythms based on it less accessible to the newly initiated.
 

Rhythm Principles
Here's the rumba clave in 3-2 orientation (the key points are easier to see this way). Notice the two points of rhythmic anticipation; one at the bombó, and the other at the rumba ponché at the end of the 3-side leading into the beginning of the 2-side.

Figure 11.1 Rumba clave relative to conga tumbao and pulse

In rumba clave, the location of the ponché is closer to the first beat of the 2-side than it is to the bombó. When listening to the clave stream on its own, it is easy to associate the ponché with the two beats of the 2-side and mistake it as a tresillo.

Although from the diagram below, the beats of the 'Pseudo 3-side' are clearly uneven, the 'pseudo-bombó' is only one-sixteenth beat late off the equidistant; listeners would have to have good bombó stability to tell the difference, and people of such rhythmic resolution would probably be aware of rumba clave already.

Figure 11.2 Clave misperceived

The example above illustrates the necessity of knowing the location of the pulse in order to maintain the correct clave framework. That's where we'll begin.
 

Salsa Practices
Instead of re-inventing the wheel, I'm going to assume that you're already familiar with our course pedagogy and terminology from previous tutorials. You may want to revisit the Dancing a Percussive Counterpoint: Core page to refresh your memory.

Acquired mode
Exercises:

• Clap rumba clave and tap pulse while seated
  (Using any of the rumba clave over tumbao moderno tracks.)
   
• Clap rumba clave and dance pulse
  (Using any of the rumba clave over tumbao moderno tracks.)
   
• Clap rumba clave and dance salsa step rhythm
  (Using any of the rumba clave over tumbao moderno tracks.) The cucaracha is the most appropriate place to start, followed by the salsa walk.
   
• Clap rumba clave and dance pulse
  (Using any of the rumba clave only tracks.)
   
• Clap rumba clave and dance salsa step rhythm
  (Using any of the rumba clave only tracks.)
   

Learned mode
Like the bombó, rumba ponché stability is essential for creating rhythmic anticipation and hence to conveying the feel of rumba. Should you want to develop rumba ponché stability, then below is the diagram for the hands-only practice as detailed in Son Clave & the Clave Rhythm Stream: Extras. Note that it's in 2-3 clave orientation.

Figure 11.3 Playing rumba clave to a count

We can then proceed to clapping clave and dancing pulse as we've done before in Dancing a Percussive Counterpoint: Core this time using rumba clave:

Figure 11.4 Playing rumba clave and dancing pulse to a count

From there, all it takes is a simple step to dancing the salsa step rhythm to rumba clave.

All of the skills you developed from the son clave tutorials are transferrable to rumba like discerning clave orientation and implied clave. The most important thing to take away from here is a profound feeling for rhythmic anticipation; which is the hallmark of rumba clave and rhythms based upon it.

All that remains now is your personal voyage of discovery of the rhythms of rumba and where they can be found in popular Latin culture.

Afro-Cuban music is sometimes described as being born of a Spanish father and an African mother; and power relationships aside, this statement representing salsa as a creole of West European and African music is largely true. This is evidenced by European chordal progressions to African rhythm; and also in the dance by African hip action coupled with the European dance hold. But there is a more sublime instance of both influences; and it concerns where the dance cycle is thought to start.

The European interpretation of the dance cycle and where it's perceived to begin has been used throughout this tutorial series. However, you should be aware that the African element perceives the cycle as initiating at a different point. With respect to rumba clave, the dance cycle begins with the ponché, and the cue to prepare for the beginning is given by the bombó. So there are actually two overlapping cycles:

• the dancer's step rhythm phrased to European convention; while
• the mind and upper body phrase to the African cycle, commencing on the ponché.

The two cycles are not independent, as clave orientation is needed to inform the phrasing of the step rhythm. Below is an example of the overlapping cycles in 2-3 orientation.

Figure 11.5a. Overlapping cycles:
rumba clave, steps in 2-3 orientation

If the step cycle were phrased in 3-2 instead, the two initiation points would be much further apart:

Figure 11.5b. Overlapping cycles:
rumba clave, steps in 3-2 orientation

The staggered cycles do two wonderful things when properly understood:

• The first is that it smoothens out the phrasing so that rhythmic weight is not concentrated into just one point. Moreover, the cycles work with each other to drive the rhythm forward - once cycle continues to advance as the other draws breath.
• The cycles behave as rhythmic counterweights to the physical activity: your lower body articulates African action to the European cycle; while your upper body employs European hold while mentally phrasing to the African cycle. The symmetry should not be lost to the experienced dancer.

Being aware of these subtleties, and interpreting them in our own unique way lends character and depth to the way we dance. You might want to visit the Body Skills Collection and Rhythm Sense sections for some ideas.

Commanding the Cycles
This is just the tip of the iceberg, and the concept opens up so many avenues for exploration it just begs some really interesting questions:

• How does clave orientation affect the dual-cycle relationship?
   
• Do the different locations of rhythmic tension relative to the start points change the way the cycles feel?
   
• How does commencing the dance on the slap stroke (beat two), sometimes called dancing 'on clave', work?
   
• What about son clave?
  You should also know that there are some instances where the start point is perceived as the bombó instead of the ponché.
   
• Can I apply all the possible permutations I learned in rumba to son clave?

You might have many more, but it all boils down to one thing - mastery of multiple perspectives of clave is the best avenue to its understanding. I encourage you to develop the skills to answer these questions and to act on the results. The perception of clave is not an academic exercise. Rather, it's a living breathing course of fulfilment that will ensure you remain passionate about Afro-Cuban dance for ages to come.