rhythmic phenomena
June 25, 2008
>rhythm and transforms ( a little film )
(time as an intellectual achievement rather than a perceptual category)
(music making time audible)
it’s what i’m working on right now.
“Rhythm is one of the most basic ways that we understand and interact with time. Our first sensory impression as we float in our mother’s womb is the rhythmic sound of her heart. The time between the opening and closing of the heart’s valves is a clock that measures the passing of our lives. Breathing is our most lasting experience of rhythm.”
“Rhythms occur at all time scales. The motion of waves against a beach, the daily flow of the sun and moon, the waxing and waning of the year; these occur at rates much slower than the heartbeat. Pitched phenomenon such as the rotation of an engine, the oscillations of a string, and the vibrations of our vocal chords occur at rates much faster than the heartbeat. At the slowest rates, we conceive of the rhythm via long term memory. At rates near that of the heartbeat, we perceive the repetition directly as rhythm. At the fastest rates, the repetitions blur together into the perception called “pitch.” Thus we perceive rhythmic patterns differently at different time scales.
