What is Rhythm to Me

 What is rhythm to me?  So many people have asked me that question but, I must admit, I’m still in search of a full answer.  Rhythm has always been a part of me, an extension of my means of expression.  Rhythm is everywhere around me, in the way people move and speak; in the swaying of a baby in his mother’s arms; in the sound of an idle engine; in the clapping of an audience chanting an encore; in the farmer tilling the field on an early morning.

And rhythm in music?  Oh yes…for me it’s the pulse, the energy within, the movement of notes and phrases.  It’s the beat that commands how fast or slow hands and feet move.  When I sit down behind my congas, or drum kit, or stand behind my percussion set up, I know that I’m there to set the rhythm, to complement the other musicians, to create an orchestrated sound which is rhythmic and melodic.  In an orchestra rhythm is set by various elements but when I’m about to play, I feel, from my inside, the energy which becomes a total physical action that brings forth that added musical layer that many times gives a crescendo, on a drum, a climax, with a crash of cymbals or a thunderous motion, with fat mallets on a bass drum.

 Rhythm gives me that drive to play, to sweat it all out and to push music to the limits, even when fingers start aching and I think that I can’t go no more.

Renzo Spiteri

September 18, 2001

Ghall-Ewwel Pagna | To the First Page