West African Music Tutorial 10 (Polyrhythms in 6/8 and 3/4 meter part 2)

West African music is centered around rhythm. Whether you are just starting off your music studies, refining your rhythmic skills, or studying the music of Africa, this is a great set of tutorials for you. Unlike other "how-to" videos on African rhythms or drumming out there, these tutorials are not geared around making drumming easy, but toward breaking down and analyzing these rhythm patterns to enrich your understanding and appreciation of the deeply complex, sophisticated, and beautiful music of West Africa.


In this tutorial, we will dive into one of the most exceptional trends of West African music, which is polyrhythm. Polyrhythm is generally defined as playing two different subdivisions of a beat at the same time. For example, one could play a duple eighth note figure at the same time as a triplet eighth note figure. West African music tends to go beyond that in that it will layer two entirely different meters together. This makes the stresses within one measure happen in different places at the same time. Polyrhythm is generally thought as an advanced rhythmic idea, so if you've gotten to this point in your rhythmic understanding, congratulations! Enjoy this tutorial!