Occam Was Onto Something

The philosophical and scientific principal known as Occam’s Razor is attributed to William of Ockham, a medieval monk who lived from about 1287 to 1347. He advocated the problem-solving principle that the simplest explanation is the best and therefore most appropriate. Aristotle, too, subscribed to the idea, and Ptolemy wrote: It is vain to do with more what can be done with fewer.

 

A Closer Shave
The ‘Razor’ is a metaphor for the act of cutting away the excess. It’s like the prescription for sculpting a horse: Just remove everything that doesn’t look like a horse. A good musical model is Latin music. It often calls for a number of drummers and rhythms to support the music, but when you remove all the ancillary bits, what you’re left with is the ‘Clave ’, a 2-bar, 5-note figure that is the backbone of all Latin music. Once you understand the clave, you can then build on it to produce something interesting.

K.I.A.S.A.P., B.N.S.  (Keep It As Simple As Possible, But No Simpler)
We’re all familiar the modernized version: Keep It Short & Simple. Good advice most of the time, but it’s the ancients’ belief that the best course of action is to always remove as much extraneous detail as possible to arrive at the core of the matter. A firm grasp of the fundamentals is the key to real understanding.

That’s too simple for me
We’re not aiming to keep it simple for the sake of keeping it simple. What we’re going for, instead, is to reduce the layers of complexity, the clutter, the added frippery -- in short, the noise -- that keeps us from discovering the underlying essence. This will allow us to construct a more solid foundation.

Micro Practice
We do ‘micro practice’ all the time. We work on a single thing: single strokes, double strokes, lines from Stick Control and the like. Why? Because it works. Reducing our focus to a single item reaps big rewards. When learning a new figure, I will often take a 2-beat or even a 1-beat section and work on it exclusively. Then, when I tackle the whole thing, I’ve got a good handle on each part.

Where’s the clave?
There’s a Simon Phillips video on Drumeo that confirms the clave theory. His band, Protocol, was working on one of Simon's compositions called Undeviginti. It’s a fairly basic composition, except that it’s in 19/8. He got a call from the keyboardist Otmaro Ruiz who simply said, “What’s the clave?” He knew that once he understood the essence -- the clave – he’d be off and running ... as was Simon.

The goal is not to shun or avoid complexity, but complexity will come more easily and be more solid if the underlying parts are fully understood.

Simon Phillips Interview on Drumeo:  https://youtu.be/prZZyLHLFbA
Skip to the clave reference:  https://youtu.be/prZZyLHLFbA?t=2335
For more on the clave, see: The Latin Clave Demystified