It don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing

It is always interesting when real science happens. There have always been jazz musicians who really know how to "swing" a tune. Ella, Dizzy, all the greats, just had a way that clicked. Fans, and even musicians, can listen to performances, and agree that one really swung, and the other did not, but not be able to elucidate what characteristic of the music made this so.

Swing music plays with time. "Swinging" music means elongating an eighth note on the downbeat and shortening it on the upbeat. But that by itself is not "swinging" -- a computer can do that, and the performance will lack the je ne sais quoi that we call swinging. So, what's the deal?

NPR recently reported a recent study suggests an answer:
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2023/01/18/1139783203/what-makes-songs-swing-physicists-unravel-jazz-mystery&usg=AOvVaw09MlxT6eZ7nGYL_vJIlQId

TL DR
Analyzing the performances that were agreed to "really swing", scientists found a common theme.
The soloist starts the downbeat just slightly after the rhythm section -- like less than 30msec after -- and then starts the upbeat in sync with the rhythm section.

I always thought such time delays were "imperceptible", but apparently they are.

 

Great read!!

Off-topic, and surprising to no one, but it's incredible that all innovative, flourishing and enduring American culture—from music most prominently (for this forum and thread in particular), but also the plastic arts, literature, fashion, food, and much more—is really just black culture, or found its ur-roots in black culture.

Aside from the Lomax family and other musicologists who helped to shine a spotlight on what we would now call "folk music", but at the time was derisively-termed "race music", it's humorous that rock 'n roll wasn't an international success until the UK (think Beatles and Stones) took notice of the old blues greats and early jump blues/electric blues pioneers and showed America herself that black music indeed rocks.

With Chuck Berry as rock music's ultimate progenitor, as well as parallel developments in America's (to my mind) single original, highbrow art export: jazz, and with R&B, gospel, doo wop, and later on, funk, hip hop & electronic music, all carrying the avant-garde imprint of brilliant African-American musicians.