What gives jazz its swing? A delay makes the difference

Jazzy sound, or swing, has a je ne sais quoi that even experts struggle to put into words. Experiments by a team of physicists and psychologists now support the hypothesis that the swing feeling is produced when performers subtly deviate from one another in the timing of their notes¹.

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-022-03082-z

Subjects

• Applied physics