Jimmy Page said, “We broke the first cardinal rule of music, which is, ‘Don’t Speed Up!’
Stairway to Heaven was playing softly on the turntable.
“It was all planned out. We sped up intentionally to match the passion of the times.”
I personally had to break the second commandment of music which might be, ‘Don’t Slow Down.’
The process of slowing a groove down, gradually, takes the drummer’s awareness into a deeper relaxation and meditation, like yoga; breathing into the posture, witnessing the release of tension in the body and the mind. This happens in drumming with downbeat reductions in tempo so subtle that you might not even notice it. But each time the person feels that simple ‘laying back’ of the groove, they experience similar deepening of awareness and well being like yoga. But this groove meditation seems to be a different form of energy than yoga. After all, rhythm is dance. Meditation drumming is popular in yoga classes. Yoga with a good beat. Stairway indeed.