The effect of musical groove on drum set performance accuracy

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether groove could enhance motor control when playing multi-limb rhythmic patterns on the drum set. In a within-subjects experimental design, 20 collegiate music majors performed rhythms using the left hand/snare drum and right foot/bass drum on an electronic drum set in three conditions: Isochronous Mmetronome, High-groove, and Low-groove accompaniments—which were 16 beat excerpts of popular songs drawn from an empirically-derived list ranked according to “grooviness.” The rhythms were performed with each accompaniment with Foot, Hand, and Foot and Hand together. Participants also rated their familiarity, enjoyment, perceptions of grooviness, and degree to which they felt “in the groove” after playing with each accompaniment. Analyses revealed that performance accuracy varied as a function of groove condition and effector condition, such that (a) Hand-only and Hand and Foot trials were very close to synchrony, whereas Foot-only trials were early, and (b) High-Groove and Metronome trials were close to the beat, whereas Low-Groove trials were late. Analyses also indicated that performance consistency varied as a function of Effector condition such that Hand-only trials had the least variability in onset asynchronies.