On Noticing

Years ago, I was at a casual tryout in a restaurant with a drummer. Nothing formal. No stakes. After we played, he said something simple: that I was missing beats. Not rushing, not dragging — just missing them.

At the time, I didn’t argue and I didn’t fully understand what he meant. I just knew it stayed with me.

What changed afterward wasn’t technique so much as attention. I started listening differently — not only to what was being played, but to where things landed, how they leaned, and how time behaved between obvious markers. I wasn’t trying to formalize anything. I just started noticing things I couldn’t un-notice.

Over time, that noticing turned into a habit. Then into measurements. Then into visual traces — not as corrections, but as records of how performances actually move.

The images below are part of that ongoing practice. They were produced across this week and are presented here together, without extended commentary. They’re not conclusions. They’re observations — snapshots of timing as it’s lived rather than summarized.

More notes will come when energy allows. For now, the work stands on its own.