Hi Jo,

I understood your question to be about finding interesting rhythm patterns and not about how to keep time with the rhythm. I can relate to your request and I'm hoping that other people here might answer your original request for useful books, videos CD's/books etc.

In the meantime, have you investigated your local music store to see if they have any books for drummers and percussionists which show the different rhythms for different styles of music, samba, mambo, salsa, rock, swing, etc?

Another easily accessible alternative is to search on the 'Net for midi files for various kinds of music, e.g your search term could be "midi mambo" or "midi flamenco" etc and you will probably be surprised at what you find. There are millions of music lovers out there in cyberland and some of them have websites with their favourite types of music and lots of midis of that type.

Then, download the midis you like, load it into a music notation programme like Noteworthy (free demo version available for download on the 'Net, which allows printing) and look at the different staff lines, find the rhythm lines, separate them out from the others, listen to them separately, follow along with them, etc.

It's a neat & easy way of finding out what other musicians are doing with the rhythm part of tunes.

As to mousethief, have a look at some of his other postings by clicking on the hyperlink at the beginning of his posting here. You'll find out he's just a pussycat really (sorry Alex/mt, is that a tasteless analogy (grin) but I think you were coming across a little tersely with your one word piece of advice - easy to misinterpret it as being loaded with something negative because of the sparseness of your response). What I mean is: he's really quite a tasty morsel of Mudcattery when you get to know him better. Now where are my two cats when I need them? (wicked grin)

Helen