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I think I would split the difference on that. Rhythm might have something to do with the reptilian brain. But I don't find that it does much for me unless I layer on some structure.
The structure that works for me (your mileage may vary) uses a physical experience to simplify the counting, so I can actually do the thing, repeat it on demand, and not find myself stuck in a kind of hyper-speed loop where my hands, eyes, ears, and counting are spinning off into different dimensions - each perhaps coherent by itself, but losing any connection with each other.
You could try all kinds of modalities - even walking in time to music, or walking while singing, really anything that combines some music you like with a repetitive activity - might give you a useful base of understanding. Eventually, the need for the physical anchor - counting out loud, patting one hand on the piano lid while the other one plays, tapping the foot, etc - gets less. But it does help at the beginning, and I still use those tools a lot when confronted with a sea of 16th notes.
Good advice, Medved. Adding a physical movement to the counting is IMHO essential. That is why I require students to count OUT LOUD very loudly...even counting under their breath or whispering does not work.
Also, I would add that for multi-note rhythms saying a common phrase that matches the notes can be very helpful. For example, for 4 eighth notes, I use "huckleberry" or "avocado" -- four syllable words for 4 note beats. Like Trip- O - Let for triplets.
Here is a chart that has many varieties of this concept:
Thinking about it I think my rhythmic sense must have been kept up/improved by my habit of walking a lot with different kind of music in my earphones. During the 25 or so years of not actively doing any music studies I always had music playing when moving around. And I always try to fit my steps to the pulse of the music. I think I also sometimes unconsciously count in my head. While it is a "passive" way of practicing I think it is one reason that I found it so easy to work with rhythm after returning to piano.
Adding a physical movement to the counting is IMHO essential. That is why I require students to count OUT LOUD very loudly...even counting under their breath or whispering does not work.
Self-consciousness has no place when you're learning music, no matter how silly you feel doing things to develop your musicality. I learnt that rapidly when I had to count aloud, then eventually sing the beats "One, two, three, four" and " one and two and three and four" - in front of my female teacher - when I started piano lessons. But if she could sing the beats in front of me as if it was the most natural thing in the world, so could I in front of her - and then by myself when I was practicing the pieces.
And in any case, it was all necessary for the aural skills part of the ABRSM exams, when I had to sing notes and tunes and beat time.
Here are 100+ teenagers doing all that rhythmic stuff - and slapping themselves, and making funny noises - in front of five thousand people:
The whole piece (specially composed for the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain) is reliant on the ability to keep time and count beats.
I used to (try to) beat time to any piece I heard on the radio, which at the time were all unfamiliar to me. Everything from the Emperor Concerto (easy) to Le sacre du printemps (impossible....... ).
Practicing without thinking of it as 'practicing' is the key to achieving eventual mastery.
Adding a physical movement to the counting is IMHO essential. That is why I require students to count OUT LOUD very loudly...even counting under their breath or whispering does not work.
Self-consciousness has no place when you're learning music, no matter how silly you feel doing things to develop your musicality. I learnt that rapidly when I had to count aloud, then eventually sing the beats "One, two, three, four" and " one and two and three and four" - in front of my female teacher - when I started piano lessons. But if she could sing the beats in front of me as if it was the most natural thing in the world, so could I in front of her - and then by myself when I was practicing the pieces.
Bennevis, excellent point. For a long time I felt silly using my entire body to play the piano instead of suffering by being stiff and only using my hands.
I am around but mainly at weekend days I want to apologize to everyone who is trying to help me here but does not see my reaction - on working days I can occasionally briefly drop in here, but I can’t completely switch to writing posts
Originally Posted by PianogrlNW
here is Eric Clapton - do you feel the beat?
Sorry again, not at all. And again, before he started singing I was able to hear something (not beat exactly but something), with this singing - ... I am 1000 times sorry, don't want to offend anyone, but I don't hear any music, not just beat.. Sorry again, this is just my personal musical preferences...
Originally Posted by Nahum
the more the mind interferes, the more it hinders to the rhythm.
Don't understand at all what you mean here but couldn’t agree more! So the question is: how to deactivate (or suspend) this mind and activate other mechanisms which are more appropriate for the subject - rhythm.
You could acquire a CD for a ballet class. beginner level. Select one where the pianist uses classical music since it is your preferred music. There will be several different rhythms, well accented.
the more the mind interferes, the more it hinders to the rhythm.
Don't understand at all what you mean here but couldn’t agree more! So the question is: how to deactivate (or suspend) this mind and activate other mechanisms which are more appropriate for the subject - rhythm.
You have already received some answers to your question: walking, dancing are not connected with intellectual activity, but with a sense of rhythm inside the body, and turning it into a percussion instrument. This body drumming is an African tradition (in the past), not European. E.J. Dalcroze was the first who drew attention to this before he developed his revolutionary system of rhythmic education in the early 20th century. The rhythmic feeling has 2 sources: natural, genetically pledged inside us , and social, when the individual carries within himself the rhythm of whole community. It follows a simple natural conclusion: the improvement of rhythmic hearing is obliged to occur in a group way! If someone is unsure of this, he can ask the participants of this choir
Not only is this choir singing with great rhythm but their bodies are also moving together as one. Maybe it is possible that if you grow up never hearing music you have a difficult time feeling the rhythm. It’s kind of puzzling and interesting at the same time.
Thank you Nahum. Yes, probably my approach to this problem is too analytical, as many other pointed out here. Well, I admit that I am a mathematician by nature. But somehow this fact didn't disturb my tone hearing... Ok, I understood that need to develop other side of my brain
Thank you everybody here! Many interesting ideas and tips! They will definitely help me to work on this issue.
We have no idea how they trained. It is a finished performance. Rehearsals can be very different than the final performance, and the practising of individual musicians between rehearsals is different again. And then you need to know what abilities each musician brought into the choir prior to joining it, and how they got those abilities. Most of us here are people who are learners, so we are at the stage of getting those abilities. "Training with the metronome" would also need to be explained. The metronome is a tool, and a tool can be used in many ways. I've watched quite a few tutorials on drumming, and the metronome was very much in the picture. But how are you using that metronome, and when?
Find a (good) drum teacher who actually works as a drummer and explain what you want.
Solving problems like you (the OP) describes is what they do.
This was my advice (overlooked ) early on in this thread, but I still stand by it...Getting your body to accurately move to the rhythm is the essence of drumming, and a good drum teacher can instill that in you much much faster than you can by yourself.
Many music teachers, when asked what second instrument one should study, recommend drums. And, because the piano is both a string instrument and a percussion instrument, Keith Jarrett said, when asked what kind of instrument he played, he replied that he plays drums, and has 88 of them.
I really think that it is very difficult and after 14 or so years of lessons I really have never heard of 'rhythm hearing' is a required or necessary skill to learn for piano development.
Not being able to carry out complex rhythms on a piano is quite a different problem.
I normally would buy a sight reading book and do the clapping exercises in this is what helped me.
As we're all now agreed that everyone has innate rhythm, if only we allow our bodies (& possibly grey matter) to get on with being innately rhythmic instead of trying to interfere by actually learning to do it from experts , I recommend clapping to this simple song. That typically Latin rhythmic figure of alternating 6/8 and 3/4 is innate in all our bones, so let the bones get on with it:
Find a (good) drum teacher who actually works as a drummer and explain what you want.
Solving problems like you (the OP) describes is what they do.
This was my advice (overlooked )
Not at all. Sorry that I somehow left it without response but I stopped at it first time. I even spent some time searching for such teacher in local inet segment. But my problem is that I can only take lessons during weekends... I was lucky enough that my wife's sister happens to be piano teacher and she agreed to work with me on Saturdays
Originally Posted by Moo :)
I personally don't think it is an easy thing to be able to listen an analyse a piece of heard music. ... Not being able to carry out complex rhythms on a piano is quite a different problem.
I normally would buy a sight reading book and do the clapping exercises in this is what helped me.
Yes, somehow I ended up with talking about inability to "analyse a piece of heard music" while "to carry out ... rhythms on a piano" is actual description of my problem. As I wrote in first post in this thread THAT is main complain that I receive when I play - "you don't count". Meaning that I am not carrying out rhythms. But to carry them out I first need to recognize them (or to know them, or to feel them), no? Let's leave aside the fact that it is denoted on the score that I am learning - maybe I don't yet read everything from a music sheet. But my teacher plays those pieces for me before asking me to learn them. Besides, many of them I can hear or even already heard a lot of times in professional performances. While I (relatively) easily "recall" what notes I need to play and I hear my notes mistakes IMMEDIATELY when I make them, I do not hear rhythm mistakes AT ALL - that's what bothers me. Thus my conclusion that I need to find a way(s) to train my rhythm sense. And I did get number of suggestions in this thread By the way here is interesting, or rather even more bothering fact about my good tone hearing: when I was about 5 years old my parents wanted a music education for me. I had some preliminary test in musical school and the diagnosis was "musically deaf" - they played a notes on a piano and asked me to name them. So I avoided the terrible fate of suffering piano lessons. And what happened later? My teacher says that after decades of listening music hours every day my hearing was developed. But hey, the time I spent listening notes is exactly the same as time that was listening rhythms!!! Now I think this thread explained me the difference. Thank you all again!
Many people do not seem to hear problems with pulse consistency themselves while they play, that is why they record and listen back. I think to be able to hear oneself go off pulse is either an learned skill or a natural ability. I don't really know where I got it, but it's like having a metronome ticking in the back of my head constantly. And it was really difficult for me in the beginning to go on playing if I noticed myself going off pulse so have had to practice ignoring little inconsistencies and resetting the inner metronome while they happen. But I still tend to get upset about missing the beat even slightly or panic if I have trouble following this internal ticking. So maybe not necessarily only positive to be too good in this type of rhythmic awareness. It's like having a very strict ear for pitch, a note out of tune on the piano can throw one off.
Anyway, I think the ability to maintain pulse should be somewhat internal and can be improved by physical exercises mentioned above. But the ability to understand how to play and count different meters is more of a theoretical skill and can be mathematically solved. I am not sure if you have trouble with only the former?
BTW Researchers have found people who actually are "tone deaf" or "rhythm challenged". These can be actual disabilities, but are very rare. Usually things can always be improved with suitable methods.
- in front of five thousand people:
). 
I want to apologize to everyone who is trying to help me here but does not see my reaction - on working days I can occasionally briefly drop in here, but I can’t completely switch to writing posts
) early on in this thread, but I still stand by it...Getting your body to accurately move to the rhythm