How to stop coming in late

What it sounds like

Your pulse is fine but you are always a fraction behind. Phrases start just after the beat, consistently, and the performance feels like it is chasing the track.

What is actually being measured

The average distance between your note onsets and the nearest detected beat, in beat fractions. Distinct from drift: a singer can be perfectly steady and steadily late.

Onset lag opens as a problem at an average deviation of 0.35 beats, and counts as severe at 1.0 — a full beat behind, on average.

Why it happens

Lateness is a preparation problem. The breath is taken on the beat rather than before it, so the note necessarily starts after it. Reading lyrics while singing produces the same effect, as does any consonant cluster that needs time before the vowel lands.

How to fix it

• —Breathe a full beat early. The inhale has to be finished when the beat arrives, not starting on it.
• —Place the vowel on the beat, not the consonant. "Strong" starts with three consonants that have to happen before the note does.
• —Learn the lyrics well enough not to be reading them. Reading costs a fraction of a second and it is exactly the fraction you are losing.
• —Count yourself in on every entry after a gap, even in performance.

The drill

Call-and-response patterns with a fixed count-in, where the pass criterion is landing on the beat rather than on the pitch alone.

Common questions