Risset Rhythm

A rhythm that seems to speed up indefinitely. See for details of how it works. This does for tempo what the Shepherd tone does for pitch. It’s analogous to zooming in on a fractal rhythm made of infinitely many identical rhythms, playing simultaneously at tempos differing by all the powers of 2. The tempo you hear at any given time is dictated by a bell curve of volume across the rhythms, centered at a ’normal’ tempo, say 160BPM. To hear the music ’speed up’, the rhythms all speed up simultaneously, but the bell curve remains fixed relative to the mix of tempos. The reverse effect can be achieved by slowing all the rhythms down simultaneously. Sometimes if you skip ahead in the video, it will appear to have slowed down rather than sped up. This is because you’ve jumped to a dominant tempo slower than where you left off. If you listen continuously however, this shift will be imperceptible and it will appear to have been rising in tempo th