Philly Soul

What it is

Earl Young was the house drummer at Sigma Sound in Philadelphia, playing on Gamble and Huff sessions with the band that later became MFSB. Cutting the Harold Melvin record The Love I Lost in 1973 he played four on the floor on the bass drum and opened the hi-hat on every offbeat eighth, and that combination had not been on a record before. Young himself has been consistent about why: he wanted the hi-hat to sizzle so the drums would carry in a club, and four on the floor gave the dancers something they could not lose. Everything in the house family on this site runs on the pattern he worked out that afternoon. What sits over it is not house at all, though, but Thom Bell arrangements: harps, vibraphone, French horns, and a string section of thirty players reading charts.

What it sounds like

Lush on top and completely dry underneath. The kick is felt more than heard, a soft thud with no click at all. The snare is a wood shell with a light rimshot and a short plate behind it. The open hi-hat is the loudest element in the kit and it rings for most of an eighth note before the foot closes it. Around it, a tambourine and Larry Washington's bongos, two people rather than one looped part. Above that: Vince Montana's vibraphone, a harp doing glissandi, sweeping violins, a Fender Rhodes, and a guitar playing sixteenth chops with the tone rolled off. Every voice is a full ensemble rather than an overdub, and the room at Sigma is audible on all of it.

Key elements

• Four on the floorA soft, round kick on all four beats at 108 to 116. It is a pulse to dance to rather than a punch, and it should never be the loudest thing in the mix.
• Open hat on every offbeatEight open hats across the two bars, one on each and. This is the invention: it is where every offbeat open hat in house music comes from.
• Closed hat on the downbeats onlyThe foot closes on the beat and lifts on the and, so the closed hat plays the four downbeats and nothing else. Adding sixteenth ghosts turns it into a different genre.
• A percussion section, not a sampleA tambourine struck on the offbeat with the shake answering on the a, and Larry Washington's bongos filling the second half of the bar. Two players, two lanes, and the reason these records sound busy without a sixteenth hi-hat.
• The orchestraStrings, horns, harp and vibes arranged in written parts rather than pads. The rhythm section is deliberately plain so the arrangement has room.

How to get them

• Hi-hatUse two samples from the same pair of cymbals, one closed and one struck half open, and put them in a choke group. The open hat should ring for roughly 300 milliseconds at this tempo before it is cut.
• KickFelt beater, front head on, minimal damping, and roll off everything above 3kHz so there is no click whatsoever. Sit it around 60Hz and mix it lower than instinct suggests.
• SnareA wood-shell snare hit near the rim, into a plate at 1.1 seconds high-passed at 400Hz. One hit per backbeat, one quiet ghost in the second bar, and no layered clap on top.
• StringsWrite actual parts: a sustained pad in the violas, a counter-melody in the violins an octave up, and cellos doubling the bassline. A string patch playing block chords will not sound like this and cannot.
• TambourineStrike on the offbeat near 78, then let the shake come back on the a near 50. Two hits per beat rather than a flat eighth pulse, which is what a hand tambourine actually does.
• BongosA second percussion track, panned opposite the tambourine, playing across the back half of the bar only. Small drums tuned high, a short room at 0.5 seconds, and no low end below 200Hz.
• BassElectric bass with a pick, playing an octave figure that lands on the beat with the kick and answers on the offbeat. Ronnie Baker's lines are worth transcribing note for note.

Reference points

Earl Young, MFSB, Gamble and Huff, Thom Bell, Vince Montana, Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes, and the Philadelphia International catalogue. Named as reference points for the sound, not as endorsements.