It isn’t often that one can look to top-40 pop music for a clear cut example of rhythmic motive diminution, but this is exactly what happens in the song “I Knew You Were Trouble” by Taylor Swift. Here’s a link to the official video, if you can hang on long enough to get past the ads and the rather long dramatic introduction:
Take a listen to the bass drum pattern that begins around 2:06 in the video. This short one-measure phrase repeats several times:
Trouble excerpt 1
This same pattern happens at the pre-chorus (for lack of a better term) at 2:56. Once the chorus section hits, the pattern breaks, and Taylor sings “Oh, oh, trouble, trouble, trouble . . .” Listen carefully to the second time she says “trouble” in this line. You’ll hear the bass drum play this:
Trouble excerpt 2
Compare the counts between the first pattern above and the first two beats of this one. You’ll see that the second pattern transforms each of the rhythms into exactly half that of the first pattern. Of course I can’t say whether this transformation is consciously intended or a happy accident. I did, however, wonder upon hearing the song for the first time why the composers/arrangers/producers did not use a triplet figure in the second excerpt. It did seem to be the more natural choice, and a close listen to the second excerpt reveals a much stiffer, asymmetrical rhythm than a triplet. And this stiffness caught me off guard when I heard the song on the radio. Whatever the intention, I think one cannot help but hear the subtle connection between the rhythm at the beginning of the song and the one in the chorus.