Mike Broadman
Senior HTF Member
- Joined
- Aug 24, 2001
- Messages
- 4,950
Vickie, the second number in a time signature is always either 4 or 8. It simply signifies whether you count the beats in "regular" time or "double" (8 is 4 twice). It's the first number in the signature that tells you what rhythm it's in: 3/4 is a waltz, 4/4 is standard (marches, rock, classical, jazz), 5/4 is the signature of Take 5 by Dave Brubeck and Jethro Tull's Living in the Past, and then you have things like 7/4, 9/8, 11/8, and all sorts of weird rhythm goodies used by prog rockers. Note that 6/8 is the same thing as 3/4, just twice as fast. That's really just a matter of what's more convenient for whoever's writing the music.
That's the basics of time signature. Of course, there is more to rhythm than just the beat. There are so many ways to do 4/4: classical music puts the emphasis on the first and third beats, rock puts it on 2 and 4 (a backbeat, which is technically syncopation), and jazz and blues commonly have shuffle, which is a subdivision of three for each beat.
The rhythmic stuff is what drew me to prog in the first place, and I get a real kick when they flaunt it like Apocolypse 9/8, or Frank Zappa's tune Thirteen, where he starts off the piece by explaining to the audience how to count it off if they want to tap their feet along to it.
Vickie rules. I wish my girlfriend could get into this kinda stuff like that.
NP: Porcupine Tree, In Abstentia
That's the basics of time signature. Of course, there is more to rhythm than just the beat. There are so many ways to do 4/4: classical music puts the emphasis on the first and third beats, rock puts it on 2 and 4 (a backbeat, which is technically syncopation), and jazz and blues commonly have shuffle, which is a subdivision of three for each beat.
The rhythmic stuff is what drew me to prog in the first place, and I get a real kick when they flaunt it like Apocolypse 9/8, or Frank Zappa's tune Thirteen, where he starts off the piece by explaining to the audience how to count it off if they want to tap their feet along to it.
Vickie rules. I wish my girlfriend could get into this kinda stuff like that.
NP: Porcupine Tree, In Abstentia