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All-Star Orchestra
Course: All-Star Orchestra > Unit 1
Lesson 1: Notes and rhythm- Lesson 1: Note values, duration, and time signatures
- Lesson 2: Rhythm, dotted notes, ties, and rests
- Lesson 3: Meters in double and triple time, upbeats
- Lesson 4: Meters in 6, 9, and 12
- Lesson 5: Review of time signatures – Simple, compound, and complex
- Lesson 6: Constant versus changing time, adding triplets, and duplets
- Glossary of musical terms
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Lesson 5: Review of time signatures – Simple, compound, and complex
Created by All Star Orchestra.
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These complex time signatures sound amazing! Do you know any other examples of these types of uneven music (preferably modern day music if you know any, but orchestral works are fine too!)(8 votes)
Take Five is a popular jazz song composed in what I believe is a 5/4. You should definitely check it out!(11 votes)
At0:30I didn't really understand compound time? Can someone help me please?(8 votes)
Compound time is kind of weird. Take a simple one that's used a lot. 6/8. You feel in in 2, like it has 2 beats when it has 6. Sure the eighth note gets the beat but that's not the beat we feel. We feel it in two. This is esspecially helpful with repeating triplet rhythms. Typically you just annotate triplets with the 3 under them. But if you don't want really any regular eighth notes and all triplets, that's where 6/8 comes in. So 6/8 is just like 2/4 just with triplets instead. 9/8 is like 3/4 and 12/8 is like 4/4.
Hope this helped!(8 votes)
At1:47, what does "Maestoso" mean?(5 votes)
Maestoso is an Italian word, and means "grand" or "majestic."(7 votes)
I was always taught that 8/8 is complex time. I was told that it has two compound beats (two sets of three eighth notes) and one simple beat (one set of two eighth notes). 8/8 was always confused with 4/4, since both time signatures have eighth notes was what I was taught. Can someone please help me sort this out? To me, both theories seem to make sense, but I'm not sure which is correct.
https://www.musictheory.net/lessons/16
↑↑↑The link above explains how 8/8 is an odd/complex time signature.↑↑↑
About 3/4 into the lesson should be the part when it is explained. Thanks for anybody's/everybody's help!(7 votes)
8/8 typically acts as a complex meter, just like you wrote. Usually, if a composer wants four sets of two eighth notes, he/she will just write the measure in 4/4 instead of 8/8. Some possible exceptions might be in extremely slow music where the eighth note is given the beat, or in other music where the primary meter is already eighth note-based (for instance, if most of the piece were in 5/8, but the composer wanted a bar with four groups of two eighth notes, he/she might write that bar as 8/8 to preserve the dominant eighth note pulse).(2 votes)
Are all musical terms Italian? The musical glossary does not say anything about that.(6 votes)
Many musical terms are in Italian, because many of the most important early composers from the Renaissance to the Baroque period were Italian, and that period is when numerous musical indications were used extensively for the first time.(4 votes)
- if im not really understanding every word does that mean i should stop or music is just not for everyone?(1 vote)
- No, when u start any new skill it takes time to develop it.Don't try to do everything at a time break topics and learn them daily. Ya and don't forget to revise the past things. Its actually easy.(7 votes)
How do I play a 4/8 on a violin?(2 votes)
Remember to keep the beat, which is in eighth notes. There will be four in a measure. It will kind of be counted like a 2/4, but just more beats in the measure that the conductor will give you.(4 votes)
Technically, yes there could be 15/4, but it is probably more common to subdivide it further. 15 could be broken down into three groups of 4/4, and one of 3/4... or perhaps if it fits the particular piece better, it could also be grouped into three measures of 5/4.
For a real world example of a similar compound meter, listen to the first few minutes of Nine Inch Nails "The Becoming". It could be counted in 13/4, but it's easier to count by subdividing it to 7/4 + 6/4, or you could go even further subdividing it to 4/4 + 3/4 + 4/4 + 2/4, which in my opinion makes counting along a breeze!
But at the end of the day, music is art... and sometimes an artist makes a decision for reasons that aren't logical and can't be explained. If you want 15/4, it just means there will be 15 quarter notes in each measure. Just remember if you have musicians reading your piece, 15 beats in a measure can get cumbersome to count along with.(2 votes)
At about1:25what does the quarter note=208 mean?(1 vote)- That is called a metronome marking. A metronome plays a steady pulse, helping the performer or group of performers keep playing at a regular speed and giving them an idea of how fast or slow a composition should be performed. Most of the time, a metronome is measured in beats per minute; in the example you gave, the metronome would be set to plays 208 beats (ticking sounds) per minute, and a quarter note would be played on each beat (for a total of 208 quarter notes per minute). Other note values can be accommodated to this, too; since an eighth note is half of a quarter note, there would be 416 eighth notes per minute at this speed.(5 votes)
If i wanted to compose a song for the violin. How would i know what meter i should use?(3 votes)- It literally depends only on you you want it to sound like. You must try writing it and see what meter fits better. It's easier to write for just one instrument.(1 vote)
0:30Video transcript
- [Narrator] There are three
types of time signatures. Simple time, which
includes any time signature with the upper number, the
number of beats in each bar, divided by two, such as two
eight, two four, four eight, four four, six four, eight
eight, eight four, and so forth. In this category, we also include three four and three eight. In compound time signatures,
the beat can be broken down into three as we've discussed
like six eight, nine eight, twelve eight, fifteen eight. We also have asymmetrical time signatures, also called complex or irregular time, which generally contain
five or seven beats. Let's look at a few of these. At the end of Ravel's Daphnis and Chloe, he wrote his wild finale in
five four, a fast five four. In general the five is
divided into three plus two. (intense orchestra music) When he listened to the
end of the Firebird, we first hear seven four in a fast tempo divided into three plus two plus two, or two plus two plus three. (dramatic orchestra music) After a few measures,
Stravinsky instructs us to play the material twice slower and the seven four
becomes a slow seven four, but still divided into
three plus two plus two, or two plus two plus three. (dramatic orchestra music)