Meter in Classical Music
In music of the common practice period (about 1600–1900), there are four different families of time signature in common use:
- Simple duple – two or four beats to a bar, each divided by two, the top number being "2" or "4" (2/4, 2/8, 2/2 … 4/4, 4/8, 4/2 …). When there are four beats to a bar, it is alternatively referred to as "quadruple" time.
- Simple triple ( 3/4) – three beats to a bar, each divided by two, the top number being "3" (3/4, 3/8, 3/2 …)
- Compound duple - two beats to a bar, each divided by three, the top number being "6" (6/8, 6/16, 6/4 …)
- Compound triple - three beats to a bar, each divided by three, the top number being "9" (9/8, 9/16, 9/4)
If the beat is divided into two the meter is simple, if divided into three it is compound. If each measure is divided into two it is duple and if into three it is triple. Some people also label quadruple, while some consider it as two duples. Any other division is considered additively, as a measure of five beats may be broken into duple+triple (12123) or triple+duple (12312) depending on accent. However, in some music, especially at faster tempos, it may be treated as one unit of five.
Read more about this topic: Meter (music)
Famous quotes containing the words classical music, meter, classical and/or music:
“The basic difference between classical music and jazz is that in the former the music is always greater than its performance—Beethoven’s Violin Concerto, for instance, is always greater than its performance—whereas the way jazz is performed is always more important than what is being performed.”
—André Previn (b. 1929)
“Much poetry seems to be aware of its situation in time and of its relation to the metronome, the clock, and the calendar. ... The season or month is there to be felt; the day is there to be seized. Poems beginning “When” are much more numerous than those beginning “Where” of “If.” As the meter is running, the recurrent message tapped out by the passing of measured time is mortality.”
—William Harmon (b. 1938)
“Against classical philosophy: thinking about eternity or the immensity of the universe does not lessen my unhappiness.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“Since a man must bring
To music what his mother spanked him for
When he was two ...”
—Gwendolyn Brooks (b. 1917)