This document provides an overview of music notation concepts including rhythm, meter, tempo, and notation of rhythms. The key points covered are: - Rhythm refers to patterns of sound and silence while meter provides a framework for rhythm based on strong and weak beats grouped into measures. - Time signatures indicate the number of beats per measure and the note value that receives one beat. - An "imaginary bar line" can help notate rhythms in 4/4 time by visualizing two-beat groupings within each measure. A similar approach helps notate 3/4 time rhythms by ensuring every beat is shown.

1. Music Studies 1
Week 4

2. Learning Outcomes
• By the end of today’s session, students will be able to:
• Understand how sound is organized in time and how it is represented in
notation
• Correctly notate rhythms using the “imaginary bar line” in 4/4 time
• Correctly notate rhythms using the “imaginary bar line” in 3/4 time

3. Time and Rhythm
• Music is sound organized in time
• Pitch (how high or low a sound is) is only part of the musical world
• The speed and regularity with which notes are played is equally
important

4. Beat, Tempo, Meter, Measure
• For the most part, popular music will have clear beats and a steady
tempo.
• Beats are grouped into measures/bars with a regular accent pattern
(meter/time signature)
• Beats are unites of time that we use to measure the flow of the
music.
• They can be sounded by any instrument or combination of
instruments.
• They can be represented by rhythm slashes on a staff:

5. Measures/Bars
• Beats usually fall into regular patterns of strong and weak accents

6. Meter/Time Signature
• These regular accent patterns define the meter
• This is expressed at the beginning of a piece by a time signature
• The time signature consists of two numbers
• The top one shows the number of beats in a bar
• The bottom one shows the kind of note that represents each beat in the
notated music

7. • The beat can be represented by
different notes.
• In 4/4, a quarter note gets one
beat
• 4/4 time is sometimes called
Common Time, and is written
with a C

8. 3/4
• 3/4 has three beats in each bar – the quarter note gets one beat
• ¾ and 4/4 are called “simple meters.”

9. • In some meters, the eighth note gets one beat.
• 6/8 has six beats in each bar
• 12/8 has twelve beats in each bar
• In both meters, the eighth note gets one beat
• 6/8 and 12/8 are called “compound meters” because the eighth notes
are felt and written in groups of three – two groups of three in 6/8
and four groups of three in 12/8

10. Tempo
• The speed at which the beats pass is called the tempo
• Tempo can be described in different ways:
1. A song can be described as simply slow, medium or fast
2. It can also be expressed more accurately with a set of commonly
accepted words such as andante, allegro or presto. These terms are
most commonly used in classical music
3. Tempo is most accurately described by metronome markings; they
represent the number of beats per minute (BPM)

11. Rhythm
• Rhythm is not the same as meter
• Rhythms are patterns of sound, accent and silence.
• One way to understand the difference between rhythm and meter is
to say that rhythm is what we perceive when we listen to music, and
meter is the framework through which we perceive it.

12. Subdivision and Multiples of the Beat
• A beat can be subdivided into notes of shorter duration.
• The quarter note can be divided in half to make two eighth notes.
• Two eighth notes take up the same amount of time as one quarter
• The eighth note can be subdivided into two sixteenth notes
• Two sixteenth notes equal one eighth note – four sixteenths= one
quarter

14. Longer Note Values and Dotted Notes
• Sometimes notes are held for more than one beat
• A half note gets two beats; it is equal to two quarter notes
• A whole note gets four beats; it is equal to two half notes or four
quarter notes
• Adding a dot to a note increases its value by one half
• A dotted eighth= 3 sixteenths
• A dotted quarter= 3 eighths
• A dotted half= three quarters

15. Ties
• Depending on the circumstances you can also use a tie to extend the
duration of a note
• Each pair of bars below sounds the same

16. Rests
• Silence is a vital part of music
• There are symbols for silent beats – they’re called rests

17. The “Imaginary Bar Line”
• Within a 4/4 measure, there is a natural accent pattern dividing the
bar in half
• Music consisting of only quarter and eighth notes and rests is
organized into two beat groupings inside each bar
• This makes it much easier to read
• In practice, there are only five combinations

18. • Rests can be substituted for any of the notes, but the basic idea
remains the same:
• In 4/4 the music is notated in two-beat groups
• Another way of saying this is that the first beat and the third beat
must be “visible”

19. • When first learning, it helps to imagine there’s a dotted bar line
before beat 3 that serves as a reminder to state the third beat,
whether as a rest or a note.
• It’s never actually drawn, but is a useful practice tool.

20. Imaginary Bar Line in 3/4
• Reading and notation issues in ¾ time are less straightforward than in
4/4
• ¾ only has one main accents, so it’s not naturally divided into two
halves
• Bars are made up of a variety of 2+1 or 1+2, or other beat groups – so
there’s no single rule
• Syncopation – accenting normally unaccented beats – can further
complicate things
• When in doubt, make every beat visible!

21. • In practice, there are a limited number of common rhythmic patterns
in ¾
• Here are some examples of alternate notation of some common
rhythms. In each case, both are acceptable

22. 16th notes in 3/4
• When notating 16th rhythms in ¾ , the rule is : make every beat
visible and no ties “inside” a beat