Understanding Time Signatures and Meters: A Musical Guide

In virtually every score of music that you have ever seen, there are numbers and symbols that explain how to interpret the music notation. As a student of music, you have become familiar with these symbols and you know that the numbers tell you how to interpret the rhythms in the music, how to count and maintain the beat, and that the numbers keep you synchronized with other performers.

Nevertheless, there are so many numbers and so many ways to write them:

Here are a few examples. There are also time signatures in the above image that are written in letters instead of numbers, which introduces even more possibilities and potential complications into the mix. However, these letters really stand in for numbers with special meanings.

This raises the question: do we really need so many different time signatures? What difference do they make? Why do musicians and composers prefer certain time signatures over others? Even though these time signatures have different meanings and purposes in music, some can sound the same to the ear. Some are quite uncommon, while others are more common.

Learn how time signatures and meters differ from each other, how they sound similar and different, and why composers prefer certain time signatures.

Sound in Time

In order to be considered music, it must move through time. It cannot be static. Music is therefore sound organized over time. Western music manages this organization through time signatures.

Using time signatures allows us to notate our music so that we can play it from a score, hear its organizational patterns, and discuss it using a common language known to other musicians. We hear and/or feel the meter of a piece based upon the patterns of beats outlined by the time signature. Musicians often use the terms "time signature" and "meter" interchangeably; but a time signature refers to the number and types of notes in each measure of music while a meter is the way those notes are grouped together in a repeated pattern to create a coherent sound. This article discusses in detail how to classify the various time signatures into meters.

Meters vs. Rhythms

A meter is a comprehensive way of describing how music moves. Musicians also discuss how music moves through time in another way, and that is through rhythm. The rhythm is the length of the notes in the music - which notes are long and which notes are short. The time signature is used by musicians to learn how to play these rhythms in the context of each piece.

The Notation

The number of notes allowed in each measure depends upon the time signature.

Notes

In the chart below, you'll find the most common notes that are used to make short and long rhythms in the various meters, starting with the longest and going down to the shortest. The chart also shows how the note values correspond to the length of the rhythm.

It is the same relationship regardless of how big or small the notes are in the various metric breakdowns. An eight-quarter note would last as long as a double-whole note!

Learning about time signatures

Time signatures determine how many notes can be allowed in each measure. Time signatures have two numbers: a top number and a bottom number: 2/4, 3/4, 4/4, 3/8, 9/8, 4/2, 3/1, etc.

The bottom number of the time signature indicates the type of note used to count each beat, while the top number shows the number of beats in each measure. From the chart above you can see that there is a fun little trick to the American note names:

Taking the 2/4 time signature as an example - with the 2 on the top of the time signature, you know there are two beats in one measure, and this leaves you with a fraction of 1/4 - a quarter, meaning the note length that this time signature indicates is a quarter note. As a result, you know that every measure contains two quarter notes of time:

Let's try again. In 9/8 time, there are nine notes in every measure.

How about in 4/2 time?

In 4/2 time, each measure has 4 notes of 1/2, so we have 4 1/2  notes:

Now try 3/1 time.

In 3/1 time, so we have 3 notes of a 1/1 length, so 3 whole notes!

Common Time and Cut Time

The above steps are how to determine the notes and beats of most time signatures, but what about the two that are letters? Actually, the two letter time signatures serve as a shorthand and variation of the most common numerical time signatures, 4/4 and 2/2.

In fact, the 4/4 time signature is so common that it has two names and two forms, the first of which is 4/4, the second of which is the common time, literally referred to as "Common Time." So whenever you hear the term "common time"  in music, you know that it is actually 4/4 time (which has how many notes of what kind of length?).

Cut common time is another common time signature. Unlike the "Common Time" signature, it has a slash through it. Technically, these measures also contain four quarter notes, but this one is called "Cut Time," hence the C is slashed. This "Cut Time" change to "Common Time" means it goes twice as fast, so instead of the quarter note getting the beat, the half note does! Cut common time is the same as 2/2, except it is written differently and is used for faster tempos than 2/2.

"In the Hall of the Mountain King" is an excerpt from the opening of Edvard Grieg's Peer Gynt Suite. This excerpt is in 4/4 common time. The measures have four quarter-notes worth of time per measure if you count the notes in the measures.

Since this piece gradually moves from sounding like a 4/4 to 2/2 as it continues, it is particularly relevant to our discussion of Common and Cut time. Exactly as it should! The conductor directs the orchestra in Cut Time at the end of the piece, rather than Common Time. Take a listen to this performance to hear how the beats get faster and if you can hear when the orchestra switches to Cut Time!

Meter Classifications

As we have discussed the basics of reading and deciphering time signatures, we will now learn how those time signatures can be understood as meters.

Meters can be classified according to two levels. The first level of classification focuses on the way the beat indicated by the time signature is subdivided.

Western music can be regularly subdivided into two or three smaller notes, but only into two or three. Please see the chart above for details. The rest of the subdivisions are either multiples of these two subdivisions, or a complex addition of them. For ease of notation and classification of meters, we have Simple Time, Compound Time, and Irregular Time.

Simple Time

consists of two notes. These meters include Common Time, Cut Time, 4/4, 3/4, 2/4, 2/2, 2/1, etc. In simple time, quarter notes, half notes, and whole notes are divided equally into two eighth notes, two quarter notes, and two half notes. As you can see in the above note length chart, the notes are categorized.

Compound Time

Compound time, or any meter whose basic note division is in groups of three, is slightly more difficult to understand. In simple time, you have an 8 at the bottom of the time signature. The beat hierarchy and accents section below will explain why there is no point in using an 8 to mark simple time.

You should therefore group your eighth notes together in threes instead of twos if you see an 8 as the bottom number in your time signature. Six eighth notes are divided into two groups of three eighth notes, nine eighth notes into three groups of three eighth notes, and twelve eighth notes into four groups of three eighth notes.

Composers could technically achieve a compound time sound by using a simple time signature and then marking all of the main beat subdivisions in triplets - making a duple division into a triple division - throughout an entire piece to achieve the same effect. However, using triplets throughout an entire piece to get a compound time sound would appear quite messy and cluttered on the page.

A comparison of the 12/8 to the 4/4 using triplets is shown in the table below. These examples sound identical to the listener, and in practice there is the added risk of confusing performers unfamiliar with varying time signatures.

In Western music of the last five or six centuries, it is more common to see a simple time signature with double divisions, but it was compound time which was developed and notated first. Western music notation was developed alongside church music, so much of the underlying theory was based on theology. The most common way to subdivide meter was in compound or triple divisions to represent musical time as three-in-one, similar to the Christian Trinity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

Irregular Time

In the final option, beats can be divided irregularly or unequally.

The performer is still able to discern patterns within these "irregular" meters. The most common irregular meters combine simple time and compound time into one measure. As a result, there are three subdivisions of beats in each measure, and there are two subdivisions of beats. An example is the 7/8 time signature. There can be no equal groups of two or three eighth notes because there are five eighth notes per measure or seven eighth notes per measure. Similar to 6/8, 9/8, and 12/8, in which groups of eighth-notes are beam together to make a larger count, 5/8 and 7/8 also beam together to make a larger count. The count lengths in 5/8 and 7/8, however, are uneven since the number of eighth notes in each measure is odd (and prime). Because some counts have two eight notes and some counts have three eighth notes, the eighth note typically stays the same length.

In each measure of 5/8, you can see three eighth notes with two eighth notes, and two eighth notes against two eighth notes in each measure of 7/8. Therefore, the first eighth note of each measure is longer than the rest of the measure in 5/8 and 7/8. Different accents and atmospheres can be created depending on where the longer beat is placed.

In the second movement of his Sixth Symphony, Russian composer Pyotr Tchaikovsky (1840-1893) uses an irregular meter. If you listen to the movement, it sounds like it should be a waltz with three beats per measure, but the "beats" of the meter are uneven; sometimes the first beat is longer, sometimes it is shorter. Because it sounds like a waltz and a dance, it seems familiar, but also lopsided and distant. (At least without some serious practice and memorization) The irregular beat patterns are unexpected and un-danceable. Familiarities become distorted, distant, potentially dangerous, and frightening.

Duple, Triple, and Quadruple Classifications

Second, meters are classified according to how many beats they contain. The three most common are duples (2/2, 2/4, 6/8), triples (3/4, 9/8, 3/2), and quadruples (4/4, 12/8, 4/2). Duple meters have two beats per measure, triple meters have three beats per measure, and quadruple meters have four beats per measure. A large or small animal that is not an equivalent to one of these three is rare.

Due to its two beats per measure and its divisibility by two, Cut-Time is a simple and duple meter.

In 3/4 time, there are three beats per measure and each beat is divisible by two, which makes it a triple and simple meter:

4/2 has four beats per measure and is a simple meter since each beat is divisible by two:

Because each measure has two beats, and each beat has three beats, 6/8 time is duple and compound meter.

Nine-eighth time is triple meter and compound meter because there are three beats per measure and each beat is divided into three:

5/8 time is a double and irregular meter, as there are two beats per measure and each beat is divided irregularly:

Take a look at your scores at home: what meter classifications have you been playing?

In the above descriptions of the various time signatures and meters, you can see that there are a lot of similarities and subtle nuances between them all. All double and quadruple time meters, for example, have two and four beats per measure, respectively. To the ear, they are similarly pitched.

Depending on the tempo, triple and simple time pieces can sound compound, while some compound pieces (e.g. 6/8) can sound like they have a simple beat subdivision, but triple (e.g. 6/8 sounds like 3/4)! Some of these meters can be distinguished by their beat hierarchies and the typical styles of music in which they are used.

Beat Hierarchies

The time signature tells us how the music should be structured in time, because music is sound organized through time.

A second important piece of information within that time signature is which notes-which beats-should be emphasized. There is an accentuation of beats in Western Classical music known as a "beat hierarchy." The first beat of every measure is the strongest and most important beat, and it should hold the most significance. In duple meters, the second beat is weak and any subdivision of the beat is even weaker. In quadruple meters, beat three of the measure is stronger than beat two, but not quite as strong as beat one, and beat four should lead into the next downbeat (beat one in the next measure). In triple time, the first beat is strong, the second is weak, and the third beat builds on beat one (leads back to beat 1).

You can interpret repertoire better if you understand the beat hierarchy of the different time signatures, especially those that use minimal articulation. Watch this example from the Spirtuoso movement of Telemann's Fantasia #6 for solo flute:

It should be in triple and simple time since this piece is in 3/2 time. There are, however, no phrase markings, and some musicians who study Baroque performance practices have argued that sections of the piece should be divided into two instead of three. A change from two to three meters would be like giving the piece a 6/8 time signature and making the 6/8 eighth note equal to a 3/2 quarter note. With a 6/8 meter, the Fantasia would be double and compound, alternating accents and beat hierarchy every third quarter note.

Hemiola

Telemann's example above, when performed with a changing beat hierarchy, is an example of a metric and rhythmic technique known as hemiola. A hemiola is a two against three sub-division of beats being played against one another. 

Syncopation

Syncopation is another way to disrupt the beat hierarchy of meters in music. A syncopated beat is one that shifts rhythmically from the traditionally strong beats of one and three. Typically, this is done by a really short note on the downbeat, followed immediately by an accented long note or by tying it to an unarticulated downbeat, so that the downbeat is completely lost. "The Entertainer" by Scott Joplin is a textbook example of how syncopation can disrupt beat hierarchy.

Immediately after the first verse, the melody line bounces quickly from the sixteenth-note downbeat to the eighth-note accent. Next, the melody downbeat in the next measure is carried over from the previous measure. It would be impossible to track the movement of the measures without the score or the repeated eighth-note chords in the left hand of the piano! 

The meters are broken down like this, but... why?

There are all these different meters and ways to subdivide them to fit the broad range of music that we have! Different types of music require different time signatures, double or triple meters, as well as Simple or Compound time signatures. Our understanding of how music is or was meant to be used begins to reveal some of the answers.

An example is a March: marches are meant to be marched to, in strict time, and humans only have two legs! Therefore, marches must be held in a quadruple or a duple time. Therefore, marches are (almost) always 2/4, 4/4, or, occasionally, 6/8. "Stars and Stripes Forever" by Sousa is in Cut Time. Although "Stars and Stripes" and other marches still being composed today are rarely marched to, they are still written in a triple time.

Music that has to be in a certain meter is also dance music. A majority of dances throughout history have a prescribed number of steps and the music that accompanies them must be synchronized. The waltz, for example, is in triple time since it follows a pattern of three steps before repeating the cycle.

Tempo can also be determined by the meter and note length in the time signature. Generally, a piece notated in 4/1 should move at a slower tempo than one notated in 4/4.

Conclusion

There you go! We examined how they're similar and different, how they're used, and how they can affect the music we hear. While many are interchangeable and sound similar, their origins and uses differ slightly. Composers use meters to organize music in time and communicate this organization to performers.

Have fun playing with any of the meters of your repertoire as if they were in a different meter, and tell us about your experiences below!