# Please help me to figure out this time signature



## Voider (Nov 13, 2017)

Hey guys! This may sound odd, but I've got an idea and I can play it in, but when I try to get the right time signature from cubase for the metronome to work or the next sequence (when root note changes) to be on point, it doesn't work. 5/4 is too early, 6/4 is too far. I just want the grid to work.

Can you tell me what time signature this is and how I would find that out? I just played a single note here to make it as most easy as possible.
Thanks in advance! 

PS: I made it downloadable if you want to check it in your DAW.


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## jonathanprice (Nov 13, 2017)

2 measures of 3/4 and 1 measure of 2/4, ~167bpm.


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## Voider (Nov 13, 2017)

At 4/4 I get this, this is totally not in the grid.. I mean shouldn't there be a time signature where everything fits in well? I want the first F1 and then the first A1 and so on be on point of a new bar. Or at least to be identical. Now the first A1 starts at the beginning of a bar and the second A1 sequence somewhere in the end of the 3rd row of the bar.


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## Jdiggity1 (Nov 13, 2017)

it's just syncopated 4/4.
try tempo at 165. Your pattern will last 2 bars then change root in 3rd bar.


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## jonathanprice (Nov 13, 2017)

Voider said:


> At 4/4 I get this, this is totally not in the grid.. I mean shouldn't there be a time signature where everything fits in well? I want the first F1 and then the first A1 and so on be on point of a new bar. Or at least to be identical. Now the first A1 starts at the beginning of a bar and the second A1 sequence somewhere in the end of the 3rd row of the bar.



Ah. Treat the notes as spanning the duration of 3 eighth notes (accented dotted quarter) in 167bpm.


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## jonathanprice (Nov 13, 2017)

Jdiggity1 said:


> it's just syncopated 4/4.
> try tempo at 165. Your pattern will last 2 bars then change root in 3rd bar.



Syncopated 4/4 was my first thought too. But if I were conducting this, it'd be easier in two 3/4 + one 2/4.


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## Jdiggity1 (Nov 13, 2017)

guess it depends on what other rhythmic elements you add.


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## jonathanprice (Nov 13, 2017)

Jdiggity1 said:


> guess it depends on what other rhythmic elements you add.



Aye.


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## Voider (Nov 13, 2017)

Uhm so.. is there any possibility to make time signature change in the mid of the grid so that it fits?

And @jonathanprice what do you mean by spanning the duration of 3 eight notes - triplets? I already had the grid set to 1/16 triplets but that didn't help me understand this time signature.

It's still a bit hard for me to get into my head what's going on with understanding this rhythm in a (one) time signature grid.


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## JJP (Nov 13, 2017)

It's basic 4/4 time. The tempo depends on how you interpret it.


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## Voider (Nov 13, 2017)

JJP said:


> It's basic 4/4 time. The tempo depends on how you interpret it.



But my note drop from A to F doesn't happen on the first beat of bar 3 as in your sheet. Something must be different..


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## resound (Nov 13, 2017)

Voider said:


> But my note drop from A to F doesn't happen on the first beat of bar 3 as in your sheet. Something must be different..


That's because you are penciling in the notes in your piano roll on quarter notes. The line is syncopated so some notes end up on upbeats. The way JJP notated it is exactly right.


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## JJP (Nov 13, 2017)

Voider said:


> But my note drop from A to F doesn't happen on the first beat of bar 3 as in your sheet. Something must be different..



This is a pretty common rhythm. You are trying to interpret each note as being on a beat. It's syncopated, meaning some notes are off the beat.

Try setting the tempo at approximately quarter = 166 or quarter = 83 and you'll get the two examples I notated.

Alternatively, you could input my example in your sequencer as notation and play it back. You'll get basically the same sound as the audio file you posted.


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## Voider (Nov 13, 2017)

I get that some notes are off the beat but I expect it to be as whole in a functionating grid as in your example @JJP, which isn't the case on my side. If I set the tempo to 166 and print the notation with cubases integrated notation reader I get this (it says 4/4 up there which is not on the screenshot) and it's still not right in the grid.

Sorry if I appear stupid right now, I'd appreciate if anyone could explain it to me like I'm a 10 year old xD


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## jonathanprice (Nov 13, 2017)

Voider said:


> And @jonathanprice what do you mean by spanning the duration of 3 eight notes - triplets? I already had the grid set to 1/16 triplets but that didn't help me understand this time signature.



@JJP has it.


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## resound (Nov 13, 2017)

Looking at the screenshot of your piano roll above, you've got your grid set to eighth note triplets and you've got the first four notes on quarter note downbeats. The second note is on the "and" of 2, meaning you need to set your grid to eighth notes and put the second note on the line between beats 2 and 3. Then the third note should be on beat 4, and so on.


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## Jdiggity1 (Nov 13, 2017)

As a side note...
If your midi track is set to Linear time base (as opposed to musical), you can use the TimeWarp tool to drag the bar lines to match your midi notes. This in effect will stretch the bar to fit around your notes, and can help in determining what tempo/meter you need to set.


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## JJP (Nov 13, 2017)

Voider said:


> If I set the tempo to 166 and print the notation with cubases integrated notation reader I get this (it says 4/4 up there which is not on the screenshot) and it's still not right in the grid.
> 
> Sorry if I appear stupid right now, I'd appreciate if anyone could explain it to me like I'm a 10 year old xD



Don't have time to explain everything right now, but it looks like your quantization grid is incorrect.

If you don't read music...
Here's a MIDI file for you to study that matches the notation I showed.


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## jonathanprice (Nov 13, 2017)

This is an alt way of notating it, where your "grid" is set to eighth notes, quarter note=165bpm. But, depending on what else you have going on, 4/4 might be more appropriate.


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## JohnG (Nov 13, 2017)

Jdiggity1 said:


> it's just syncopated 4/4.
> try tempo at 165. Your pattern will last 2 bars then change root in 3rd bar.



This ^^^

Don't overcomplicate it.


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## JJP (Nov 13, 2017)

jonathanprice said:


> This is an alt way of notating it, where your "grid" is set to eighth notes, quarter note=165bpm. But, depending on what else you have going on, 4/4 might be more appropriate.



Egad, that makes things needlessly complex. This is such a common rhythm that most musicians easily hear it in 4/4.

Unless there is some unusually specific reason to change meters, do not notate it this way. You'll be advertising that you have no sense of groove, and that seriously undermines your sex appeal.


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## JohnG (Nov 13, 2017)

it's 4/4...nothing complex, as others have said.


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## Voider (Nov 13, 2017)

JJP said:


> Don't have time to explain everything right now, but it looks like your quantization grid is incorrect.
> 
> If you don't read music...
> Here's a MIDI file for you to study that matches the notation I showed.



Thank you! I can read music but opening the midi file was just really making it faster for me.
It works now with 4/4 on 200bpm and with the grid set to 1/8, I don't know why I didn't figured it out earlier since it's in the most basic time signature of all. Maybe it was really a tempo problem, that I didn't spend enough attention to the time signature / tempo relation to make it fit in.

I mean it's basically not hard to change a tempo since it doesn't affect the relation of the notes. But if you play something live in with a tempo in your head and it doesn't match to the tempo of the DAW, then it might happen that it doesn't fit at all.


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## NoamL (Nov 13, 2017)

JJP said:


> It's basic 4/4 time. The tempo depends on how you interpret it.



The bottom one is what I hear @JJP.

@Voider when thinking of syncopated rhythms like this, I find it useful to stop thinking of the grid and instead think of groups of 16th notes (or 8th notes).

With your pattern, I hear: 123 123 123 123 12 12

or 333322. Notice it all adds up to 16. We are still definitely in 4/4 and the conductor would have no problem keeping everybody together with a simple 4/4 pattern.

IMO 333322 is just a rearrangement of 332 332. It feels "more" syncopated because you are prolonging the offbeat feeling and only giving the audience the onbeat notes at the very end.

Here is composer Chistopher Tin conducting 332 (in 8th notes) in 4/4


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## jonathanprice (Nov 13, 2017)

JJP said:


> Egad, that makes things needlessly complex. This is such a common rhythm, that most musicians easily hear it in 4/4.
> 
> Unless there is some unusually specific reason to change meters, do not notate it this way. You'll be advertising that you have no sense of groove, and that seriously undermines your sex appeal.




Well, I can't speak to my groove or otherwise, but if this were the only thing going on, I'd definitely want to conduct it mixed meter. Maybe not as groovy, but definitely more muscular.






Besides, as an orchestrator, my page rate just went up 50%.


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## JJP (Nov 13, 2017)

jonathanprice said:


> Besides, as an orchestrator, my page rate just went up 50%.



I know of an arranger who got angry about how he was being treated on a gig and wrote a chart in 1/4.

Instant 1600% pay increase!


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## jemu999 (Nov 13, 2017)

NoamL said:


> With your pattern, I hear: 123 123 123 123 12 12


This^


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## JohnG (Nov 13, 2017)

it's 4/4 for goodness' sake. It's one of the most common rhythms. If you notate it otherwise the players will think you are ignorant.


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## JJP (Nov 13, 2017)

Joking aside, John's got a good point. This rhythm is so common that notating or conducting it any way other than 4/4 will make you look clueless. There's a lot of bad notation out there. Don't be part of the problem.


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## jonathanprice (Nov 13, 2017)

I can still imagine a version with anvil-to-your-eardrums, anticipated with rolls and whole shebang, that would be better in mixed meter. But I get it. It's 4/4. That was my first unedited call, but there's a mixed meter arrangement that totally makes sense.


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## bryla (Nov 14, 2017)

jonathanprice said:


> This is an alt way of notating it, where your "grid" is set to eighth notes, quarter note=165bpm. But, depending on what else you have going on, 4/4 might be more appropriate.


IF I played along and we'd do this in mixed meter – as JJP and JohnG already has told why not – the 3/4 is a simple meter and should be notated as the compound 6/8. But still.... 4/4.

Not exactly the same rhythm but it's so common that it is all over the place in pop music: 
Never choose your conducting patterns just to show off your skills!


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## stigc56 (Nov 14, 2017)

JJP said:


> It's basic 4/4 time. The tempo depends on how you interpret it.


I think the last version is right. I would write it that way.


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## bryla (Nov 14, 2017)

stigc56 said:


> I think the last version is right. I would write it that way.


both are right.


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## jonathanprice (Nov 14, 2017)

bryla said:


> IF I played along and we'd do this in mixed meter – as JJP and JohnG already has told why not – the 3/4 is a simple meter and should be notated as the compound 6/8. But still.... 4/4.



Yeah, my bad. I was hearing the second and fourth note unaccented (edit: less-accented) in my head. That isn't the case in the original.


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## stigc56 (Nov 14, 2017)

bryla said:


> both are right.


I think the version with the slow tempo - 83 - is the most precise way to write it, because I hear a strong accent on 1 in the bar created by the two eights function as an up-beat. If I should use the fast version - tempo 166 - I would write it in alla breve, cut time.


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## mikeh-375 (Nov 14, 2017)

Like some guys have already said, it's 4/4.... occams razor, musicians' favour. 
It's a classic bossa nova rhythm too.


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