16th notes etc - what are they?

[EssentialTension]

[quote name='Eight' post='478923' date='May 4 2009, 12:33 PM']I've seen beats divided into 5 or 7 (barred as triplets are but with a 7 instead of a 3 written above (or underneath)).[/quote]

Those would be quintuplets (5 in the time of 4) and septuplets (7 in the time of 6) just as triplets are 3 in the time of 2. I guess you could also have nonuplets (9 in time of 8), undecuplets (11 in the time of 10) etc.

[Eight]

[quote name='EssentialTension' post='478927' date='May 4 2009, 12:43 PM']Those would be quintuplets (5 in the time of 4) and septuplets (7 in the time of 6) just as triplets are 3 in the time of 2. I guess you could also have nonuplets (9 in time of 8), undecuplets (11 in the time of 10) etc.[/quote]
Yup.

My head was screaming from the idea of these "irrational" time signatures so I couldn't get the proper terms out. To be quite honest, I now have a massive headache thinking about the whole thing.

[MacDaddy]

[quote name='lowdown' post='478866' date='May 4 2009, 11:47 AM']So do i,
In tandem with the time sig, it all makes numerical sense,
especially for the beginner.
Garry[/quote]

not necessarily, it can be more confusing. If you are in 12/8 and you are talking about 1/8 notes, then you have three 1/8 notes per beat and twelve 1/8 notes to the bar.

[steve-soar]

Apologies for last night.

[jakenewmanbass]

[quote name='Musky' post='478910' date='May 4 2009, 12:21 PM']Hmm... [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_signatures#.22Irrational.22_meters"]this[/url] would seem to suggest that's not the case.[/quote]
I stand corrected post duly withdrawn... however there is enough info early on in the thread to get the OP through his question and as always it's good to have new info brought to one's attention.

It's worth noting though that these examples lie at the very edges of music and even though theoretically accurate they often serve to confuse when introduced at this level. (they have literally been used by a handful of writers in the history of music).
As the article itself points out:

"It is arguable whether the use of these signatures makes metric relationships clearer or more obscure to the musician; it is always possible to write a passage using non-"irrational" signatures by specifying a relationship between some note length in the previous bar and some other in the succeeding one. "

Edited May 4, 2009 by jakesbass

[jakenewmanbass]

[quote name='steve-soar' post='479126' date='May 4 2009, 05:20 PM']Apologies for last night. [/quote]
No need to apologise Steve

[steve-soar]

[Linus27]

[quote name='cytania' post='478548' date='May 3 2009, 09:12 PM']Classic rock bass sound is 'pumpin eigths', you know 'ba-ba-ba-ba-ba'. Sixteenths is double that, a real fast rocker or punk type song.

Playing these is actually harder than it sounds, your fingers sort of get bored and deviate. When I started bass I quickly latched onto boogie-lines and other classic rock'n'roll stuff but rock eigths seemed obvious, easy. How wrong I was. Getting that rock style consistent and on-the-beat has taken alot of the last year...[/quote]

Glad I'm not the only one who knows this. A lot of people slag Adam Clayton off for his bass player. Yet, a lot of producers say that his timing is spot on. Not many bass players can play as tight on the beat and as consistant as he can.

[hopkinsgm]

[quote name='northstreet' post='478813' date='May 4 2009, 10:37 AM']...The last time I talked about quavers the singer went and bought some crisps...[/quote]
I'm failing to see why that would be a bad thing?

G

[risingson]

Wow, looks like this topic has deviated a lot from the original question! Poor guy, he only wanted to know what 16th notes were, a couple of the posts seem a tad patronising IMO.

In regards to the whole 'American corruption' of semiquaver vs. 16th notes, well actually I fear the Americans might be winning the war on the technical vocab... I know most of the professional musicians and Jazz musicians subscribe to the same lingo nowadays. I actually think it makes more sense.

[BassMunkee]

[quote name='OutToPlayJazz' post='478580' date='May 3 2009, 09:40 PM']Here you go...



As has already been mentioned, the Americans use the following names for note lengths - I've provided the English translations as well.

Whole Note - Semibreve - 4 beats
Dotted Half Note - Dotted Minim - 3 beats
Half Note - Minim - 2 beats
Quarter Note - Crotchet - 1 beat
Eighth Note - Quaver - 1/2 beat
Sixteenth Note - Semiquaver - 1/4 beat[/quote]
THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU.
This is a very helpful post and I've found it very useful.
For the record I haven't found any part of it to be patronising or sarcastic or anything else.

[BigBeefChief]

I love the way guys like OutToPlayJazz and Jakesbass explain things. You can tell that noy only do they know their stuff, but also have a lot of experience in explaining it to numpties like me!

Good work.

[lowdown]

[quote name='MacDaddy' post='479114' date='May 4 2009, 05:04 PM']not necessarily, it can be more confusing. If you are in 12/8 and you are talking about 1/8 notes, then you have three 1/8 notes per beat and twelve 1/8 notes to the bar.[/quote]

Is that not numerical?
As opposed to 3 [b]quavers[/b] to the beat,
and 12 [b]quavers[/b] in the bar.

I think my post was a bit confussing, sorry

Garry

[MacDaddy]

[quote name='lowdown' post='479811' date='May 5 2009, 12:36 PM']Is that not numerical?
As opposed to 3 [b]quavers[/b] to the beat,
and 12 [b]quavers[/b] in the bar.

I think my post was a bit confussing, sorry

Garry[/quote]

If we are talking about 1/8 notes, then wouldn't you expect there to be 8 of them?

In 12/8 I think explaining 3 1/8 to the beat, and 12 1/8 to the bar, is more confusing.

In 3/4 there are 6 1/8 notes per bar, it loses all sense once we move out of 4/4.

I'm happy using the conventions developed over 1000 years of written notation .

[MacDaddy]

[quote name='OutToPlayJazz' post='478580' date='May 3 2009, 09:40 PM']- I've provided the English translations as well.[/quote]

Was it Oscar Wilde, something along the lines of 'England and The United States, 2 countries divided by the same language'

[Twigman]

1/18th notes will be semiquaver triplets in 6/8 time

Edited May 5, 2009 by Twigman

[dlloyd]

[quote name='Twigman' post='480066' date='May 5 2009, 04:35 PM']1/18th notes will be semiquaver triplets in 6/8 time[/quote]

No they wouldn't. The number of notes in the bar is only relevant in common time and, even then triplets etc. don't affect the naming.

[Cornfedapache]

Blimey... A muso argument!

[dlloyd]

[quote name='Cornfedapache' post='481297' date='May 6 2009, 06:29 PM']Blimey... A muso argument![/quote]

Not really.

[bassicinstinct]

[BottomEndian]

[quote name='Musky' post='478910' date='May 4 2009, 12:21 PM']Hmm... [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_signatures#.22Irrational.22_meters"]this[/url] would seem to suggest that's not the case.[/quote]
Wow. I've never, [i]ever[/i] come across those before. They make zero sense to me. For a bit of contrast, if you scroll up a bit to the "Other variants" subsection preceding that one, it mentions Carl Orff's idea of replacing the lower number with the note value itself. Genius. So simple. 6/8 becomes 2 over a dotted crotchet.

(Mind you, I've sung Orff's [i]Carmina Burana[/i] a few times, and I've never seen that notation either. I suppose the editors swapped them all out for the traditional approach. )