Using John Varney's rhythm wheel to differentiate 3/4 and 6/8 time signatures • Hacker News Board

Re: Using John Varney's rhythm wheel to differentiate 3/4 and 6/8 time signatures

#71

Post by lmm » Sat, Aug 25, 2018, 2:45 PM UTC

nerflad wrote: post #40

DavidPiper wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not the case. While some inexperienced composers/arrangers/scorers may transcribe 3/4 pieces in 6/8 to make the score look better, it is a fundamentally incorrect thing to do. 3/4 has one significant beat per bar: ONE two three | ONE two three - Think any waltz you've ever heard. 6/8 has two siginficant beats per bar: ONE two three Four five six | ONE to three Four five six - Think Follow the Yellow Brick Roa…

> ONE two three | ONE two three This phrase also has two significant beats. There's just a barline in the middle. See my point?

That's an argument that 3/4 is the same as 6/4, not an argument that 3/4 is the same as 6/8.

If your phrases really go ONE two three FOUR five six then notate your piece as 3/8. 6/8 is for ONE two three Four five six SEVEN eight nine Ten eleven twelve, where beat four is significant, but not as significant as beat one.

Of course you do have patterns of bar phrases, not all first-beats-of-the-bar are equal in a larger piece, and where you draw the line between a bar and a phrase is ultimately a matter of taste and judgement. But a player will absolutely understand 6/8 and 3/4 differently; a run of quavers in 6/8 is ONE two three Four five six, a run of quavers in 3/4 is ONE two Three four Five six.

Re: Using John Varney's rhythm wheel to differentiate 3/4 and 6/8 time signatures

#72

Post by greglindahl » Sat, Aug 25, 2018, 3:14 PM UTC

sparky_z wrote: post #57

greglindahl wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have no idea what the intent of the artist is, but it's worth noting that the overwhelming majority of rock music is in ballad meter, not 3. So this is extremely unusual music for the audience this artist usually plays for. For this piece, I think it's a waltz because it's in 3/4, at a typical waltz tempo, and it "feels like" a waltz, which is to say that the emphasis on the beats and their precise timing feels lik…

Well, my whole argument was that while it superficially "feels like" a waltz in some ways, it's clearly in 6/8 because of how the underlying beat is grouped. That's what matters. Just as a sanity check, I decided to look up some sheet music and see how others have interpreted the song. Every single one that I can find notates it in 6/8 (interestingly with some individual measures in 9/8). http://www.musiclassroom.com…

The overwhelming majority of waltzes are notated in 3/4 with the measures in pairs, because it takes 2 measures (6 dance steps) to do one rotation of a rotary waltz. The two downbeats are equal. The music video on YouTube of Seal performing this song has equal downbeats.

If you write it in 6/8 instead, many musicians will emphasize 4 less than 1.

I think that dancers knowing music and musicians knowing dance is extremely useful. It changes your opinions about notation.

Re: Using John Varney's rhythm wheel to differentiate 3/4 and 6/8 time signatures

#73

Post by dahart » Sat, Aug 25, 2018, 3:52 PM UTC

quadrangle wrote: post #20

nerflad wrote: post #12

There is no difference between 3/4 and 6/8 unless you are trying to decide on which one makes your score easier to read. It's just different ways of conceptualizing the phrase. Mathematically (and therefore rhythmically) they are the same, of course. Maybe the site is trying to make some other differentiation but it didn't work at all in Firefox. (Source: I am a professional drummer)

You may be a professional drummer, but you are of some sort of mindset that has you in denial of the concept of convention . You also certainly feel rhythm but do not intellectually understand it. Rhythm is a cognitive/perceptual/psychological process whereby we relate events to one another. It is not mere timing. When you impose in your mind a structure on a timing by giving extra attention to certain events, then y…

> You may be a professional drummer, but you are of some sort of mindset that has you in denial of the concept of convention.

Huh, maybe you are violently agreeing with @nerflad? I read the parent comment to mean that convention is the only thing that matters.

> You also certainly feel rhythm but do not intellectually understand it.

Why the snark and personal attack? You have no idea what @nerflad understands intellectually. I’m always surprised when someone with your level of HN karma hasn’t learned to avoid insults and condescension in comments like yours. Are you threatened by the idea that there’s more that one right way to write a tempo?

> Rhythm is a cognitive/perceptual/psychological process whereby we relate events to one another.

I think that definition of rhythm is very bad. Rhythm can exist without a human perceiving it. Google dictionary’s definition sounds better: “a strong, regular, repeated pattern of movement or sound”. So does Wikipedia’s: “Rhythm (from Greek ῥυθμός, rhythmos, "any regular recurring motion, symmetry") generally means a "movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions". This general meaning of regular recurrence or pattern in time can apply to a wide variety of cyclical natural phenomena having a periodicity or frequency of anything from microseconds to several seconds (as with the riff in a rock music song); to several minutes or hours, or, at the most extreme, even over many years.”

So, in summary, the meaning of the word pretty much is mere timing. Your treatise on perceptual psychology is talking about something else.

> The 3/4 vs 6/8 distinction is a historic convention, not something in the math.

Isn’t that exactly what @nerflad was saying??

Re: Using John Varney's rhythm wheel to differentiate 3/4 and 6/8 time signatures

#74

Post by roywiggins » Sat, Aug 25, 2018, 4:59 PM UTC

sparky_z wrote: post #31

greglindahl wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a waltz. Normally waltzes are notated in 3/4.

Why do you say it's a waltz? The intended audience is clearly not ballroom dancers. You might argue that anything in "waltz time" is a waltz, but then your argument becomes circular. You would be saying it's a waltz because it's in 3/4 time and it's in 3/4 time because it's a waltz.

For what it's worth, it's quite easy to dance a waltz to the song. It's got enough of an oom pa pa that a waltz is very natural.

Possibly it makes more sense to musicians to notate it as 6/8 because the triples come in pairs. It's still a waltz though, and dancers' instinct will be to break it into triples. It's not hard to scramble a 6/8 signature to make it not a waltz (don't put downbeats every three, and it isn't a waltz) but that song definitely doesn't do that.

Re: Using John Varney's rhythm wheel to differentiate 3/4 and 6/8 time signatures

#75

Post by roywiggins » Sat, Aug 25, 2018, 5:02 PM UTC

greglindahl wrote: post #72

sparky_z wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, my whole argument was that while it superficially "feels like" a waltz in some ways, it's clearly in 6/8 because of how the underlying beat is grouped. That's what matters. Just as a sanity check, I decided to look up some sheet music and see how others have interpreted the song. Every single one that I can find notates it in 6/8 (interestingly with some individual measures in 9/8). http://www.musiclassroom.com…

The overwhelming majority of waltzes are notated in 3/4 with the measures in pairs, because it takes 2 measures (6 dance steps) to do one rotation of a rotary waltz. The two downbeats are equal. The music video on YouTube of Seal performing this song has equal downbeats. If you write it in 6/8 instead, many musicians will emphasize 4 less than 1. I think that dancers knowing music and musicians knowing dance is extre…

It certainly has the feel of a waltz. It's not that hard to make a 6/8 time signature not sound like a waltz (as you say, just hide the second down beat, or move it). But it's very very easy to waltz to the song.

Whether it makes more sense to musicians write it 6/8 or not, I have no idea, but it's still a waltz.

Re: Using John Varney's rhythm wheel to differentiate 3/4 and 6/8 time signatures

#76

Post by yellowapple » Sat, Aug 25, 2018, 7:35 PM UTC

dylan604 wrote: post #44

nerflad wrote: post #12

There is no difference between 3/4 and 6/8 unless you are trying to decide on which one makes your score easier to read. It's just different ways of conceptualizing the phrase. Mathematically (and therefore rhythmically) they are the same, of course. Maybe the site is trying to make some other differentiation but it didn't work at all in Firefox. (Source: I am a professional drummer)

In a non-Archer sense of the word, how do percussionists think of phrasing? As a non-percussionist/string player, a phrase was a great place to take a breath for us regular humans that can't circular breath. The basic definition I was always given was 8 bars. That was always worked well for me. As a DJ, the 8 bars would tell me the percussionist is due for a cymbal crash ;-). I always got a chuckle when I'd get a pie…

Depending on the context, you might actually want to "stagger-breathe" to avoid breathing right on the phrase boundary. You generally don't want the breaths to be noticeable, especially if it's in the middle of a long sustained note. Instead, you'd take a breath on one measure mid-phrase, another player would take a breath in the next measure or so, etc. to keep the note going. When I marched in a drum and bugle corps, we'd actually all have individually preassigned breath marks.

Of course, this only works well if you have multiple players per part. This ain't really practical outside of marching or symphonic/orchestral contexts.

Re: Using John Varney's rhythm wheel to differentiate 3/4 and 6/8 time signatures

#77

Post by yellowapple » Sat, Aug 25, 2018, 7:39 PM UTC

UncleMeat wrote: post #52

nerflad wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(1) 2 3 | (1) 2 3 and (1) 2 3 (4) 5 6 are rhythmically identical. You're only conceptualizing them differently. Anyway, thank you for taking the time to write this myopic and extremely condescending explanation of my area of study. I will be sure to return the favor someday.

They have different hierarchies. In typical 3/4, the first beat of each measure is given equal weight. In typical 6/8, the first beat is given a bit more weight than the fourth beat. Same reason why we treat 2/4 and 4/4 differently.

2/4 v. 4/4 is more about the number of quarter notes (beats) per measure (2 v. 4, respectively).

Similar deal with 3/4 v. 6/8. In 3/4, you have 3 beats per measure, subdivided into halves (duplets). In 6/8, you have 2 beats per measure, subdivided into thirds (triplets).

Re: Using John Varney's rhythm wheel to differentiate 3/4 and 6/8 time signatures

#78

Post by yellowapple » Sat, Aug 25, 2018, 7:42 PM UTC

tgb wrote: post #10

Hm, not sure I like the example for 6/8 time. It's so much slower tempo than 3/4 time example that it's very hard to compare the two for me.

Agreed. The differences are much clearer at equal BPM (or even equal measures per minute).

Re: Using John Varney's rhythm wheel to differentiate 3/4 and 6/8 time signatures

#79

Post by yellowapple » Sat, Aug 25, 2018, 7:47 PM UTC

monochromatic wrote: post #8

Site doesn’t work for shit on mobile.

Works fine for me on Firefox for Android (surprisingly, since a lot of these sorts of things tend to only work on Chrome). You just have to tap the things instead of hovering over them.

Re: Using John Varney's rhythm wheel to differentiate 3/4 and 6/8 time signatures

#80

Post by yellowapple » Sat, Aug 25, 2018, 7:59 PM UTC

I think a lot of the confusion/misunderstanding around here has to do with how folks are defining "beat"; seems like folks are defining the "beat" to be each eighth-note, when (in my experience) it's actually each quarter note, whether plain (for 3/4) or dotted (for 6/8).

That is: 6/8 is approximated not by 3/4, but rather by a very-triplet-heavy 2/4.

The article explains this somewhat ("one and two and three and" v. "one and ah two and ah"), but the comparisons/examples don't really do a good job of demonstrating it in practice.