Meter or metre is a term that music has inherited from the rhythmic element of poetry, where it means the number of lines in a verse, the number of syllables in each line and the arrangement of those syllables as long or short, accented or unaccented (Scholes 1977). Hence it may also refer to the pattern of lines and accents in the verse of a hymn or ballad, for example, and so to the organization of music into regularly recurring measures or bars of stressed and unstressed "beats", indicated in Western music notation by a time signature, note-lengths and bar-lines.

The terminology of western music is notoriously imprecise in this area (Scholes 1977). MacPherson (1930, 3) preferred to speak of "time" and "rhythmic shape", Imogen Holst (1963, 17) of "measured rhythm". However, London has written a book on musical metre, which "involves our initial perception as well as subsequent anticipation of a series of beats that we abstract from the rhythm surface of the music as it unfolds in time" (London 2004, 4).

This "perception" and "abstraction" of rhythmic measure is the foundation of human instinctive musical participation, as when we divide a series of identical clock-ticks into "tick-tock-tick-tock" (Scholes, 1977). "Rhythms of recurrence" arise from the interaction of two levels of motion, the faster providing the pulse and the slower organizing the beats into repetitive groups (Yeston, 1976, 50–52). "Once a metric hierarchy has been established, we, as listeners, will maintain that organization as long as minimal evidence is present" (Lester 1986, 77).

Contents 1 Metric structure 2 Meter in song 3 Meter in dance music 4 Meter in classical music 4.1 Changing meter 4.2 Polymeter 4.3 Examples of various meter sound samples 5 Sources 6 See also 7 External links

[edit] Metric structure

The definition of a musical metre requires the identification of repeating patterns of accent forming a "pulse-group" that corresponds to the poetic foot. Normally such pulse-groups are defined by taking the accented beat as the first and counting the pulses until the next accent (MacPherson 1930, 5; Scholes 1977). Normally, even the most complex of meters may be broken down into a chain of duple and triple pulses (MacPherson 1930, 5; Scholes 1977). The level of musical organisation implied by musical meter, therefore, includes the most elementary levels of musical form (MacPherson 1930, 3).

Some music, including chant, has freer rhythm, like the rhythm of prose compared to that of verse (Scholes 1977). Some music, such as some graphically scored works since the 1950s and non-European music such as Honkyoku repertoire for shakuhachi, may be considered ametric (Karpinski 2000, 19).

Metric structure includes meter, tempo, and all rhythmic aspects which produce temporal regularity or structure, against which the foreground details or durational patterns of any piece of music are projected (Wittlich 1975, chapt. 3). Metric levels may be distinguished: the beat level is the metric level at which pulses are heard as the basic time unit of the piece. Faster levels are division levels, and slower levels are multiple levels (Wittlich 1975, chapt. 3).

Hypermeter is large-scale meter (as opposed to surface-level meter) created by hypermeasures which consist of hyperbeats (Stein 2005, 329). The term was coined by Cone (1968) while London (2004, 19) asserts that there is no perceptual distinction between meter and hypermeter. Lee (1985) and Middleton have described musical meter in terms of deep structure, using generative concepts to show how different meters (4/4, 3/4, etc) generate many different surface rhythms. Rhythmic units can be metric, intrametric, contrametric, or extrametric.

[edit] Meter in song

The concept of meter in music derives in large part from the poetic meter of song and includes not only the basic rhythm of the foot, pulse-group or figure used but also the rhythmic or formal arrangement of such figures into musical phrases (lines, couplets) and of such phrases into melodies, passages or sections (stanzas, verses) to give what Holst (1963, 18) calls "the time pattern of any song" (See also: Form of a musical passage).

Traditional and popular songs may draw heavily upon a limited range of meters, leading to interchangeability of melodies. Early hymnals commonly did not include musical notation but simply texts that could be sung to any tune known by the singers that had a matching meter. For example The Blind Boys of Alabama rendered the hymn Amazing Grace to the setting of The Animals' version of the folk song The House of the Rising Sun. This is possible because the texts share a popular basic four-line (quatrain) verse-form called ballad meter or, in hymnals, common meter, the four lines having a syllable-count of 8:6:8:6 (Hymns Ancient and Modern Revised), the rhyme-scheme usually following suit; ABAB. There is generally a pause in the melody in a cadence at the end of the shorter lines so that the underlying musical meter is 8:8:8:8 beats, the cadences dividing this musically into two symmetrical "normal" phrases of four measures each (MacPherson, 14).

Two-fold, four-fold and eight-fold division and multiplication, of phrases into measures and of phrases into passages, is indeed "common" and "normal" - the above arrangement is typical of the Baroque suite and the Bach chorale - but it is far from universal. God Save the Queen, for example, has six three-beat measures in its first phrase and eight in the second, yet it still achieves symmetry. A Twelve-bar blues has three lines, not two or four, of four measures each. In some regional music, for example Balkan music (like Bulgarian music, and the Macedonian 3+2+2+3+2 meter), a wealth of irregular or compound meters are used. Another term for this is "additive meter".

[edit] Meter in dance music

Meter is often essential to any style of dance music, such as the waltz or tango, that has instantly recognizable patterns of beats built upon a characteristic tempo and measure. The Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing (1983) defines the tango, for example, as to be danced in 2/4 time at approximately 66 beats per minute.

The basic slow step forwards or backwards, lasting for one beat, is called a "slow", so that a full "right-left" step is equal to one 2/4 measure.

But step-figures such as turns, the corte and walks-in also require "quick" steps of half the duration, each entire figure requiring 3-6 "slow" beats. Such figures may then be "amalgamated" to create a series of movements that may synchronise to an entire musical section or piece. This can be thought of as an equivalent of prosody.

[edit] Meter in classical music

In music of the common practice period (about 1600–1900), there are four different families of time signature in common use:

• Simple duple – two or four beats to a bar, each divided by two, the top number being "2" or "4" (2/4, 2/8, 2/2 … 4/4, 4/8, 4/2 …). When there are four beats to a bar, it is alternatively referred to as "quadruple" time.
• Simple triple ( 3/4 (help·info)) – three beats to a bar, each divided by two, the top number being "3" (3/4, 3/8, 3/2 …)
• Compound duple - two beats to a bar, each divided by three, the top number being "6" (6/8, 6/16, 6/4 …)
• Compound triple - three beats to a bar, each divided by three, the top number being "9" (9/8, 9/16, 9/4)

If the beat is divided into two the meter is simple, if divided into three it is compound. If each measure is divided into two it is duple and if into three it is triple. Some people also label quadruple, while some consider it as two duples. Any other division is considered additively, as a measure of five beats may be broken into duple+triple (12123) or triple+duple (12312) depending on accent. However, in some music, especially at faster tempos, it may be treated as one unit of five.

[edit] Changing meter

In twentieth century concert music, it became more common to switch meter—the end of Igor Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring is an example. A metric modulation is a modulation from one metric unit or meter to another. The use of asymmetrical rhythms also became more common: such meters include quintuple as well as more complex additive meters along the lines of 2+2+3 time, where each bar has two 2-beat units and a 3-beat unit with a stress at the beginning of each unit. Similar meters are used in various folk music as well as some music by Philip Glass. Additive meters may be conceived either as long, irregular meters or as constantly changing short meters.

[edit] Polymeter

Although sometimes used synonymously (Anon. [2001]), polymeter is the use of two metric frameworks (time signatures) simultaneously, while polyrhythm refers to the simultaneous use of two or more different patterns, which may be in the same time-signature (Anon. 1999).

Research into the perception of polymeter shows that listeners often either extract a composite pattern that is fitted to a metric framework, or focus on one rhythmic stream while treating others as "noise". This is consistent with the Gestalt psychology tenet that "the figure-ground dichotomy is fundamental to all perception" (Boring 1942, 253; London 2004, 49-50).

In "Toads Of The Short Forest" (from the album Weasels Ripped My Flesh), composer Frank Zappa explains: "At this very moment on stage we have drummer A playing in 7/8, drummer B playing in 3/4, the bass playing in 3/4, the organ playing in 5/8, the tambourine playing in 3/4, and the alto sax blowing his nose" (Mothers of Invention 1970). "Touch And Go", a hit single by The Cars, has polymetric verses, with the drums and bass playing in 5/4, while the guitar, synthesizer, and vocals are in 4/4 (the choruses are entirely in 4/4) (The Cars 1981, 15).

[edit] Examples of various meter sound samples

1. sample of how 1/4 meter (help·info) sounds in a tempo of 90bpm.
2. sample of how 2/4 meter (help·info) sounds in a tempo of 90bpm.
3. sample of how 3/4 meter (help·info) sounds in a tempo of 90bpm.
4. sample of how 4/4 meter (help·info) sounds in a tempo of 90bpm.
5. sample of how 5/8 meter (help·info) sounds in a tempo of 120bpm.

[edit] Sources

• Anon. 1999. "Polymeter." Baker's Student Encyclopedia of Music, 3 vols., ed. Laura Kuhn. New York: Schirmer-Thomson Gale; London: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0028653157. Online version 2006, at http://www.enotes.com/music-encyclopedia/polymeter (Accessed 4 April 2009).
• Anon. [2001]. "Polyrhythm". Grove Music Online. (Accessed 4 April 2009)
• The Cars (1981). Panorama (songbook). New York: Warner Bros. Publications Inc.
• Holst, Imogen (1963). The ABC of Music: A Short Practical Guide to the Basic Essentials of Rudiments, Harmony, and Form, with a foreword by Benjamin Britten. London & New York: Oxford University Press.
• Honing, Henkjan (2002). "Structure and Interpretation of Rhythm and Timing." Tijdschrift voor Muziektheorie 7(3):227–32.pdf
• The Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing (1983). Ballroom Dancing, Hodder and Stoughton.
• Karpinski, Gary S. (2000). Aural Skills Acquisition: The Development of Listening, Reading, and Performing Skills in College-Level Musicians. ISBN 0-19-511785-9.
• Krebs, Harald (2005). "Hypermeter and Hypermetric Irregularity in the Songs of Josephine Lang.". in in Deborah Stein (ed.),. Engaging Music: Essays in Music Analysis. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-517010-5. 
• Larson, Steve (2006). "Rhythmic Displacement in the Music of Bill Evans". In Structure and Meaning in Tonal Music: Festschrift in Honor of Carl Schachter, edited by L. Poundie Burstein and David Gagné, 103–22. Harmonologia Series, no. 12. Hillsdale, NY: Pendragon Press. ISBN 1576471128
• Lester, Joel (1986). The Rhythms of Tonal Music. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press. ISBN 0-8093-1282-4. 
• London, Justin (2004). Hearing in Time: Psychological Aspects of Musical Meter. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-516081-9. 
• MacPherson, Stewart (1930). Form in Music. London: Joseph Williams Ltd.
• Mothers of Invention, The. 1970. Weasels Ripped My Flesh. LP, Bizarre/Reprise MS 2028.
• Scholes, Percy (1977). "Metre" and "Rhythm", in The Oxford Companion to Music, 6th corrected reprint of the 10th ed. (1970), revised and reset, edited by John Owen Ward. London and New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0193113066
• Scruton, Roger (1997). The Aesthetics of Music, p.25ex2.6. Oxford: Clarendon Press. ISBN 0-19-816638-9.
• Waters, Keith (1996). "Blurring the Barline: Metric Displacement in the Piano Solos of Herbie Hancock". Annual Review of Jazz Studies 8:19–37.
• Wittlich, Gary E. (ed.) (1975). Aspects of Twentieth-century Music. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall. 
• Yeston, Maury (1976). The Stratification of Musical Rhythm. New Haven: Yale University Press.

[edit] See also

• Wazn
• Tala
• List of musical works in unusual time signatures
• Counting (music)

[edit] External links

• www.oddtimeobsessed.com website and Internet radio dedicated to odd meters in music. (odd time signatures)
• Catherine Schmidt-Jones. "Meter in Music". http://cnx.org/content/m12405/latest/. Retrieved 2008-11-10. 

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