Eighth Note Triplets Options

[Phil66]

Hello folks,

As part of my injury rehab I'm learning THIS lesson as it's not too demanding on my left arm/shoulder, as a side lesson Gab suggested THIS lesson.

One thing that is confusing me, and please don't say "Just play your guitar" I have a need to understand. My question is this, Why are eighth note triplets called "eighth notes" when there are twelve of them???? Shouldn't they be called twelfth note triplets? I thought eighth notes lasted for an eighth of a bar???

I think this is the kind of thing that makes music theory difficult for me to take in.

I've asked Gab in my thread but I've posted it here to help others too.

Cheers

Phil

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This post has been edited by Phil66: Oct 6 2020, 08:50 PM

[Storm Linnebjerg]

Try to think of rhythm theory as math, really.

A whole = 1/1, half = 1/2, quarter 1/4... and so on. I'm sure you know these.

1/1 = 2/2 = 4/4 = 8/8 = 16/16 and so on.

1/4 = 2/8 = 4/16.

Here are some nice illustrations take from https://musictheorysite.wordpress.com/2015/...-simple-metre/:







However a bar of 3/4 is "complete" at a value of three quarter notes. Remember how typically we count 1, 2, 3, 4 in 4/4? Those beats are quarter notes. In 3/4 we count 1, 2, 3 and then start over. And those are also quarter notes, but there are only 3 of them to complete the bar.

An exercise could be to think about how many note values it takes to fill 7/8, 5/4 or any other time signature you might use, but be free to use any note value. Pink Floyd has some songs that use some other time signatures ("Money" for instance).

I'll give you an example:
7/8 has seven 8th notes to be complete, but as we saw earlier in this post two 8th notes equal a quarter note. This means we could also have three quarter notes plus an 8th note to fill the bar. This time signature is more advanced than 3/4 or 5/4 of course, but the principle is the same.

Thinking of these note values as divisions (they are literally divisions) can also help in understanding rhythm.
A bar of 4/4 could be made up of these combined values for instance (this is just an example, there are endless combinations):
Five 16th-notes, one 8th-note, one 16th note and 2 quarter-notes. This will add up to 4/4, which is essentially the same length as one whole-note.

You could try to do a similar execise for 3/4 using any combination of note-values, as long as they add up to a total of 3/4. The exercise can be done for any time signature.
You will probably notice that a whole-note (Remember it means "whole" as in 1/1 = 2/2 = 4/4) cannot be fitted into the bar, and the only way to play it would be to tie it over the bar-line, meaning we would write that whole-note note-value as "something that fits into 3/4" (you do the math ) and whatever is left of it is tied on in the next bar (hint: there's an example in GP file from my last post).

Remember that a "quarter note" will NOT have different lengths in 3/4, 4/4, 5/4 or 15/16 for that matter. Only thing that changes the note length of a quarter note is the BPM of the song or exercise. Time signature is not equal to the tempo (BPM), but to how the song is counted.

I'm gonna stop here before going into explaining more behind BPM as it can complicate things, but I'm more than open to continue about that

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Let's also sum up quickly about triplets from earlier:



A triplet is 3 notes in the time of 2. 8th-note triplets have a "3" marked above them (sometimes not in classical music notation), but the flags on the notes are the same as that of a regular 8th note - a single flag. Similarly 16th notes have 2 flags. 16th note triplets have 2 flags, but also a 3 above them.

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BONUS info on the blues shuffle:
In blues you often have a shuffle feel, which is actually indicated as this:



The simple explanation is that it means that two 8th notes are played as "1 quarter note triplet + 1 eigth note triplet" - you know that shuffly feel of holding the first note longer and the second one shorter. It comes from feeling it like triplets actually, and here is an illustration:



Notice how the blue square is a bit cluttered notation wise, and the shuffle marking clears up the notation a bit. However, they are still played the same way. The note values in green and red are there to illustrate subdivions. You can see how the quarter-note beat still falls on 1, 2, 3, 4, while there are eight 8th-notes to fill the bar. Meanwhile you can also see the triplets and how a quarter-note triplet equals two 8th-note triplets (you will have to compare the rhythm in the blue square with the upper rhythm of the green square). Guitar Pro does a good job of lining these up for a visual representation too.

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This post has been edited by Caelumamittendum: Oct 12 2021, 11:59 AM

[Todd Simpson]

Wow. That's the best explanation of time I think I've ever seen. I hope it gets put in our wiki! I'm gonna PM Fran.

Todd

Try to think of rhythm theory as math, really.

A whole = 1/1, half = 1/2, quarter 1/4... and so on. I'm sure you know these.

1/1 = 2/2 = 4/4 = 8/8 = 16/16 and so on.

1/4 = 2/8 = 4/16.

Here are some nice illustrations take from https://musictheorysite.wordpress.com/2015/...-simple-metre/:



plets (you will have to compare the rhythm in the blue square with the upper rhythm of the green square). Guitar Pro does a good job of lining these up for a visual representation too.

You are at GuitarMasterClass.net

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[Storm Linnebjerg]

Wow. That's the best explanation of time I think I've ever seen. I hope it gets put in our wiki! I'm gonna PM Fran.

Todd

Thanks, Todd. It was very much off the top of my head written-in-a-hurry kinda thing. I'd go more in depth with stuff like this if I were to write lesson material on it.

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