---

Rhythm & Meter

---

---

Music is not just melody and harmony, it also includes rhythm and lyrically, meter. The rhythm of a piece of music is notated by the time signature of the piece. The time signature divides the music into beats per measure.

---

Rhythm Basics

Music Meter

In music, Meter refers to the regularly recurring patterns and accents such as bars and beats. Unlike rhythm, metric onsets are not necessarily sounded, but are nevertheless implied by the performer (or performers) and expected by the listener.

Western music inherited the concept of Meter from poetry, where it denotes: 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. The first coherent system of rhythmic notation in modern Western music was based on rhythmic modes derived from the basic types of metrical unit in the quantitative Meter of classical ancient Greek and Latin poetry.

Later music for dances such as the pavane and galliard consisted of musical phrases to accompany a fixed sequence of basic steps with a defined tempo and time signature. The English word "measure", originally an exact or just amount of time, came to denote either a poetic rhythm, a bar of music, or else an entire melodic verse or dance involving sequences of notes, words, or movements that may last four, eight or sixteen bars. Meter is related to and distinguished from pulse, rhythm (grouping), and beats:

Meter is the measurement of the number of pulses between more or less regularly recurring accents. Therefore, in order for meter to exist, some of the pulses in a series must be accented—marked for consciousness - relative to others. When pulses are thus counted within a metric context, they are referred to as beats.

• A piece of music written in 4/4 time has four quarter notes to a measure.
• A piece of music written in 3/4 time has three quarter notes to a measure.
• A piece of music written in 5/4 time has five quarter notes to a measure.
• A piece of music written in 6/8 time has six eighth notes to a measure.
• A piece of music written in 9/8 time has nine eighth notes to a measure.
• A piece of music written in 12/8 time has twelve eighth notes to a measure.

---

Poetry Meter

In poetry, meter is the basic rhythmic structure of a verse or lines in verse. Many traditional verse forms prescribe a specific verse meter, or a certain set of meters alternating in a particular order. The study and the actual use of meters and forms of versification are both known as prosody.

In linguistics, prosody is the study of elements of speech that are not individual phonetic segments (vowels and consonants) but which are properties of syllables and larger units of speech, including linguistic functions such as intonation, stress, and rhythm. Such elements are known as suprasegmentals.

Prosody reflects the nuanced emotional features of the speaker or of their utterances: their obvious or underlying emotional state, the form of utterance (statement, question, or command), the presence of irony or sarcasm, certain emphasis on words or morphemes, contrast, focus, and so on. Prosody displays elements of language that are not encoded by grammar, punctuation or choice of vocabulary.

Poetry Meter in Music

When you first start learning music, especially when you're learning from chord charts with lyrics, you'll notice that more often than not, words are separated by their syllables to coincide with the time of the music. This is because music lyrics are often poetic and adhere to a rhythm.

---

Division

As beats are combined to form measures, each beat is divided into parts. The nature of this combination and division is what determines meter. Music where two beats are combined is in duple meter, music where three beats are combined is in triple meter. Music where the beat is split in two are in simple meter, music where the beat is split in three are called compound meter.
Thus,

• Simple Duple (2/4, 4/4, etc.)
• Simple Triple (3/4)
• Compound Duple (6/8)
• Compound Triple (9/8)

Divisions which require numbers, tuplets (for example, dividing a quarter note into five equal parts), are irregular divisions and subdivisions. Subdivision begins two levels below the beat level: starting with a quarter note or a dotted quarter note, subdivision begins when the note is divided into sixteenth notes.

---

Downbeat & Upbeat

The downbeat is the first beat of the bar, i.e. number 1. The upbeat is the last beat in the previous bar which immediately precedes, and hence anticipates, the downbeat. Both terms correspond to the direction taken by the hand of a conductor.

This idea of directionality of beats is significant when you translate its effect on music. The crusis of a measure or a phrase is a beginning; it propels sound and energy forward, so the sound needs to lift and have forward motion to create a sense of direction. The anacrusis leads to the crusis, but doesn't have the same 'explosion' of sound; it serves as a preparation for the crusis.

An anticipatory note or succession of notes occurring before the first barline of a piece is sometimes referred to as an upbeat figure, section or phrase. Alternative expressions include "pickup" and "anacrusis". The term anacrusis was borrowed from the field of poetry, in which it refers to one or more unstressed extrametrical syllables at the beginning of a line.

---

On-Beat & Off-Beat

In typical Western music 4/4 time, counted as "1 2 3 4, 1 2 3 4...", the first beat of the bar (downbeat) is usually the strongest accent in the melody and the likeliest place for a chord change, the third is the next strongest: these are "on" beats. The second and fourth are weaker—the "off-beats". Subdivisions (like eighth notes) that fall between the pulse beats are even weaker and these, if used frequently in a rhythm, can also make it "off-beat".

The effect can be easily simulated by evenly and repeatedly counting to four. As a background against which to compare these various rhythms a bass drum strike on the downbeat and a constant eighth note subdivision on ride cymbal have been added, which would be counted as follows (bold denotes a stressed beat):

1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 — play eighth notes and bass drum alone
1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 — the stress here on the "on" beat play But one may syncopate that pattern and alternately stress the odd and even beats, respectively:
1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 — the stress is on the "unexpected" or syncopated beat play

So "off-beat" is a musical term, commonly applied to syncopation, that emphasizes the weak even beats of a bar, as opposed to the usual on-beat. This is a fundamental technique of African polyrhythm that transferred to popular western music. According to Grove Music, the "Offbeat is [often] where the downbeat is replaced by a rest or is tied over from the preceding bar". The downbeat can never be the off-beat because it is the strongest beat in 4/4 time. Certain genres tend to emphasize the off-beat, where this is a defining characteristic of rock'n'roll and ska music.

---

Simple Meter

Simple Meter is when the beats in a measure can be divided into twos. A piece with a time signature of 3/4 has 3 crotchet (quarter note) beats in every bar. Each crotchet beat can be divided into 2 quavers (eighth notes) and so it is in simple meter or simple time. There are a total of 6 quavers in a bar arranged in twos across 3 beats.

---

---

Compound Meter

Compound Meter is when the beats in a measure can be divided into threes. While the basis of time signatures is fractions, they should not be seen as such. For example you cannot reduce a time signature of 6/8 to 3/4. The six in the top number is not a numerator, but a division. While you could notate a measure in 3/4 as having 6 quavers (six eighth notes), it's how they are grouped that makes the difference. The 8th notes in 3/4 are grouped into three sets of two while the 8th notes in 6/8 are grouped into two sets of three. 3/4 is a simple meter, while 6/8 is a compound meter.

Simple Meter

Compound Meter

Compound Meter

---

Swing & Shuffle

In swing rhythm, the pulse is divided unequally, such that certain subdivisions (typically either eighth note or sixteenth note subdivisions) alternate between long and short durations. Certain music of the Baroque and Classical era is played using notes inégales, which is analogous to swing.

In shuffle rhythm, the first note in a pair may be twice (or more) the duration of the second note. In swing rhythm, the ratio of the first note's duration to the second note's duration can range: The first note of each pair is often understood to be twice as long as the second, implying a triplet feel, but in practice the ratio is less definitive and often much more subtle. In traditional jazz, swing is typically applied to eighth notes. In other genres, such as funk and jazz-rock, swing is often applied to sixteenth notes.

In most jazz music, especially of the big band era and later, the second and fourth beats of a 4/4 measure are emphasized over the first and third, and the beats are lead-in—main-beat couplets (dah-DUM, dah-DUM....). The "dah" anticipates, or leads into, the "DUM." The "dah" lead-in may or may not be audible. It may be occasionally accented for phrasing or dynamic purposes.

or in 4/4. Note that in 4/4 the shuffle is notated as triplets.

Many consider swing and shuffle to be synonymous, but the difference is usually how it is notated and and how it is interpreted. Shuffle tends to be notated either by the notes as in the above examples or by the text "Shuffle". Swing tends be written as strait rhythm with notes to "Swing" the rhythm. The amount the piece swings is determined by what the swing ratio is.

---

Swing Ratio

The swing ratio is the ratio between the long beat and the short beat. In straight time the ratio is one to one or 1:1. With a shuffle the long beat is two times the length of the short beat and so it has a swing ratio of two to one or 2:1. Anything beyond the shuffle ratio would fall into the realm of swing.

2:1 = Shuffle

3:1 = Swing

---

Additive Rhythm & Divisive Rhythm

In music, the terms additive and divisive are used to distinguish two types of both rhythm and meter:

• Divisive: A divisive (or, alternately, multiplicative) rhythm is a rhythm in which a larger period of time is divided into smaller rhythmic units or, conversely, some integer unit is regularly multiplied into larger, equal units.compound rhythm can be considered.
• Additive: additive rhythm is where larger periods of time are constructed by concatenating (joining end to end) a series of units into larger units of unequal length, such as a 5/8 meter produced by the regular alternation of 2/8 and 3/8.

When applied to meters, the terms perfect and imperfect are sometimes used as the equivalents of divisive and additive, respectively

For example, 4 may be evenly divided by 2 or reached by adding 2 + 2. In contrast, 5 is only evenly divisible by 5 and 1 and may be reached by adding 2 or 3. Thus, 4/8 (or, more commonly, 2/4) is divisive while 5/8 is additive.

---

Divisive Rhythm

For example: 4/4 consists of one measure (whole note: 1 "Not Shown") divided into a stronger first beat and slightly less strong second beat (half notes: 1, 3 on Kick), which are in turn divided, by two weaker beats (quarter notes: 1, 2, 3, 4 on Snare), and again divided into still weaker beats (eighth notes: 1 & 2 & 3 & 4 & on Hi-Hat).

---

Additive Rhythm

Additive rhythm features nonidentical or irregular durational groups following one another at two levels, within the bar and between bars or groups of bars. In the special case of time signatures in which the upper numeral is not divisible by two or three without a fraction, the result may alternatively be called irregular, imperfect, or uneven meter, and the groupings into twos and threes are sometimes called long beats and short beats.

---

African Roots

The rhythms from Sub-Saharan Africa are the roots of many genres of music that are popular in North and South America and Western Europe. Some rhythms, especially those in the Caribbean and South America are nearly verbatim to their African roots, while others evolved from African rhythms.

Standard African Bell Pattern

A bell pattern is a rhythmic pattern of striking a hand-held bell or other instrument of the idiophone family, to make it emit a sound at desired intervals. It is often a key pattern[1][2] (also known as a guide pattern, phrasing referent, timeline, or asymmetrical timeline), in most cases it is a metal bell, such as an agogô, gankoqui, or cowbell, or a hollowed piece of wood, or wooden claves. In band music, bell patterns are also played on the metal shell of the timbales, and drum kit cymbals.

The Bembé

The most commonly used key pattern in sub-Saharan Africa is the seven-stroke figure known in ethnomusicology as the standard pattern, or bembé. The standard pattern is expressed in both a triple-pulse (12/8 or 6/8) and a duple-pulse (4/4 or 2/2) structure. Many North American percussionists refer to the triple-pulse form as the 6/8 bell. The standard pattern has strokes on: 1, 1a, 2& 2a, 3&, 4, 4a.

In 12/8: 1 & a 2 & a 3 & a 4 & a || X . X . X X . X . X . X || In 4/4: 1 e & a 2 e & a 3 e & a 4 e & a || X . . X . . X X . . X . X . . X ||

---

12/8 Bell Patterns

---

---

---

---

---

4/4 Bell Patterns

---

---

---

---

---

Single-Celled Bell Patterns

Some bell patterns are single-celled and therefore, not key patterns. A single-celled pattern cycles over two main beats, while a two-celled key pattern cycles over four main beats. The most basic single-celled pattern in duple-pulse structure consists of three strokes, known in Cuban music as tresillo.

---

Tresillo

The tresillo (Cuban term) is the most basic single-celled figure in duple-pulse structure.

---

Cinquillo

The five-stroke cinquillo (Cuban term) is a common single-celled variant (two additional strokes)

---

Off Beats

In some rhythms the bell just plays repeating cycles of offbeats.

---

Polyrhythms

Polyrhythm is the simultaneous use of two or more rhythms that are not readily perceived as deriving from one another, or as simple manifestations of the same meter. The rhythmic layers may be the basis of an entire piece of music (cross-rhythm), or a momentary section. Polyrhythms can be distinguished from irrational rhythms, which can occur within the context of a single part; polyrhythms require at least two rhythms to be played concurrently, one of which is typically an irrational rhythm. Concurrently in this context means within the same rhythmic cycle. The underlying pulse, whether explicit or implicit can be considered one of the concurrent rhythms.

---

Caribbean & South America

Son Clave

The clave is a rhythmic pattern used as a tool for temporal organization in Brazilian and Cuban music. In Spanish, clave literally means key, clef, code, or keystone. It is present in a variety of genres such as rumba, conga, son, mambo, salsa, songo, timba and Afro-Cuban jazz. The five-stroke clave pattern represents the structural core of many Cuban rhythms. The study of rhythmic methodology, especially in the context of Afro-Cuban music, and how it influences the mood of a piece is known as clave theory. The most common clave pattern used in Cuban popular music is called the Son Clave, named after the Cuban musical genre of the same name. Clave is the basic period, composed of two rhythmically opposed cells, one antecedent and the other consequent. The Son Clave is the basis for other rhythms. It is the undelying pulse on which many other African/Latin rhythms are based.

Son Clave 3:2 Two Measures

---

Son Clave 3:2 One Measure

---

Son Clave 2:3

---

Son Clave 2:3 One Measure

---

Tresillo

In Cuban popular music, the first three strokes of son clave are also known collectively as tresillo, a Spanish word meaning triplet i.e. three almost equal beats in the same time as two main beats. The beats can be thought of as two long beats and one short beat.

---

Bo Diddley Beat

The Bo Diddley beat is a syncopated musical rhythm that is widely used in rock and roll and pop music. The beat is named after rhythm and blues musician Bo Diddley, who introduced and popularized the beat with his self-titled debut single, "Bo Diddley", in 1955. The beat is essentially the Afro-Cuban clave rhythm or based on the clave or a variation thereof.

Here is a list of some popular songs that use the Bo Diddley Beat: Not Fade Away - Buddy Holly, Willie and the Hand Jive - Johnny Otis, His Latest Flame - Elvis Presley, I want Candy - The Strangeloves, Magic Bus - The Who, Panic In Detroit - David Bowie, Bad Blood - Neil Sedaka, American Girl - Tom Petty, (She's So) Selfish - The Knack, Cuban Slide - The Pretenders, Faith - George Michaels, Desire - U2, Black Horse and the Cherry Tree - KT Tunstall

---

Rumba Clave

Rumba is a secular genre of Cuban music involving dance, percussion, and song. It originated in the northern regions of Cuba, mainly in urban Havana and Matanzas, during the late 19th century. It is based on African music and dance traditions, namely Abakuá and yuka, as well as the Spanish-based coros de clave.

Rumba Clave 3:2

---

Rumba Clave 3:2 in one measure

---

Rumba Clave 2:3

---

Rumba Clave 3:2 in one measure

---

Bossa Nova

Bossa nova is a relaxed style of samba developed in the late 1950s and early 1960s in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It is mainly characterized by a "different beat" that altered the harmonies with the introduction of unconventional chords and an innovative syncopation of traditional samba from a single rhythmic division. The "bossa nova beat" is characteristic of a samba style and not of an autonomous genre. The bossa nova wave became popular around the world; this increased popularity helped to renew samba and contributed to the modernization of Brazilian music in general.

The so-called Bossa Nova Clave (or Brazilian Clave) has a similar rhythm to that of the Son Clave, but the second note on the two-side is delayed by one pulse (subdivision). The rhythm is typically played as a snare rim pattern in Bossa Nova Music.

---

---

5/4 Clave

The five four clave contains four notes, two long notes followed by two short notes. One of the most familiar song to use this particular rhythm is the Mission Impossible theme song.

---

Calypso

Calypso is a style of Caribbean music that originated in Trinidad and Tobago during the early to mid-19th century and spread to the rest of the Caribbean Antilles by the mid-20th century. Its rhythms can be traced back to West African Kaiso and the arrival of French planters and their slaves from the French Antilles in the 18th century.

It is characterized by highly rhythmic and harmonic vocals, and was historically most often sung in a French creole and led by a griot. As calypso developed, the role of the griot became known as a chantuelle and eventually, calypsonian. As English replaced "patois" (Antillean) as the dominant language, calypso migrated into English, and in so doing it attracted more attention from the government. It allowed the masses to challenge the doings of the unelected Governor and Legislative Council, and the elected town councils of Port of Spain and San Fernando. Calypso continued to play an important role in political expression.

Calypso in the Caribbean includes a range of genres, including benna in Antigua and Barbuda; mento, a style of Jamaican folk music that greatly influenced ska, the precursor to rocksteady, and reggae; spouge, a style of Barbadian popular music; Dominica cadence-lypso, which mixed calypso with the cadence of Haiti; and soca music, a style of kaiso/calypso, with influences from chutney, soul, funk, Latin and cadence-lypso.

---

List of Popular Calypso Artists

---

Mento

Mento is a style of Jamaican folk music that predates and has greatly influenced ska and reggae music. It is a fusion of African rhythmic elements and European elements, which reached peak popularity in the 1940s and 1950s. Mento typically features acoustic instruments, such as acoustic guitar, banjo, hand drums, and the rhumba box - a large mbira in the shape of a box that can be sat on while played. The rhumba box carries the bass part of the music.

Mento is often confused with calypso, a musical form from Trinidad and Tobago. Although the two share many similarities, they are separate and distinct musical forms. During the mid-20th century, mento was conflated with calypso, and mento was frequently referred to as calypso, kalypso and mento calypso. Mento singers frequently used calypso songs and techniques. As in calypso, mento uses topical lyrics with a humorous slant, commenting on poverty and other social issues. Sexual innuendo is also common.

---

Ska

Ska is a music genre that originated in Jamaica in the late 1950s and was the precursor to rocksteady and reggae. It combined elements of Caribbean mento and calypso with American jazz and rhythm and blues. Ska is characterized by a walking bass line accented with rhythms on the off beat. It was developed in Jamaica in the 1960s when Stranger Cole, Prince Buster, Clement "Coxsone" Dodd, and Duke Reid formed sound systems to play American rhythm and blues and then began recording their own songs. In the early 1960s, ska was the dominant music genre of Jamaica and was popular with British mods and with many skinheads.

Music historians typically divide the history of ska into three periods: the original Jamaican scene of the 1960s; the 2 Tone ska revival of the late 1970s in Britain, which fused Jamaican ska rhythms and melodies with the faster tempos and harder edge of punk rock forming ska-punk; and third wave ska, which involved bands from a wide range of countries around the world, in the late 1980s and 1990s.

List of Popular Ska Bands

---

Rocksteady

Rocksteady is a music genre that originated in Jamaica around 1966. A successor of ska and a precursor to reggae, rocksteady was the dominant style of music in Jamaica for nearly two years, performed by many of the artists who helped establish reggae, including harmony groups such as the Techniques, the Paragons, the Heptones and the Gaylads; soulful singers such as Alton Ellis, Delroy Wilson, Bob Andy, Ken Boothe and Phyllis Dillon; musicians such as Jackie Mittoo, Lynn Taitt and Tommy McCook. The term rocksteady comes from a popular (slower) dance style mentioned in the Alton Ellis song "Rocksteady", that matched the new sound. Some rocksteady songs became hits outside Jamaica, as with ska, helping to secure the international base reggae music has today.

---

---

Reggae Beats

---

Reggae is a music genre that originated in Jamaica in the late 1960s. The term also denotes the modern popular music of Jamaica and its diaspora. A 1968 single by Toots and the Maytals, "Do the Reggay", was the first popular song to use the word reggae, effectively naming the genre and introducing it to a global audience. Reggae is rooted out from traditional Jamaican Kumina, Pukkumina, Revival Zion, Nyabinghi, and burru drumming. Jamaican reggae music evolved out of the earlier genres mento, ska and rocksteady.

List of Popular Reggae Bands

---

One Drop Rhythm

One drop rhythm is a reggae style drum beat. Popularized by Carlton Barrett, long-time drummer of Bob Marley and the Wailers, the creator is disputed, and it has been attributed to drummers including Barrett, and his brother Aston, and Winston Grennan.

Characteristics

The backbeat is characterized by the dominant snare drum stroke (usually a click produced by cross-sticking) and bass drum both sounding on the third beat of every four, while beat one is left empty. Thus, the expected hit on beat one is "dropped," creating the one-drop effect. Dropping out the bass on the "one" of the measure further accentuates the downbeat of the drums creating the rhythm.

A List of some songs that use One Drop

---

---

---

---

Reggae Characteristics

Stylistically, reggae incorporates some of the musical elements of rhythm and blues (R&B), jazz, mento, calypso, African, and Latin American music, as well as other genres. Reggae scenes consist of two guitars, one for rhythm and one for lead—drums, congas, and keyboards, with a couple of vocalists.

Reggae is played in 4/4 time because the symmetrical rhythmic pattern does not lend itself to other time signatures. One of the most easily recognizable elements is offbeat rhythms; staccato chords played by a guitar or piano (or both) on the offbeats of the measure, often referred to as the skank.

This rhythmic pattern accents the second beat and the fourth beat in each bar and combines with the drum's emphasis on beat three to create a unique sense of phrasing. The reggae offbeat can be counted so that it falls between each count as an "and" (example: 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and ... , etc.) or counted as a half-time feel at twice the tempo so it falls on beats 2 and 4. This is in contrast to the way most other popular genres focus on beat one, the "downbeat".

The tempo of reggae is usually slower than both ska and rocksteady. It is this slower tempo, the guitar/piano offbeats, the emphasis on the third beat, and the use of syncopated, melodic bass lines that differentiate reggae from other music, although other musical styles have incorporated some of these innovations.

---

---

---

Rockers

The rockers rhythm is the one drop with a steady bass drum on every eighth note, though one drop is slower than a ska pattern, and rockers is often slower than one drop.

A list of some songs that use Steppers

• Is This Love - Bob Marley
• Exodus - Bob Marley
• Buffalo Soldier - Bob Marley
• Satisfy My Soul - Bob Marley
• Jamming - Bob Marley
• Lion - Burning Spear

---

Steppers

The steppers rhythm is essentially the one drop with a steady bass drum on every quarter note.

---

Classical Western Music

Waltz

A waltz is dance music in triple meter, often written in 3/4 time. A waltz typically sounds one chord per measure, and the accompaniment style particularly associated with the waltz is to play the root of the chord on the first beat, the upper notes on the second and third beats. The strength of the beats are strong, weak, weak.

---

Lombard Rhythm or Scotch Snap

The Lombard rhythm or Scotch snap is a syncopated musical rhythm in which a short, accented note is followed by a longer one. This reverses the pattern normally associated with the shuffle or swing. The lombard pattern in 12/8 follows:

And in 4/4:

---

Modern Western Music

Charleston

---

Shuffle Pattern

A shuffle pattern alternates between long notes and short notes. The long notes fall on the beat while the short notes fall on the off-beat. A shuffle pattern can be notated in 12/8 as follows:

or in 4/4. Note that in 4/4 the shuffle is notated as triplets.

---

Rock Beats 4/4

The following are examples of variations of really simple rock drum patterns played on the bass drum, snare drum and hi-hat cymbal. The first four examples show some variations for the bass drum pattern. The fifth example shows an eighth note pattern on the hi-hat.

In the following: Rests for each voice are not illustrated.
The count is (including the off-beat eighth notes): 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + (Pronounced "one and two and three and four and")

---

Four on the Floor - Bass hits on 1, 2, 3, and 4. Snare hits on 2 and 4. Hi hat hits on 1, 2, 3, and 4.

---

Bass hits on 1, and 3. Snare hits on 2 and 4. Hi hat hits on 1, 2, 3, and 4.

---

Bass hits on 1, 2+, 3, 4+. Snare hits on 2 and 4. Hi hat hits on 1, 2, 3, and 4.

---

Bass hits on 1, 1+, 3, 3+. Snare hits on 2 and 4. Hi hat hits on 1, 2, 3, and 4.

---

Some Patterns with Open Hi-Hat

Bass hits on 1, and 3. Snare hits on 2 and 4. Hi hat hits on 1, 1+, 2, 2+, 3, 3+, 4, and in the 4+ hit the hi-hat is open.

---

Bass hits on 1, 2+, 3, 4+. Snare hits on 2 and 4. Hi hat hits on 1, 1+, 2, 2+, 3, open 3+, 4, 4+.

---

The Country Train Beat - Straight

Bass hits on 1, 3. Snare hits on 1, 1+, 2, 2+, 3, 3+, 4, 4+. With acccent on 2 and 4

---

---

The Jungle Beat

Bass hits on 1, 3. Snare hits on 2, 4. Floor Tom hits on 1, 1+, 2, 2+, 3, 3+, 4, 4+. With acccent on 1 and 3

---

Rock Beats 6/8

Six Eight time is used in double jigs, jotas, zortzikos, polkas, sega, salegy, tarantella, marches, barcarolles, loures, and some rock music. Anapestic tetrameter poetry also fits into 6/8 time when said aloud. The following are some examples of basic six eight patterns played on the bass drum, snare drum and hi-hat cymbal.

---

---

---

---

---

---

Rock Beats 12/8

Common in slower blues and doo-wop; also used more recently in rock music. Can also be heard in some jigs like "The Irish Washerwoman".

---

---

This is an example of a 12/8 shuffle

---

---

---

---

Terms

---

Tempo

---