Simple Time Signatures
Senior 1 · Music
Simple Time Signatures
Lesson 4 of 5
20 min
Turn on a radio in Kigali and most of the songs you hear, gospel, Afrobeat or pop, are in four-four time. It is also the time of many hymns and school songs. It is so widespread that it has a nickname, common time, and a sign of its own. Knowing it well means you can read and perform a large share of the music around you.
In four-four time each bar holds four crotchet beats. It is simple quadruple time. Count "1, 2, 3, 4" in every bar, and "1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &" when the beats are split into quavers.
The accents are strong, weak, medium, weak. Beat 1 is the strongest. Beat 3 is a little stronger than beats 2 and 4, so it carries a medium accent. That medium accent is what makes four-four feel different from two-four: in two-four every other beat is fully strong.
Four-four time is often written with a large C in place of the two numbers. It is called common time, and it means exactly the same as four-four.
Frère Jacques is a traditional French melody that is sung all over the world. Here it is in C major, with the counting and the sol-fa.
Worked example
Check bar 5 and write its counting. It holds four quavers and two crotchets. The four quavers make half × 4 = 2 beats and the two crotchets make 2 beats, so the total is 4: the bar is complete. The quavers are counted "1 & 2 &", and the crotchets fall on beats 3 and 4.
Worked example
Which notes in the song fall on the medium accent? Beat 3 of each bar: E in bars 1 and 2, the minim G in bars 3 and 4 (sung on "vous" of dormez-vous in the French words), E in bars 5 and 6, and the minim C in bars 7 and 8.
The four-beat pattern is down, left, right, up. Beat 1 always falls straight down; beat 2 moves in towards the body; beat 3 crosses out to the right; beat 4 rises to prepare the next downbeat.
Frère Jacques is a round: the same melody sung by several groups, each starting later than the one before. Split the class into four groups. Group 1 begins; group 2 starts from bar 1 when group 1 reaches bar 3; groups 3 and 4 follow, each two bars later. One person conducts in four so that all the groups keep the same beat.
Tip
Four-four: 1 2 3 4, strong-weak-MEDIUM-weak. The medium accent on beat 3 is what tells four-four apart from two-four. The large C (common time) means four-four. Conduct it down, left, right, up.
Try each question first, then check the worked solution underneath.
How many quavers fill one bar of four-four time?
Solution: 8. Four crotchet beats, each split into two quavers: 4 × 2 = 8.
A bar of four-four holds a minim and a crotchet. What is missing?
Solution: One beat: a crotchet or a crotchet rest. 2 + 1 = 3, and four beats are needed.
Which beat of a four-four bar has the medium accent, and which way does the conductor's hand move on it?
Solution: Beat 3. The hand crosses to the right.
Write the sol-fa of bars 7 and 8 of Frère Jacques.
Solution: d s, d | d s, d. The G below middle C is the soh below doh, so it is written s with a comma.
What does a large C at the start of the staff mean?
Solution: Common time, which is exactly four-four time: four crotchet beats in every bar.
Remember
Sources and credits
The lesson text, the conducting diagram, the common-time diagram and the practice were written by Ganzaa.
This lesson adapts CC BY-SA material and is shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.
