Would you please explain the 4/2 time signature in the Rookie Tour Lesson 8 Note Duration? For some reason, if it 2/2 it would make sense for me.
Thank you very much.
Question: Rookie Tour Lesson 8 Note Duration
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SammyNguyen
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davidsides
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Re: Question: Rookie Tour Lesson 8 Note Duration
Sure thing.
So there are two key takeaways from a 4/2 time signature:
1. The half note is assigned the beat
2. It takes 4 half notes to fill a measure.
While 2/2 is definitely a more common time signature, we decided to go with 4/2 with our Rookie arrangements to ultimately make the sheet music look friendlier for beginners. By assigning the half note to the beat, we are allowed to deliver the music to our Rookie users and keep the integrity of the music while avoiding the use of notes with flags/beams. This makes the music look less intimidating.
The other key element to this time signature is that we went with a 4-count rather than a 2 count. In 4/2, you count to 4 and in 2/2 you'd count to 2. We decided to use a 4-count because "4-counts" is a standard in music. We wanted to have the Rookie users get familiar with this standard count from the beginning so that as they move on to 4/4 lessons later, there will at least be some familiarity with the count.
You'll notice that our rookie lessons have dotted lines every other measure. This is something we did to allow for the 4 count as users "count over the bar line" to get from one measure to the next.
Let me know if that clears things up for you.
So there are two key takeaways from a 4/2 time signature:
1. The half note is assigned the beat
2. It takes 4 half notes to fill a measure.
While 2/2 is definitely a more common time signature, we decided to go with 4/2 with our Rookie arrangements to ultimately make the sheet music look friendlier for beginners. By assigning the half note to the beat, we are allowed to deliver the music to our Rookie users and keep the integrity of the music while avoiding the use of notes with flags/beams. This makes the music look less intimidating.
The other key element to this time signature is that we went with a 4-count rather than a 2 count. In 4/2, you count to 4 and in 2/2 you'd count to 2. We decided to use a 4-count because "4-counts" is a standard in music. We wanted to have the Rookie users get familiar with this standard count from the beginning so that as they move on to 4/4 lessons later, there will at least be some familiarity with the count.
You'll notice that our rookie lessons have dotted lines every other measure. This is something we did to allow for the 4 count as users "count over the bar line" to get from one measure to the next.
Let me know if that clears things up for you.