Music (time signatures)....?

Question

With respect to the denominator (I know what the numerator means..). I've been told it determines whether the rhthym is compound or simple. But what does this mean, and how does it translate to use on a high hat?

Answer 1

The denominator, or "bottom number" tells you what type of note is equal to one beat. 2=half note, 4=quarter note, 8=8th note, and 16=16th note. Those are really the only ones you'll have to know. Very little music will ever be written out of the confines of those note values equalling the beat. So, if you're in 6/8 time, for example, the 8 tells you that the eighth note equals the beat, and the top number tells you that you can have a total value (in any combination of notes) of 6 of those eighth notes in one measure. 5/4 time, then, would mean that the quarter note equals one beat and you can have the equivalent of five quarter notes in the measure. So, if you're playing eight notes on a hi-hat in 5/4 time, you would be playing 10 notes on the hi-hat per measure because 10 eight notes take up the same amount of time as 5 quarter notes. Compound and simple are not very necessary terms (I learned them in music school and quickly forgot them).

Answer 2

Like the poster above, I also played the piano for a long time, so I'm not really sure if this translates any differently in percussion. But from what I remember, the numerator tells you how many beats per measure and the denominator tells you what kind of note represents 1 beat. For example, in 4/4 time (which is sometimes represented by a "C" for "common time"), there are 4 beats per measure and the quarter note is counted as 1 beat. Or in 6/8 time, there are 6 beats per measure and the eighth note gets counted as 1 beat.

And about simple and compound time signatures, here's a quote from Wikipedia:

"Compound time signatures are distinguished by an upper number which is commonly 6, 9 or 12. The most common lower number in a compound time signature is 8, meaning the time is beaten in quavers.

Unlike simple time, however, compound time uses a dotted note for the beat unit. Consequently, the upper and lower numbers in compound time signatures do not represent the number of beats per bar and the beat unit."

Hope this helps. :)

Answer 3

the "denominator" doesn't impact your hi-hat approach as much as the style of the song should. A rock, shuffle or samba can all be in 4/4 but should be played very differently.
You should get a book on playing in different styles, it will give you some general rules of thumb for different feels.
I assume you're asking this for jazz band application, in that case, something written in 2/2 would probably have you playing 1/4 notes instead of 1/8 notes and anything written in x/8 will have you playing some sort of 1/8 note pattern... again, 4/4 will depend much more on the feel written above the time signature.

hope that helps.

Answer 4

The denominator is basically the speed of the notation; 3/4 time is three quarter notes per measure while 3/8 time is three eigth notes per measure.

I do not believe that the bottom number affects "compound" vs "simple", which I believe refers to logical breakdowns in time signature (for example, 7/4 time might be played as 4/4 + 3/4 or vice versa).

Answer 5

I have no idea about drumming, sorry. But I do know that 4/4 means that there are 4 beats in a measure, and every 1/4 note gets one beat. I think 3/4 means there are 3 beats in a measure, and every 1/4 note gets one beat? I played piano for 10 years, but we never really did much of theory! 3/4 is used for waltzes, I know that...

Answer 6

The denominator breaks down the mesure by stating what kind of note value equals one beat, and from there that note value can be broken down so the number of notes in the mesure doesn't exceed the number of beats in that mesure. As for the high hat you just play the notes you'd normally play, it doesn't effect the way their played any, it just effects how many of them there are and how they're broken down in the music.