Time signatures: what the two numbers mean

The two stacked numbers at the start of a piece are one of the most badly-taught things in music, mostly because they look like a fraction and are not one. They are two separate answers to two separate questions.

Top: how many. Bottom: of what

The top number says how many beats are in a bar. The bottom number says which note value counts as one beat.

A bottom 4 means the quarter note is the beat. A bottom 8 means the eighth note is. A bottom 2 means the half note is, which looks strange until you meet a march.

So four four is four quarter-note beats per bar. Three four is three. Two two is two half-note beats, and it is written that way rather than as four four because it wants to be felt in two, at speed.

Four four, and why it is called common time

Most popular music is in four four. Count one two three four along with almost any pop, rock or dance record and it will fit. It is common enough that the symbol C is used as shorthand for it, and common enough that everything else is described in relation to it.

Three four is the waltz, and you can hear the difference immediately because the stress lands every third count instead of every fourth. One two three, one two three. Once your body has that, the notation is a formality.

Six eight is the tricky one

Six eight says six eighth-note beats in a bar. In practice nobody counts six. They count two, with each beat divided into three.

One-and-a, two-and-a. That lilt is six eight, and it is behind most jigs, a great deal of sea shanty, and the swaying feel of songs like House of the Rising Sun.

This is the difference between simple and compound time. In simple time the beat divides in two. In compound time it divides in three. Six eight is two beats that divide in three, which is why it is written with a six on top and still feels like two.

Working it out by ear

You do not need the score. Tap along until you find the pulse, then find the strongest tap. Count from there to the next strong one.

Four gets you four four. Three gets you three four. If the pulse itself feels like it splits into three rather than two, you are in six eight or something like it.

Every melody in our catalogue carries its own count, and each song page shows the bar length alongside its tempo, so you can check your ear against the notation.

The odd ones

Five four and seven eight exist and are not exotic, they are just unfamiliar in Anglo-American pop. Take Five is in five, and a lot of Balkan and Turkish dance music lives in seven, nine and eleven.

The trick with those is to stop counting the whole bar and instead group it: seven eight is usually felt as two plus two plus three, or three plus two plus two, and once you hear which grouping a tune uses it stops being difficult and starts being a dance step.

Time signatures are not tempo

A common confusion worth clearing up. The time signature says how beats are grouped, not how fast they go. A piece in three four can be a slow waltz or a frantic scherzo. Speed is a separate instruction, usually a metronome mark or an Italian word at the top of the page.