Music notation questions

[Megan]

Does the 3 in the brackets mean to be played 3 octaves higher ?


Thanks.

[Chris]

No, those are triplets. In means to play three notes in the time you would usually play two. This is a bit of a complicated example, though.

Here's something simpler. What if you wanted to have two notes for the duration of a single quarter note? That's easy - you use two eighth notes. What if you wanted to have four notes for the duration of a single quarter note? That's easy too - you use four sixteenth notes. But what if you wanted to have THREE notes for the duration of a single quarter note? Well, to do that, you write three eighth notes and then put a "3" with a bracket above them, just like in your example.

The notes don't all have to be of equal value to do this. Instead of three eight notes, you could have one quarter note and one eighth note, all under the "3" with the bracket. All of those notes would be played in the time it takes you to play one regular quarter note. So the quarter note in the triplet would take up two thirds of a beat, and the eighth note would take up one third of a beat.

This is basically the situation with your example (except the first triplet has two sixteenth notes instead of one eighth note). So, it looks like you are in 2/4 time here - two beats per measure with a quarter note getting one beat. The first bracket gets one beat, matching the first quarter note in the left hand - the two sixteenth notes get the first third of that beat, and the quarter note gets the last two thirds of that beat. The second bracket also gets one beat, matching the second quarter note in the left hand - the quarter note gets the first two thirds of that beat, and the eighth note gets the last third of that beat.

The "sim." in the following measure indicates that will work the same way.

[Megan]

Thanks for your instruction Chris, I understand what you are getting at, but it is a bit tricky puting it in practice.


.

[Chris]

Yes, this takes some practice. A metronome helps a lot.

[Peter]

Thanks for your instruction Chris, I understand what you are getting at, but it is a bit tricky puting it in practice.


.

Cross rhythms such as 2 against 3 often cause problems which can be easily remedied by thinking mathematically and dividing the unit into 6 with the first of the two and three group both coming on one, the second of the three on three, the second of the two on four and the third of the three on five – this produces a combined rhythm of 1 2and 3. Try tapping it out first.

[Megan]

Thank you for that very informative information Peter, I shall be working on it.