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In 4/4 time, beats two and three should always be separated. Now that you’ve seen where the “strong ” beats lie, you can see why it’s important not to beam over the middle of the measure. Beats two and four are weak, while beat three is the secondary strong beat, meaning that it’s strong, but not as strong as beat one. In 4/4 time, beat one is the strongest beat in the measure. We’re going to start with 4/4 time since it’s the most common time signature.Įvery time signature has “strong” and “weak” beats. These rules will make more sense once we get into individual time signatures, so let’s get started! Grouping: 4/4 Time But because the triple lines of thirty-second note beams can get a little messy, we connect groups of four with a single line.
#NOTEFLIGHT PIZZICATO HOW TO#
If you’re feeling a little lost, check out our articles How to Read Sheet Music and A Complete Guide to Time Signatures to give yourself a refresher! Beamingīefore we get into grouping, let’s first cover how to beam together eighth notes, sixteenth notes, and thirty-second notes.Įighth notes are connected by a single line. Not only are we going to cover how to beam notes together, but we’re going to dive into how to group those beamed notes and rhythms depending on the time signature.
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Connecting several notes with tails is what we call “beaming.” Beaming notes together is important because it makes sheet music significantly easier to read. In music theory, notes with less rhythmic value than a quarter note, such as an eighth or sixteenth note, have “tails” attached to them.
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