Notation question

[Elavro]

Hey

I'm just starting to learn how to read notation. I'm learning the song Solar from Miles davis. It's in 4/4.

Because i'm still learning, i have to look at each bar seperatly. I noticed that each bar isn't equal in terms of lenght of notes and rest counted together.

Example:
bar 1: 3 quarter notes and 2 eight notes = 4 quarter notes
bar 2: 1 eighth rest, 2 quarter notes, 1 eight note = 3 quarter notes
bar 3: 3 quarter notes, 1 eight note = 3.5 quarter notes

If i play bar 2 and 3 just the way its written im 'done' before there have been 4 beats. I solve this by playing the last eight note on the 'and' of beat 4, but I am unsure if this is correct.

I hope you can understand what I mean and thanks in advance for reading and helping me

[bassandbeyond]

You're talking about the melody to "Solar", right? It sounds like you are looking at a bad transcription, but perhaps there are some notational symbols you haven't learned to identify yet. For example, a dot (.) after one of those quarter notes makes it 50% longer, or equal to a quarter note plus an eighth note.

[Elavro]

Ah, didn't knew that, thanks for helping, it 'fits' now