What are 16th notes? Newbie by the way..

[DioMANOWARDio]

I've seen people talk about playing 16th notes and I was just curious to see what it means. I just started playing bass so I don't really know anything.

P.s does it have something to do with a metronome?

Thank you.

 

[Roy Vogt]

Time in music is divided into beats. Most Rock and Funk is in 4/4 time. 4/4 means 4 beats per measure with a quarter note getting a beat. If you divide the quarter notes in 1/2 you will get 8th notes-8 to a bar of 4/4. Check out any AC/DC bass line like "You Shook Me All Night Long" to see what that feels like.
If you continue to divide those 8th notes in 1/2 you'll get 16th notes-16 to a bar of 4/4. If you set your metronome to a slow tempo (say 40) and play 4 notes in each beat (click) that's 16th notes. For a musical example check out Jaco Pastorius' tune "Come On, Come Over", particularly the chorus.
The Wikipedia article is pretty accurate:
Meter (music) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[BassChuck]

That's a good question. Actually if you have to ask that there are many other questions you'll have to ask too. Check out some of the stickys and links to music theory that you'll find here on TB. You have a lot of reading ahead of you, but its all good. Learning music is great fun, and you have a huge field of excitment waiting for you.

 

[Frohman]

Count a beat to four. 1-2-3-4 and start stomping the beat. Now count to eight over that beat. For every 1 beat you stomp, count two beats. (1)1-2-(2)3-4-(3)5-6-(4)7-8. 1 should be on the 1, 3 on the 2, 5 on the 3 and 7 on the 4. Now you're counting 8th notes over a 4th note beat. Now try counting 4 times per 1 beat. Knowing mathematics, you know it brings you up 16 counts per measure.

Take a visual example as well.

| represents a 4th.
! represents an 8th.
. represents a 16th.

|.!.|.!.|.!.|.!.

As you can see the 4-beat measure here is divided into 16 digits.

A 16th note says something about how long a note is played. If for example you play in a tempo where you have 80 beats per minute(4th notes), you can play quadruple that in 16th notes, bringing you up to 320 16th notes per minute. It's all math really. Playing 16th notes is just another word for playing really fast.

I hope that wasn't too confusing for you.

 

[scowboy]

Tower of Power ... What is Hip

 

[kr0n]

In regular 4/4 (quarter note gets beat, 4 beats for a bar).

Whole note = 4 beats
Half note = 2 beats
Quarter note = 1 beat
Eight note = 0,5 beat
Sixteenth = 0,25 beat

So for a full bar you need either
1 whole note,
2 half notes,
4 quarter notes,
8 eight notes,
16 sixteenth notes
or any combination of these so that when you add them up, you get one whole bar and each bar has the value of 4 quarter notes when in 4/4 time. You can go over the bar with note lengths sure, but in standard notation note values add up correctly, and loads of songs employ steady rhythmic patterns starting from beat 1. Keep It Simple Silly.

I suggest reading and practicing through Online Bass Lessons at StudyBass.com and especially Bass Lessons : Rhythm the Rhythm section. Better yet, get a few lessons from a teach to nudge you the right way.

 

[Locki]

simple answer
Quarter notes = 1 2 3 4
Eighth notes = 1 + 2 + 3 + 4
16th Notes = 1 e + a 2 e + a 3 e + a 4 e + a

this is all in 1 bar, so quarter notes there'd be 4 quarter notes in a bar (4/4) eighth notes thered be 8 notes in a bar and 16th notes = 16 notes in a bar (assuming song is 4/4)

 

[Cinquez Griffin]

Count a beat to four. 1-2-3-4 and start stomping the beat. Now count to eight over that beat. For every 1 beat you stomp, count two beats. (1)1-2-(2)3-4-(3)5-6-(4)7-8. 1 should be on the 1, 3 on the 2, 5 on the 3 and 7 on the 4. Now you're counting 8th notes over a 4th note beat. Now try counting 4 times per 1 beat. Knowing mathematics, you know it brings you up 16 counts per measure.

Take a visual example as well.

| represents a 4th.
! represents an 8th.
. represents a 16th.

|.!.|.!.|.!.|.!.

As you can see the 4-beat measure here is divided into 16 digits.

A 16th note says something about how long a note is played. If for example you play in a tempo where you have 80 beats per minute(4th notes), you can play quadruple that in 16th notes, bringing you up to 320 16th notes per minute. It's all math really. Playing 16th notes is just another word for playing really fast.

I hope that wasn't too confusing for you.

Nice really helped me out thanks

 

[mambo4]

16th notes are also very useful to understand in terms of how they subdivide the basic rhythm.
That is , for each of the 16 possible choices, how it sounds/feels when played against a simple pulse. check this out:

Anthony Wellington teaches rhythm using the rhythm yardstick.

 

[robbotbass]

Advance playing but a great way to SEE 16th notes with your eyes! and hear it in a broken up pattern. Please look at this I swear it will help you understand 16th notes.

Anthony Wellington teaches slap bass and rhythm using the "Modes of Rhythm" - YouTube