Double Bass Why do we need time signatures?

[JoeWPgh]

weneedtimesignaturesforthesamereasonweneedspacesandpunctuationitsetsthestructure

 

[dkelley]

in my opinion you dont need them, or at least you dont need to pay attention to them all the time. i was in a band once that had all sorts of weird time signatures and when we would go to record, it would sometimes cause problems. thats when we would just set the metronome to 1/4 so instead of beep beep beep boop, it was just beep beep beep beep.

the time signatures were still there but we would ignore them for a second for recording purposes. everything worked, everything still sounded great too so dont even try to tell me that it wouldnt work.

No... you weren't ignoring them. ... you were using a metronome that wasn't capable of using (or correctly configured to utilize it's) progressive changing time signatures.

You guys still played in your custom changing time signatures. ... 1/4 or similar metronome settings are used all the time in progressive rock to keep the beat while the band changes time signatures.

A beat is still a beat. ...

 

[fmoore200]

weneedtimesignaturesforthesamereasonweneedspacesandpunctuationitsetsthestructure

You forgot the # .. Has ziltoid taught you nothing?!

 

[wmheilma]

Why time signatures? Because it helps to describe the underlying rhythm and structure. The irony is that the coolest things happen when you go against the structure you have created. like when you play a quarter note triplet or better yet when you play four note arpeggios over a 12/8 feel. That wouldn't sound cool if your audience did not expect you to 'stay between the lines'. it is also hard to read phrases with no context.

 

[xabicho]

Rhythm is part of the creative process then comes the question how to organize the rhythm that is intricately tied to the melody. Sometimes melodies are very strong the power of the intervals calls for a change of time signature to relate in a cohesive way with the phrasing. But at the end it is an intellectual way to organize or represent musical ideas and a way to communicate that ideas to other musicians or leave them for future generations. During the Gregorian chant period the music was written on an open field with no staff and represented with symbols taken for the Latin which was the dominant language in Europe. For example ''' represented 3 notes together like a triplet but most of the music was pass to other generations as an oral traditions.

On the other hand some African tribes have a complexity of rhythms, time signatures and different tempos playing at the same time. No written music just oral tradition, and as the Hindus they just follow a beat without the limitation of Time Signatures.

So Time signature is mostly a western Europe tradition that we follow. Basically the language that we are familiar with our culture. Perhaps would be good for us learn a different music language like the one coming from India with 1/4 steps on the tonal system, ragas and complex rhythmic foundation. In the meantime we need to rely on Time Signatures to communicate our ideas.

Great thread…& yes Olivier Messian in Europe and George Crumb here in USA have compositions without time signatures but mostly 20th Century composers.