[Harold Owen:]
>I have been fond of using 9/8 when the 8th-note
>groupings were 2-2-2-3 or 3-2-2-2 or 3-3-3. Using a time signature of
>2+2+2+3/9 is certainly possible, but it looks unwieldy and unsightly
>to me. In some of my pieces the grouping changes often, and I don't
>like having to change the time signature all the time.
I would probably just use 9/8 here. Beaming of notes would be the natural
way to show the groupings within each bar. (My earlier discussion of time
signatures a couple of days ago was applying to standard, regular metres, and
was not intended to be taking a position on irregular metres such as this.)
I was once working on a piano piece where almost all bars were irregular:
the bars changed in length almost every bar, and even when the same length of
bar recurred, the grouping of notes often differed. I used the quaver (eighth)
as my basic (somewhat fast) note-value, gave each bar a time signature of x/8,
where x was simply the length of the bar in quavers, and used beaming to
indicate the grouping.
>I seem to recall a Dave Bruebeck tune that went 2-2-2-3, 2-2-2-3, 2-2-2-3,
>3-3-3. Anyone remember the title? Anyone have the notation? What time
>signature does he use?
I have a copy of it. It's "Blue Rondo a la Turk"; there is a dual time
signature at the start: first just 9/8 appears; this is followed, in
parentheses, by 2+2+2+3/8.
When the grouping is 3+3+3, once every four bars, the time signature is not
changed for this.
There is no change at all until you start to approach the middle section,
where there is a transitional passage where the 9/8 bars alternate with the 4/4
rhythm of the approaching middle section - an interesting effect. When the 9/8
resumes for a bar or two in this alternating section, and also after the middle
section of the piece (where there's another alternating section of the two
metres), it is just given as 9/8, without the parenthesized version being added.
(Contrary to what some people said earlier in the discussion on swing
rhythms - namely that swing is almost always notated in straight notes - the
middle section in this piece is notated mostly in dotted rhythms. Brubeck's
scores - at least the piano versions I have - often use dotted rhythms in this
manner.)
Regards,
Michael Edwards.
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