On Jun 29, 2005, at 2:32 PM, Darcy James Argue wrote:
I recently wrote a piece in a slow (q=72) 6/4, subdivided in three -- mostly. However, it frequently alternates between bars of 6/4 and 4/4, or 5/4, or 7/4.
It would have made absolutely no sense to use 3/2 for this, for any number of reasons. For starters, the quarter note is the beat, not the half note; the time signature changes would be needlessly confusing and obscure what was actually going on if I alternated 3/2 with 4/4; etc.
I agree. The denominator (for lack of a better term) should be the value that gets the pulse, for the purposes of clearest reading.
This is why I like modern time signatures like
3+2
Q.
(that's 3+2 over a dotted quarter)
for 10/8. I know 10/8 has a long and easily-understandable history to it, but it sure is more clear right away the way I noted it.
That's also why I prefer 6/4 to 3/2 when it is a single measure interspersed in measures of 4/4 or similar time sigs. The pulse is still the quarter.
There is that enigmatic passage in the Rite of Spring (Sacrificial Dance) where Stravinsky alternates composed-time measures. He freely mixed things like 4/8 with 2/4 (along with the usual 3/4, 1/8, and 3/8) for no apparent reason, making it almost impossible for a large group to sight read accurately. He re-notated it a few years later to clarify what the pulses were. If you compare the earlier obtuse version with the later version, it is much clearer to the eye. (Of course, the pulse is where nobody in the orchestra except the conductor accents anything, but that is clearer with the choreography, as the entire company is in the air on those "downbeats!")
Christopher
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