It is quite proper to use a 3/2 bar in the middle of a 4/4 work, using a
quarter note pulse, with the intention of keeping the quarter note pulse
but the 3/2 divided 2+2+2. This is done quite correctly and frequently,
not constantly.
But that does not keep it from being very confusing to the uninitiated.
When I was a young 8th grader, my band director was leading my high
school band through a reading of one of the greatest of all concert band
works, Percy Grainger's folk song-inspired _Lincolnshire Posy_. (For
anyone unfamiliar with the work, I HIGHLY reccomend that you seek out a
recording and, if possible, a score, for this gorgeous and original
work.) The director, otherwise a quite accomplished musician, came to a
4/4 - 3/2 metric sequence and started rushing through the 3/2 bars at
double tempo. He stopped and said "If this is not what the composer
wants at this point, then he has notated this passage INCORRECTLY!" I
though it odd, and have made a mental note of such metric passages ever
since. (He hadn't had any trouble with the 2/2 - 2/4 bars in the
Overture to _Candide_, oddly enough.)
Another time, many years later, I was helping my wife as she was
directing a volunteer church choir. An anthem had a similar 4/4 - 3/2
metric passage, and a tenor (of course) would simply not HEAR of a meter
with a THREE at the top and a TWO at the bottom being beat in SIX, and
the QUARTER NOTE getting the beat. HE HAD LEARNED about time
signatures, and that SIMPLY WAS NOT THE WAY THAT THEY WORKED, and he
didn't care WHAT KIND OF COLLEGE DEGREES the both of us had, BECAUSE IF
WE HADN"T LEARNED ABOUT TIME SIGNATURES, TOO, etc. etc. etc.
(a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, and the littler the knowledge
...)
RBH
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