Hi, folks. I’m trying to transcribe a piece of music for piano, but the time signature is completely eluding me. Here’s the song.
What I’ve got so far (I think), is that the chorus- heard for four bars in the beginning and again at :43- is in 4/4. The part that begins at 1:59 (“la, la la laaa”) is in 7/4 time. What I can’t seem to figure out is the verses: first example :18-:43. I don’t know if there is a funky time signature there, or if it is changing within the verse or what. Halp!
Moved to Cafe Society.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator
The verses are the same as the ‘la la las’. 3/4 followed by 4/4, or 7/4 if you like.
This sounds right.
So the basic 7/4 beat would go like this (each dot is a 16th note):
Snare | . . . . | X . . . | . . . . | . . . . | X . . . | . . . . | X . . . |
Kick . | X . . . | . . . X | . X . . | X . . . | . . . . | X . . . | . . . . |
…if that makes any sense.
Dammit, man, I’m a pianist, not a drummer!
So I transcribed the verses using 7/4 time and it sounds pretty good when plugged into my composing program. I don’t know, for some reason when I listen to the song itself I have a really hard time counting the beat. Thanks, guys.
Where is Musicat? He knows this shit.
Well, I figured if I laid out the basic beat it would clear up some of the mystery.
It’s a bunch of odd time signatures thrown together. Pretty creative of them:
4, 4, 4, 6
3, 4, 3, 4, 3, 4, 3, 4, 4
4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 6, 4
3, 4, 3, 4, 3, 4, 3, 4, 4
4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 6
3, 4, 3, 4, 3, 4, 3, 4, 3, 4, 3, 4, 3, 4, 3, 4, 4
4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 6, 4, 4, 4…
I think I got that right. I only listened through once, so I might have spaced out on one of those 4/4 measures.
It’s not just 7/4. Sinisternik has it about right. Whether you want to group each 3/4 4/4 pair as a single 7/4 bar would be up to you.
Let me add:
Thanks for this song. I hadn’t heard it before, but I think I might use this as a homework assignment for some of my students.
Great job, seems right to me.
In this case I would not interpret those as 7/4 because the first beats of the consecutive 3/4 and 4/4 measures are just so heavily accented. Also it keeps switching around. Contrast to “Money” by Pink Floyd, which is in 7/4 all the way (except where it lapses to 4/4 for the guitar solo). The accent on beat 4 is very subtle. This song has a BANG-2-3-BANG-2-3-4 feel that you just don’t get in tunes that are in odd meter (usually jazz tunes).
I don’t really hear those 6s as such; they sound more 4-2. And I agree that it’s not really 7/4 because the 4/4 parts are just a typical 4/4 beat. And the 3/4 sounds so much like it’s a 4/4 missing it’s last leg. 7/4 just usually feels a bit off, without knowing exactly where.