Odd time phrasing, how does it really sound?

This is the thing. I have a habit of inserting some odd time segments in otherwise totally normal 4/4 time, just to make things a little more interesting. I do it when I compose, and when I play in bands...

And concerning that, I had bunches of people tell me "you know that thing you did there those two 7/8's in chorus were cool" but those people are usually musicians.

And then I had people that are not musicians say to me "man you made a mistake in chorus, I think you lost the beat"

So I was talking to my friend about this, and we sort of came to a conclusion that we can't agree is odd-timing normal 4/4 songs, cool, or a bad thing to do, since many of non-musicians find it irritating.

I think that, if you are going to change the time, that it should be subtle and should hardly be noticed by the audience. If the change is too grating, then I would seriously consider revising.

Occasionally, a very noticeable change is made, but the transition is well-thought out enough so that it doesn't feel like a beat is added or missing

musik am onlee for/for.

seriously? You want to know if it's OK, even "good," to change up the time signature? No one's ever done that. No one.

kaff.

Or you could make it really obvious, and it wouldn't sound like a mistake any more. Just like how writing parallel fifths once sounds like a mistake, but doing it repeatedly in similar ways exposed areas makes it sound like part of the piece.

If it feels natural, it won't seem like a mistake. If the entire band does it, it won't feel like a mistake. If the drummer randomly inserts a 7/8 bar and doesn't tell the rest of the band...then....bad news bears.

In response to ferkungamabooboo, plenty of composers switch time signatures in mid-piece. Look at John Williams' Jurassic Park or Paul Dukas' The Sorcerer's Apprentice. As usual, they both transition in and out of the change subtly, without disrupting the music.

If it feels natural, it won't seem like a mistake. If the entire band does it, it won't feel like a mistake. If the drummer randomly inserts a 7/8 bar and doesn't tell the rest of the band...then....bad news bears.

Problem there is with the band for not picking it up. Also offsetting instruments by an 8th note sounds cool.

In response to ferkungamabooboo, plenty of composers switch time signatures in mid-piece. Look at John Williams' Jurassic Park or Paul Dukas' The Sorcerer's Apprentice. As usual, they both transition in and out of the change subtly, without disrupting the music.

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Xeno: What's wrong with disrupting the music? Anything unexpected that happens in a piece of music could be called "disrupting", yet often it's exactly those things that make a piece interesting. I really don't see why it should be a goal to make those changes "hardly be noticed by the audience". Very often a piece even draws one of its main characteristics from such harsh and entirely unsubtle signature changes (Like Le Sacre du Printemps, etc.).

I simply haven't seen a piece where a bold time signature change was used successfully. (As a matter of fact, I haven't seen a piece where a bold time signature change was used at all.)

I probably should mention that my background is in classical music, and I have little to no knowledge of how jazz and other such genres are constructed. For all I know, time changes are prevalent in other genres...

Well, Gardener mentioned Le Sacre du Printemps, listen to that. Great piece, it is.

I don't remember every part, but the part that I'm thinking of that's clearly in rapidly changing time sigs could be taken as just unmetered, with the phrase markings as time signatures... I dunno, I could see it as not exactly rapidly-changing time sigs in succession...

haha... I'm even more lost now, then I was before... so many different views :)

Anyway, I was thinking more of doing it something like a fill, you know, like just for one bar or so...

Again, it depends on the style, but if you randomly extend a bar by an 8th note without forwarning to the band, that sounds like a mistake, whether you do it intentionally or not.

I could be playing in the key of C major, but keep intentionally hitting Eb's just to mix things up, and it will sound like a mistake. And some people might think it's cool.

There's no necessary 'right' and 'wrong' but generally it isn't a good idea to mess with the meter without some discussion with the band beforehand. Unless you've had that discussion already and they just aren't going along with it, in which case they suck.

It has to be natural. I must flow with intent... you can use metrical hiccups to create or resolve tension; to augment energy; to give a sense of direction... BUT, it must be done always in a way that compliments the music.

Do you HEAR a time change? Do YOU hear a bar of 7 at the end of your phrase? If not, don't do it....don't write something for the sake of it....it has to be meaningful. When you disrupt the flow, even the schmoes know. (that rhymes...)

Listen:

Excerpt from 'Aires De Lando' from Maria Schneider's Sky Blue.

What time sig are we in? ... trust me, it's MESSED up....BUT - it feels organic and flows beautifully...

I Think the 7/8 can be easy if you divide the accents in natural ways, like S.Revueltas "Sensemay

Most westerners hear in duple and sometimes triple(if they are more than listeners... in fact the average "listener" just "hears" a flow of accents without reference to a meter(at least in any conscious and intellectual way).

But most performing musicians are much more comfortable in duple because it is the stock of almost all songs(99.9999%).

I similarly tend to add beats and such when playing by myself. This is not good unless it is intentional or you understand what is going on. If you can't say "Hey, thats in 7/8" then it is bad(not necessarily sound wise).

The reason is it is a bad habit and you probably are adding/removing time not because it makes musical sense but because it "feels" better. For example, adding a chromatic passing tone can get you to land on the beat with the note you want but that doesn't mean you should do it. I'm not saying sound wise it is good or bad... but that if you are not in full control of what you are doing then it something you need to work on.

So either you can become more familiar with duple(which will help you understand more on what your doing "differently") or you can focus on understanding those complex time signatures.

If you already understand exactly what your doing and you have no problems playing in 15/16, 11/8's, etc then disregard what I have said. If it sounds good to you then thats all that matters unless your goal is to please those people that don't like odd meters...

I simply haven't seen a piece where a bold time signature change was used successfully. (As a matter of fact, I haven't seen a piece where a bold time signature change was used at all.)

This is where it helps to NOT stick to Vivaldi and Bach your entire life.

Bartok

Stravinsky

Hindemith

Schoenberg

Copland

The list could go on for months, really.

And that's just the EARLY 20th century. Get into the 60's and on, and *God forbid* the 21ST Century, rhythm gets so complex that time signatures are just left out sometimes.

YouTube - Messiaen - Quatuor pour la fin des temps 6th mouvment

this is more or less in 4/4 (more or less) but he throws in extra 16th notes just for kicks through the whole thing making it extremely uneven. (and extremely awesome)

And in some milder form you sometimes already have rather weird metrical shifts in baroque and classical music, just that those are generally not achieved by visibly changing the time signature, but through other means that have similar effects (accentuation, starting a piece with an uncommon upbeat etc.). You have such things a lot in French baroque for example, and very often in Haydn's music. (Take the Finale of his symphony No. 80 for example.) Whether you achieve this through time signature changes or other means is irrelevant in the end. And as Voce said, let's not even go in the 20th/21st centuries, where there's no end of "bold time signature changes". (Not even to mention non-"western" music cultures and even folk music in many "western" countries.)

And as I said before: It can certainly have a very disruptive effect, especially if the rest of the piece is throughout in a very simple meter, but that doesn't make it bad.

Well, there are a whole bunch of factors going into what you're talking about, but for starters, if someone in the audience says that they thought you made a mistake, it's your decision how you want to take that. There are PLENTY of people out there that tell themselves that the audience simply couldnt understand it. Was it their fault or yours?

To know that you would have to answer the question of whether you're writing for yourself or for your audience. Personally I think Milton Babbitt's "Who cares if you listen" mentality is one of the most illogical approaches to concert music I have ever heard, but that's for you to decide.

But let's not try to pretend that anything coming from someone willing to call themselves a "composer" is going to be aimed at just everyone. Since you said that someone in the audience referred to a part as "the chorus", it makes me think that you might be writing in a form, and for an audience which raises certain expectations. So of course when Stravinsky does his rhythmic deal, he may be able to pull it off, but that does mean that you can indiscriminately apply his technique to, say, rock/pop and expect the same result.

Beyond that, I would say that you might want to be weary of relying on "to make it more interesting" as justification for anything in composition, or any form of art. Yes, you can apply techniques for the purpose of making a composition more interesting, but that is far from saying that a range of those possibilities will yield the same result. "To make it more interesting" in the sense that I read into what you said, would suggest to me jarring the sense of predictability a bit in order to make sure that it doesnt get too predictable. But there are plenty of ways to do that through accenting without changing meter. Beyond that there are tons of ways you can tweak meter. Are you giving the impression of actually skipping a beat or adding one in? Does it actually change the pulse when the meter changes? Is anything being done to make the meter change predictable? Is it transitional? Is it intended to break up the flow of the passage it is in? etc.

Again, not exactly sure what kind of music you're aiming to write, but start by listening to people who have done it, eg Stravinksy. Hell, Beethoven didnt necessarily change meters in the technical sense, but he sure as hell gave the bar line a run for its money like no one before him had.

One word:

Odd times over 4/4 can be pretty damn cool, I'd say.

good fun!!

For me odd time signatures are the most natural sounding rhythms, somehow I instinctly write in 5/4, 9/8, 11/8 etc. It is not how I want but it is how it comes out spontaneously. I also like changing the time signatures and it still sounds complete and harmonic somehow, I mean it is not messes up the balance at all. It doesn't sound mistake if you emphasize it maybe with another instrument, maybe the drums react in unisono with the chosen instrument... I am a big Bartok fan though and turned to progressive music later which is maybe the biggest source of odd time signatures (Dream Theater, King Crimson).

For me odd time signatures are the most natural sounding rhythms, somehow I instinctly write in 5/4, 9/8, 11/8 etc. It is not how I want but it is how it comes out spontaneously. I also like changing the time signatures and it still sounds complete and harmonic somehow, I mean it is not messes up the balance at all. It doesn't sound mistake if you emphasize it maybe with another instrument, maybe the drums react in unisono with the chosen instrument... I am a big Bartok fan though and turned to progressive music later which is maybe the biggest source of odd time signatures (Dream Theater, King Crimson).

Well, I was a fan of DT for some time, but then I kind of realized that music is supposed to sound good to everyone, and most people get lost in odd time. Most of them say they can't figure out where the beat begins and where it ends. So I just came down to sporadically inserting some odd time frazes for a beat or two, just to break the monotony of it.

Meshuggah are crazy but in a good way, but they too seem to make things more complicated then they need to be.

Yes, but it is hard to please everyone. It depends what the aim is. As I don't live from music yet, for me first of all the most important is that I should enjoy it first as I can't control what is coming out naturally. If others like it too, it is an extra. I agree that too complicated stuff might loses the music inside, it is something you can appreciate, the math and the brilliant playing, but not enjoy. I think DT is somewhere in between, while complicated still has the melodies, grooves, good riffs and rhythms. For you it is probably good idea to break it and hide those rhythms to make it interesting.