

The term simple meter is used to describe meters where the beat can be divided into two equal parts. To understand the differences between simple and compound meter, you should first understand how notes can be divided into two parts or (if they are dotted rhythms) divided into three parts. Time signatures tell you what the meter is. The time signature tells the musician the pattern of the beats, so "time signature" and "meter" are related. In music, the word meter is used to describe the pattern of beats. When the music is a quick tempo, you will usually default to the "in 2," style of counting 6/8. When it is "in 2," you will only be counting beats 1 and 4. This common time signature can be "in 6" or "in 2." When it is counted in six, it means you could every eighth note (1-2-3-4-5-6). In 6/8 time, the eighth note gets the beat (8) and there are 6 beats per measure. You will sometimes see this written as a C with a line through it (like the cent symbol in American currency).

This is sometimes known as "cut time," since it is exactly half of common time (or 4/4). In 2/2 time, the half note gets the beat (2) and there are 2 beats per measure. Since it is so common, it's nicknamed "common time," and can be written as the letter "C" instead of "4/4." This is the most common time signature most beginning musicians see, It's also what most popular music is written in.

The quarter note (4) gets the beat and there are 4 beats per measure. This is the four-four time signature, there are four beats per measure and the quarter note gets the beat. See if you can say which note receives the beat and how many beats are in a measure for these examples:
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You know how to figure out which note value gets the beat, but to make things easier, here is a time signature cheat sheet. You can see the count of the beats under the measures. Looking at the example above, we know that the quarter note will get the beat (4) and there will be three (3) beats per measure. You can always determine which note will get the beat by figuring out the note value would take that many of to equal a whole note. If you said, "quarter notes" you are right! So, seeing a 4 means the quarter note will get the beat. You might be wondering, how do I know what note value is a 4? Try answering this: It would take 4 _ to equal a whole note. The bottom number tells you what note value will get the beat. The top number tells you how many beats are in the measure. Time signatures will look like two numbers on top of each other, similar to a fraction. A time signature tells you two important things: One of the first things you will see when looking at a piece of music is the time signature.
