What is the note with the 3 flags called? and how many beats does it get?

[arren31]

The note with 1 flag is called an eighth note, and gets half a beat. The note with 2 flags is called a sixteenth note, it gets 0.25% of a beat (0.25% is probably not the right term for it so tell me what the right term is too. I'm guessing other term for it is a quarter of a beat??). But what about the note with 3 flags, what is it called? and how many beats does it receive?

My guess is it is called a twenty-fourth note, and it receives 6 beats in a beat, I don't have a guess on the percentage 

[outin]

Notice a pattern here?
1/2
1/4
1/8
1/16
1/32
1/64
1/128

[outin]

I would not try to associate the note values with the beats that way at all. The meter of the piece defines the pulse of the music and the note values make sense only as related to each other. Example: A 16th note gets half of the time value of an 8th note. It's  simple mathematics really.

[perfect_pitch]

The note with 1 flag is called an eighth note, and gets half a beat. The note with 2 flags is called a sixteenth note, it gets 0.25% of a beat (0.25% is probably not the right term for it so tell me what the right term is too. I'm guessing other term for it is a quarter of a beat??). But what about the note with 3 flags, what is it called? and how many beats does it receive?

My guess is it is called a twenty-fourth note, and it receives 6 beats in a beat, I don't have a guess on the percentage 

You may need to work on your percentages... A Semiquaver is 1/4 of a crotchet beat, or 25% of the beats value, Demisemiquaver is what you're after, which is 1/8 of a crotchet beat, or 12.5% of the beats value.

[keypeg]

None of these note values should be considered any kind of fraction of a beat.  Outin has tried to say the same.  It is unfortunate that some books still introduce note value by talking about beats, and having the first music all by in 4/4 and 3/4 time (where the quarter notes gets the beat).  It leads to confusion later on when you run into things like 3/8 or 2/2 time.  The concepts of note value and beats should be kept separately.

The note values relate to each other.  The image on the bottom is a good way of looking at it.  There are two half notes in a whole note.  That means you can play two half notes while sustaining a whole note.  There are two quarter notes in a half note so you can play two of them while sustain the half note.  This also means that you can play four quarter notes in the time you can play one whole note.  This is math: fractions, multiplication and division.  You can play with this by beating out the relative time, and by doing rhythm exercises.  Any one of these note values can become a "pulse" (rather than beat) for the other.  You could decide to compare an eighth to a quarter, beat out your eighths 1-2-1-2 and tap out your quarters on every second eighth note.  Or you could beat out your quarters 1-1-1-1 or 1-2-3-4 or 1-2-3, and stick in an eighth in the middle which is also our classical 1-and-2-and (the "and" is in the middle).

A "beat" gives us the meter, a kind of underlying rhythm.  In a 3/4 waltz we're going 1-2-3-1-2-3 and we know that from one number to the next we're counting in quarter note values.  If the same thing were written in 3/8 time, we'd be counting in eighth note values: 1(eighth) 2(eighth) 3(eighth).  Do not mix up beat with note values.

[outin]

Thanks Keypeg for explaining it...I felt overwhelmed by the task

I really cannot believe this person is learning the 3rd movement of Pathetique. But from your post I assume that rhythm is actually taught like that somewhere?

BTW. I never taught of them as flags, they look more like tails to me 

[keypeg]

People can decide to try to learn anything in any kind of a fashion.  You might pick up a piece of music, maybe knowing a few things about note names and such, and just try to figure it out.  That might be happening here.  It may not be taught that way anywhere, and just be a matter of figuring things out somehow.

[perfect_pitch]

None of these note values should be considered any kind of fraction of a beat. 

I don't necessarily agree... Given that almost all beginning music is in ?/4 time signature, then it seems easy enough to give them a 'standard'. By letting them know that commonly a crotchet is a single beat, a quaver is half that, and a semiquaver half again, then they understand the relationship between the length of notes.

Once they understand the relationship between the note lengths and come across more complex music, it's easy enough to explain that in ?/8 time signature, the quaver becomes the beat and that the semiquaver is still half the length of a quaver - but not just like fractions, it is half of the beat.

The reason I believe this, is because when people learn music - beginning music is often filled with semibreves and minims... and to adequately help them count it properly - it helps to define how long or how many 'beats' to hold it for. It helps to have a reference point... Which is why a lot of beginner books start with Middle C - it's easy to recognise.

[outin]

I don't necessarily agree... Given that almost all beginning music is in ?/4 time signature, then it seems easy enough to give them a 'standard'. By letting them know that commonly a crotchet is a single beat, a quaver is half that, and a semiquaver half again, then they understand the relationship between the length of notes.

Once they understand the relationship between the note lengths and come across more complex music, it's easy enough to explain that in ?/8 time signature, the quaver becomes the beat and that the semiquaver is still half the length of a quaver - but not just like fractions, it is half of the beat.

The reason I believe this, is because when people learn music - beginning music is often filled with semibreves and minims... and to adequately help them count it properly - it helps to define how long or how many 'beats' to hold it for. It helps to have a reference point... Which is why a lot of beginner books start with Middle C - it's easy to recognise.

Maybe it's different when you have to learn those absurd names for the note values...I just don't get it why those are used, since the whole thing is so simple when you just name and treat them as mathematical fractions. That's how it's been taught here forever and kids get it very easily...

[lostinidlewonder]

The fractions are important but you can shift the notes around it. For example you can consider semiquavers and quavers as you would crotchets vs minims, or semiquavers vs crotchets are like crotchets and semibreves etc etc, the ratios are useful to move around when sorting out how to play what you are reading.

[keypeg]

(Keypeg wrote) None of these note values should be considered any kind of fraction of a beat. 
I don't necessarily agree... Given that almost all beginning music is in ?/4 time signature, then it seems easy enough to give them a 'standard'. By letting them know that commonly a crotchet is a single beat, a quaver is half that, and a semiquaver half again, then they understand the relationship between the length of notes.

Once they understand the relationship between the note lengths and come across more complex music, it's easy enough to explain that in ?/8 time signature, the quaver becomes the beat and that the semiquaver is still half the length of a quaver - but not just like fractions, it is half of the beat.

The reason I believe this, is because when people learn music - beginning music is often filled with semibreves and minims... and to adequately help them count it properly - it helps to define how long or how many 'beats' to hold it for. It helps to have a reference point... Which is why a lot of beginner books start with Middle C - it's easy to recognise.

We often see shortcuts for quick end results.  The novice can quickly get at the music and play it because of them, and the hope is that later he will unlearn the faulty concepts he has absorbed.  I've looked at this both as a student and as a teacher including what I'm learning about music teaching from my own teacher.

In my own experience as a student, there are a few false concepts and incomplete ones that I learned and based myself on and then had to change.  That was not easy.  I would have preferred to take a little longer and get it right in the first place.  I also discovered that in some areas where music was a muddy affair for me, it was actually because I lacked the tools that these things would have given me. I have learned from my teacher how difficult it is to wean transfer and previously taught students of these shortcuts and get them to adopt concepts which the little kids get easily because they are taught directly from the start.  All this makes sense to me.

Given that almost all beginning music is in ?/4 time signature, then it seems easy enough to give them a 'standard'. By letting them know that commonly a crotchet is a single beat, a quaver is half that, and a semiquaver half again, then they understand the relationship between the length of notes. 

Yes - and the music they tend to play all has a /4 on the bottom  - so everything gels and fits together.  They don't have the complete picture, and also don't know they have the complete picture.  It's like getting a keyhole view of music.

Once they understand the relationship between the note lengths and come across more complex music, it's easy enough to explain that in ?/8 time signature, the quaver becomes the beat and that the semiquaver is still half the length of a quaver - but not just like fractions, it is half of the beat.

It may be easy to explain, but that does not mean it is easy to understand.  After spending a lot of time with ?/4 music, together with that first explanation, the ?/8 comes as a shock and is bewildering.  It is "that other, different thing".  You are then learning a "different" thing each time, when in fact the system is common for all of them.  It also leads to the kind of question that we have in the opening post.

Meanwhile lost inidlewonder wrote:

(lostinidlewonder wrote) The fractions are important but you can shift the notes around it. For example you can consider semiquavers and quavers as you would crotchets vs minims, or semiquavers vs crotchets are like crotchets and semibreves etc etc, the ratios are useful to move around when sorting out how to play what you are reading.

Shortcuts deprive us of that kind of flexibility.

[dogperson]

Totally agree with LostInWonder with getting the whole picture at the beginning.  As I child -student, I was taught a simplified version of use of the pedal--- and yes, it got me started, but it was certainly not optimal.  As an adult re-learner, I am now 'unlearning' and 'learning' the full, appropriate use.

It would have been better, IMHO, to have been taught the full range at one time, rather than unlearning later.  Maybe this is the difference in learning as an adult vs. a child:  the adult should be capable of hearing and applying all that is needed to know without shortcuts.

[lostinidlewonder]

It would have been better, IMHO, to have been taught the full range at one time, rather than unlearning later.  Maybe this is the difference in learning as an adult vs. a child:  the adult should be capable of hearing and applying all that is needed to know without shortcuts.

I think it is an important part of learning anything really to do things not completely correctly and improve/change it in the future. One fully appreciates a proper method vs a lesser one because they can experience both and make the comparison. Those who try to do it right immediately in my opinion do not think but rather hope to copy/paste ideas of mastery without knowing why it's better than other ways through many examples. Adults are most challenging when it comes to this concept where children will follow without question gradual improvement and recreation of ones ability. I like the idea of developing ones abilities through their natural hands and mind rather than forcing them into a model of perfection.

[perfect_pitch]

Maybe it's different when you have to learn those absurd names for the note values...I just don't get it why those are used, since the whole thing is so simple when you just name and treat them as mathematical fractions. That's how it's been taught here forever and kids get it very easily...

Really??? I have to say it, but I think the fractional names are dumb. Given that the term 'whole note' is referred to a note that is worth 4 crotchet beats in common time, and is still half the length of a standard breve note (for which I don't know what you refer to that as in terms of fractions... a double, duple, 2/1 note???)

You try explaining to a 4-year old how a quaver is an eighth note, despite the fact that in 6/8 time signatures and 3/4 time signatures you'll only find 6 of them in a bar, or 4 of them in 2/4 (yes, I know what you might say in response - but remember... 4-year old) or that the beat is a quarter note - which sounds like a fractional number???

[outin]

Really??? I have to say it, but I think the fractional names are dumb. Given that the term 'whole note' is referred to a note that is worth 4 crotchet beats in common time, and is still half the length of a standard breve note (for which I don't know what you refer to that as in terms of fractions... a double, duple, 2/1 note???)

You try explaining to a 4-year old how a quaver is an eighth note, despite the fact that in 6/8 time signatures and 3/4 time signatures you'll only find 6 of them in a bar, or 4 of them in 2/4 (yes, I know what you might say in response - but remember... 4-year old) or that the beat is a quarter note - which sounds like a fractional number???

I started at 6 and had no problem understanding notes as ratios of each other. They were presented very neatly as images similar to what Keypeg posted above. Maybe 4 years is too young to understand note values, but I still don't think it justifies NOT using a highly logical and easy to remember system. Even if you need to teach names by rote, there's still no reason not to use the most logical names. We have had this discussion before with a certain member from UK (who seems to have left us now). I guess people who refuse to implement the metric system find things like that ok, I OTOH find them highly illogical...

As an adult even if I didn't know all the notes beforehand, I could easily rationalize what the note values are from their names in our system. But I have no idea what a breve or crotched is... We call them exactly what I wrote down in my first post on this thread.

[keypeg]

I think it is an important part of learning anything really to do things not completely correctly and improve/change it in the future. One fully appreciates a proper method vs a lesser one because they can experience both and make the comparison. Those who try to do it right immediately in my opinion do not think but rather hope to copy/paste ideas of mastery without knowing why it's better than other ways through many examples.

I think you are talking past each other, because a few days ago you were writing exactly the same thing I was saying.  This has absolutely nothing to do with perfection or doing things completely correctly.  It has to do with being given correct information or incorrect information.  Whatever our age, we build concepts from day one, and what we do builds up from those concepts.  Beats are not note values and note values are not beats. That is to say, a beat "is not" a quarter note.  Beats and note values are different things.  Note values compare against each other which is what you wrote the first time around.

I don't mind learning how to do only some of the things that I need to learn to do.  That is normal, and our growth from infancy shows that this is so.  A small child might only be able to say "fat" instead if "fast" because he cannot pronounce "s".  He might say "Me walk." instead of "I am walking" because he is not capable of forming a longer chain of words.  But we don't teach him that the word is "fat" and then reteach him that it is "fast".  We don't say "Me walk." to him.  He has a chance to incorporate the full thing over time, absorb it.

If you think someone isn't ready for something, then don't tell him anything at all rather than telling him the wrong thing.  Undoing things is difficult and often incomplete.  You do not "benefit" by correcting wrong information that you have been given and held on to for a while.  There is no reason to compare anything.  The only thing that shortcut teaching done is "instant gratification" or making it easier for a teacher to convince parents that Johnny is learning fast, because look how the repertoire and grade levels are going upward.

I cannot imagine that you are for the idea of teaching incorrect things.  What I think is actually happening is that you are responding to an abstract statement and not seeing that it refers to these kinds of things.

[lostinidlewonder]

I think you are talking past each other, because a few days ago you were writing exactly the same thing I was saying.

Well thanks for your unwanted kibitzing but I dont feel that I am talking past dog at all. I was writing what you were saying?? Huh? How does that even relate to talking past someone? Go reread what dog said not just my quote of his.

 This has absolutely nothing to do with perfection or doing things completely correctly.  It has to do with being given correct information or incorrect information.  

Perhaps you can imagine that people can learn with a good mentor intrinsically rather than simply following rules. If piano was just about following correct info you could learn it straight out of a book and internally.

Whatever our age, we build concepts from day one, and what we do builds up from those concepts.  Beats are not note values and note values are not beats. That is to say, a beat "is not" a quarter note.  Beats and note values are different things.  Note values compare against each other which is what you wrote the first time around.

You have related my interaction with with dog about progressive improvement to talking about value of beats?? I am responding to his more generalistic comments not the beats. Good Grief Charlie Brown!

If you think someone isn't ready for something, then don't tell him anything at all rather than telling him the wrong thing.  Undoing things is difficult and often incomplete.

Your idea here is silly because no one does anything perfectly no matter how many rules or instructions are given to them. You don't learn incorrect/wrong things don't be so negative, you are playing somewhat correct and constantly move towards more correct. If you think people just play correct immediately while following rules and if they cannot they should just give up and do something they can, well I'm sure you haven't much experience teaching early beginners. I am not talking about theory with dog.

I cannot imagine that you are for the idea of teaching incorrect things.  What I think is actually happening is that you are responding to an abstract statement and not seeing that it refers to these kinds of things.

No it's just you not reading dog closely enough since he was talking more than just the beat values and was discussing piano in general giving pedalling as an example. Go back and read.

[dogperson]

I love it when people quibble over what I meant... I was not trying to state 'everything should be done perfectly'...  but there needs to be the type of information given, where a student doesn't think this is all.  I am not assigning blame, but when I was taught to pedal, it was either 'up or down' with no information about other possibilities... so no learning progress until a different teacher many yrs later. 

This is not looking for immediate perfection, 'doing it right to begin with'  because that is impossible, but the information to STRIVE for perfection... this is not looking for an impatient shortcut to the process of learning and improvement... but complete information only so that there can be accurate exploration and progress. No shortcuts sought, here.

[keypeg]

Lostinidlewonder, we were talking about a particular thing originally - the idea of understanding the relationship between different note values, as opposed to a shortcut that simply says that a quarter note = 1 beat, which then needs to be unlearned.  What you wrote afterward seemed to go in the same direction so we seemed to be on the same page.  What dogperson wrote afterward seemed to be about the same thing - dp and I seemed to be in sync with our thinking, and the same kind of thing.  Therefore when you responded, it appeared that you were responding to that general idea that dp and I were both talking about.

There is a misunderstanding in there somewhere, which is not uncommon on the Internet.

[keypeg]

I love it when people quibble over what I meant... I was not trying to state 'everything should be done perfectly'...  but there needs to be the type of information given, where a student doesn't think this is all.  I am not assigning blame, but when I was taught to pedal, it was either 'up or down' with no information about other possibilities... so no learning progress until a different teacher many yrs later. 

This is not looking for immediate perfection, 'doing it right to begin with'  because that is impossible, but the information to STRIVE for perfection... this is not looking for an impatient shortcut to the process of learning and improvement... but complete information only so that there can be accurate exploration and progress. No shortcuts sought, here.

I think I was trying to say the same thing, and I was caught out because of similar things.

[lostinidlewonder]

Lostinidlewonder, we were talking about a particular thing originally....

There is a misunderstanding in there somewhere, which is not uncommon on the Internet.

Yes it's your misunderstanding. Why did you bother butting into my response to dog, why don't you read dogs response to me fully? It is your misunderstanding not mine. Don't appreciate being told I'm talking past someone, go do something else.

[perfect_pitch]

We have had this discussion before with a certain member from UK (who seems to have left us now).

Mind if I ask who that was??? I must have missed it...

[keypeg]

Lostinidlewonder, the thing that both dog and I were talking about is very important to me.  That is why I wrote about it.  Part of dialogue involves catching where things are misunderstood.  It happens.  But then the next thing is to actually have a dialogue - not to get mad at people.  You are a teacher.  We both have concerns about the same thing as students and I was interested in your thoughts on the matter, and still am.  Your response has taken me aback.

[keypeg]

why don't you read dogs response to me fully?

I did read it before responding.  It confirmed that we were talking about the same kind of thing, because we both had the same thing happen when we were taught, along with the same need to redo what we had understood about one aspect of music.  For dog it was about pedal, for me it was about note value.  Additionally when I taught theory I had to untangle a student from the same kind of partial understanding.

[outin]

Mind if I ask who that was??? I must have missed it...

Mr Nyi...(never could spell the name), our resident piano technique expert

[adodd81802]

Notice a pattern here?
1/2
1/4
1/8
1/16
1/32
1/64
1/128

The arguing after this comment is hilarious. I am bemused that anybody else felt the need to comment and how far from the OP's question the topic of discussion has seem go have gotten...

There is nothing good about a thread in which you have to trawl through 30 childish messages before getting to any kind of answer, or missing the answer due to the childish messages.

Why are users so intent of forcing their "professional" methodology on other users? who cares if you look at the notes as fractions, as their own values, as percentages, as long as it works for the OP and the answer in one form or another is correct?

Why is there an immediate need to belittle other users if they have some information incorrect rather than just offer your own advice to the OP.

Comical. The internet is both the best and worst thing to happen to our society.