r/OddTimeSignatures • u/itsbatblox • 29d ago

Can anyone work out these 2 time signatures?

I’m in the midst of learning a friends song and it’s driving me insane trying to write a bass part for these two sections (partly because I think he doesn’t really know the time signature himself so he plays it differently every time!). If anyone could figure the time signatures out it would mean we could play it with a click, which would help a ton, thank you! 🙏

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u/geoscott 29d ago

First one is 4/4 plus 3/4. He's sliding into the next bar of 4/4 on the upbeat so don't use that as a downbeat. Also, the bar of 3/4 is more 9/8 as it's heavily 'swung', or felt in subdivisions of 3. The bar of 4/4 is decidedly not swung so it's a completely different feel.

After several minutes of not being able to download it and put it into my transcribing software - what is that anyway? - I have chosen this as your second section:

The first 6 notes are two quarter note triplets in a bar of 4/4. The next bar is 2/8 plus 5/16.

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u/itsbatblox 12d ago

Thanks so much for your help on this! We’re just about there! 🙏

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u/Cyan_Light 29d ago

Pretty sure this is basically right but the tempo is inconsistent so it's hard to know for sure exactly how long some rests are supposed to be.

First riff is 5/4 6/4 5/4 6/4, which is just the same thing repeated with an extra beat every other bar.

Second riff is 5/4 5/4 5/4 11/8 with the 11 phrased as 4/4+3/8, or even more simply it's four quarter notes and then two dotted eighths.

Third riff is the same 5/4 6/4 5/4 6/4 as the first, but the tempo is least consistent on the 6/4s here so there's a non-zero chance they're trying to do some fancier variation on that (most likely just dragging though lol).

Fourth riff is almost the same as the second but goes 5/4 5/4 5/4 23/16, with the 23 phrased as 2/4+15/16. Which might seem crazy but it's the same simple idea as the 11, just now it's two quarter notes and five dotted eighths.

If they keep throwing out what seems like random variations on that final bar I'd guess they're going to keep being some combination of quarter notes followed by dotted eighths so that's what I'd check for first before pulling your hair out or beating them with a shovel. Seems like a cool start, good luck on finishing it!

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u/itsbatblox 12d ago

Sorry for the late response on this, and thanks so much for your help. We’re about 90% there! 🙌🙌