ELEMENTS OF RHYTHM
Have you ever stopped to observe the
movement of trees, branches and leaves?
interest of the waves of the sea, how they
come and go? seen people walk,
children play, animals move gracefully about?
Are you conscious of your breath, how
regularly you take them to keep you alive?
If you have spent time on these, you have felt
and seen rhythm, because rhythm is not only
in everything that happens around you.
Rhythm is in you.
What is Rhythm?
• It is the sensation of on-going movement
in music. It is the element which makes us
clap, stamp, click and move to music. It
refers to the organization of duration, the
distribution of notes in time - that is the
arrangement of long and short notes and
their accentuation. Rhythm is the result of
duration and accentuation.
– Rhythm has component parts: They are beat,
accent, meter and rhythmic pattern.
BEAT IS THE MOST FUNDAMENTAL
–
COMPONENT OF RHYTHM. IT IS THE
RECURRING PULSE FOUND IN MOST MUSIC.
• Beat in music can be compared with your
heartbeat. It is the pulse or throb that is sensed
rather than sounded and it occurs regularly. It is
the component of rhythm that makes you dance,
clap or tap with your foot.
• Accent – In music some beats are heavier than
others. They occur on the first beat for every
group of beats. The heavy beats are called
“accented beats”
Meter – is the grouping of beats. It comes from a
Greek word “metron” meaning
measure.
• The tendency for grouping can be
understood by considering how human
beings speak. They do not say every word
exactly. Words and syllables are grouped
together some being stressed while others
are not.
• There are three common meters in music:
duple, triple and quadruple meters.
1. Duple meter- you feel like marching.
There are two beats in a group or measure.
The first beat is accented while the second
is not.
• Measures are set apart by vertical lines called
bar lines. In duple meter, each measure on the
staff contains all the notes to be sounded over a
span of time ticked off two beats sounding like:
Beat, beat / Beat, beat
2. Triple meter – Here the accent occurs
only in every three beats. The listener feels Beat, beat, beat Beat, beat, beat
3. Quadruple Meter- The accent occurs
once in every four beats ,like:
Beat, beat, beat, beat Beat, beat, beat. Beat
Activities: Clap each metric pattern shown
in a flash card
4. Rhythmic Pattern – is the division of
beats into patterns of sound
• It is indicated by the words and syllables of
the words. Say the rhyme and you will sound
the rhythmic pattern. Say the lines and clap
the rhythmic pattern:
• Row row row your boat gently down the stream,
• Merrily merrily merrily merrily, life is but a dream.
• Sing Bahay Kubo and stamp your feet to the accent.
• Sing the song and clap the beat.
• Sing the song again and tap the rhythmic pattern with your
ball pen
Activities: Do the same while singing “Are
You Sleeping”
Use the song Row Row Your Boat and do
the following:
1. Sing the song and stamp the beat.
2. Sing the song, stamp the beat and bend
your knees to the accent.
3. Sing the song, stamp the beat, bend your
knees to the accent and clap the
rhythmic pattern.
2. Give the definition of the
following terms:
• 1. beat
• 2. accent
• 3. meter
4. rhythmic pattern
5. measure
6. bar lines
3. Listen to pieces of music and
identify the meter of the songs.
Note values: The kind of note
shows duration or length of a tone.
Kinds of notes:
• Whole note ○
Eighth Note ♪
• Half note ○
Sixteenth Note ♬
• Quarter note ♩
Thirty second note
Half notes and quarter notes consist of a note
head and a stem.
Eighth notes, sixteenth notes and thirty second
notes consist of a note head, a stem and 2 or
more flags or hooks.
Sometimes beams are used to join 2-8 notes
Drawing Notes
• 1. Note heads are oval rather than round.
• 2. The flags or hooks of eighth, sixteenth
and thirty second notes always point to
the right no matter which side of the note
the stem is on.
•
♩
♬ ○