Just a few more facts on time signatures:
In
ska,
reggae, and a few other
genres, the 2nd and 4th
beats (
up beats) of the
4/4 signature are
accented.
In
Scandinavian waltzes, the 2nd beat is accented. Think of standard waltz ad OOM pah pah. Scandinavian waltzes go oom PAH oom. :)
Think of
6/8 and
9/8 time signatures as
triplet versions of
2/4 and
3/4. 6/8 has two
pulses per
measure, and 9/8 has three. The difference between 2/4, 3/4 and 6/8, 9/8 is that in 6/8 and 9/8, each pulse contains three notes.
In
rock, a 6/8 beat may be used to sound
fast paced because
16th notes in 4/4 are too fast,
8th notes are too
slow, but the triplet (12th) note is
perfect (that's my
theory, anyway).
Various non-
conventional time signatures can lead to
confusing (at times) but
interesting rhythmic feels. I wrote a song in
10/8 once, where parts of it sounded like
5/4, but other parts of the exact same piece sounded like 4/4 but
repeated 5 times instead of 4 (as in
standard 4/4 music) . Sometimes, time signatures are
alternated every other
measure.
Gustav Holst's
Song Of the Blacksmith alternates between 3/4 and 4/4.
Toadies by
Possum Kingdom uses an unusual time signature which is mainly 4/4 but counts like this, "1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
1 2 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4" (repeats).
Sometimes unusual time signatures are good because just as you are listening, your
brain naturally starts counting 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 and if all of a sudden you're thrown off, and the music becomes instantly more
interesting.