The meters every band counts
· 37 rhythms · 3 traditions
37 common drum beats and odd time signatures, from rock backbeat and swing to 7/8 as 2+2+3, each with its accents and tempo on a metronome.
Snare on two and four.
This page holds 37 common drum beats and time signatures, each with its accents and each playable on the metronome at its usual tempo. There are 25 popular beats from rock backbeat and swing to house and drum and bass, 11 odd meters from 5/4 as 3+2 and 7/8 as 2+2+3 to 15/8, and a North American indigenous round dance, frames shared by rock, jazz, blues, hip-hop and electronic music rather than one country.
Four-beat music is many rhythms, told apart by where the weight falls. A rock backbeat leans on 2 and 4, four on the floor kicks every beat, half-time moves the main snare to 3 so the same tempo feels broader, funk leans hard on 1, and swing sets its eighth notes on a triplet feel over four steady beats. The marks are blank, because the accents carry the information.
Swing is a metrical scaffold here, not a fixed performance ratio. Players move the long and short notes with tempo and style, nearly even at a fast jazz tempo and much heavier in a slow shuffle; the metronome holds the triplet floor and your ears find the pocket.
The blues shuffle makes the hidden triplet explicit. Each beat has three spaces and the middle one is silent, so count "one trip let" and play on "one" and "let".
Odd meters are grouped rather than counted as long strings. Five is 3+2 or 2+3, seven 2+2+3 or 3+2+2, and the accent on each group start gives the body somewhere to stand. Say "one two three, one two" for 3+2, or use words or steps of those lengths.
House sits around 120 to 128 quarter notes a minute and drum and bass much faster, but a style is never only a speed and an accent map. Trap needs its hi-hat language, second line the looseness and conversation of New Orleans percussion.
Start with Rock backbeat, Blues shuffle and 5/4 as 3+2.
These are the beats a band counts and the patterns a drum machine plays. Rock backbeat accents 2 and 4, where the snare usually falls. Four on the floor accents all four beats, a kick on every count. Half-time accents only beat 3, which gives the bar more room in the same four counts. Start with these three, a foot on all four beats and the hands clapping only where the stronger click falls, and switch from Rock backbeat to Half-time without changing the foot.
Swing keeps four, with the hi-hat on 2 and 4 and triplet eighths between the beats. Blues shuffle lays out twelve units in four groups of three and leaves the middle of each triplet hollow; count through the hollow box rather than shortening the group, saying “one, gap, last” across each three. No fixed swing ratio in the metronome suits every player and tempo. Slow blues is the same twelve at 40 to 70 a dotted quarter, with the snare on the second and fourth pulse.
Funk accents the one, and its sixteenths and ghost notes are more than the strip can voice. Second line groups eight as 3+3+2, the outline of its bass drum. Bo Diddley beat is a son clave pattern on guitar, its gaps drawn hollow. Charleston has gaps too; keep a small pulse running to hear its early second attack. Train beat’s snare sixteenths and Bluegrass’s cut-time boom-chick have to be heard, since their count rows are plain.
The electronic rows are tempo landmarks more than definitions. House, Techno and Trance put a kick on all four beats; Drum and bass breaks a faster pulse; Dubstep and Trap put a half-time snare on three; Boom bap returns the snare to 2 and 4 at a slower pace. Jersey club’s kick pattern is a selected reading that the catalogue marks as uncertain.
Start with Rock backbeat, Four on the floor and Blues shuffle.
Snare on two and four.
Rock backbeat is four quarter-note beats with the main weight on 2 and 4, where the snare usually lands. Count “one, TWO, three, FOUR” without crushing the accented beats. You hear it across rock, pop and countless first drum lessons. Practise clapping 2 and 4 while your foot taps all four beats. If the clap drifts, speak the numbers and leave the instrument alone for a minute.
Kick on every beat: disco, house, techno.
Four on the floor puts an equal kick on 1, 2, 3 and 4. It drives disco, house, techno and trance, with the tempo and surrounding parts separating those styles. Count all four quarters and feel each as a landing point. The trap is pressing every beat so hard that the bar loses direction. Walk the pulse, then add a slightly clearer 1 without making the other three disappear.
Snare only on three.
Half-time keeps a four-beat bar but places the main snare accent on 3. Count “one, two, THREE, four”. At the same written tempo, the groove feels as if it has opened into a slower stride. You hear that shape in rock, hip-hop, trap and dubstep. Practise switching between a backbeat on 2 and 4 and half-time on 3 without changing the metronome.
Four with triplet eighths and the hi-hat on two and four.
Swing uses four main beats with triplet-based movement between them, often with the hi-hat marking 2 and 4. Count “one, two, three, four”, then hear the eighth-note pair as the first and third parts of a triplet. Jazz players adjust that spacing constantly, so the grid is only a floor. Practise a scale while tapping 2 and 4. If the tapping collapses, slow the scale down.
Twelve-eight, the middle triplet left out.
Blues shuffle is twelve eighth-note units grouped 3+3+3+3. In each group, the middle triplet is silent, giving long-short motion. Count “one trip let, two trip let” and play on the number and “let”. It runs through blues, boogie and shuffle-based rock. Start with one note and exaggerate the empty middle. Add fills only once that gap feels settled, or the shuffle drifts into straight eighths.
Twelve-eight with the snare on the second and fourth pulse.
Count it as 3 + 3 + 3 + 3, with the weight on 4, 10.
The one, and sixteenths.
Count it as 4 even units, with the weight on 1.
New Orleans: the tresillo in the bass drum.
Second line uses an eight-unit 3+3+2 pull, with landmarks on 1, 4 and 7. Count “one two three, one two three, one two” while keeping a steady four underneath. It comes from New Orleans parade rhythm and appears in bass drum patterns and popular grooves. Tap the eight units with one hand and the three group starts with the other. Keep it loose once the alignment is secure.
Son clave on a guitar.
Count it as 4 + 4 + 4 + 4, with the weight on 1, and nothing on 2, 3, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12, 14, 15, 16.
Beat one and the and-of-two.
Count it as 4 + 4, with the weight on 1, and nothing on 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8.
Country's snare sixteenths.
Count it as 2 even units, with the weight on 1.
Cut time, boom-chick on the mandolin.
Count it as 2 even units, with the weight on 1.
Slow, slow, quick, quick.
Count it as 4 even units, with the weight on 1, 3.
Three with swung eighths.
Count it as 3 even units, with the weight on 1.
Louisiana's accordion two.
Count it as 2 even units, with the weight on 1.
The rubboard's shuffle.
Count it as 4 even units, with the weight on 1, 3.
Hip-hop's kick and snare.
Count it as 4 even units, with the weight on 2, 4.
Half-time snare, hi-hats in sixteenths and faster.
Count it as 4 even units, with the weight on 3.
Four on the floor with the open hat on the off.
Count it as 4 even units, with the weight on 1, 2, 3, 4.
Four on the floor, harder.
Count it as 4 even units, with the weight on 1, 2, 3, 4.
Four on the floor, faster.
Count it as 4 even units, with the weight on 1, 2, 3, 4.
Broken beats at 170.
Count it as 4 even units, with the weight on 2, 4.
140 with the snare on three.
Count it as 4 even units, with the weight on 3.
Krautrock's unbroken eighths.
Count it as 4 even units, with the weight on 1, 2, 3, 4.
The kick pattern of Newark: one, and-of-two, three-and, four-and.
Count it as 4 + 4, with the weight on 1, and nothing on 2, 3, 5, 7.
These odd meters are named by their groups, and a bar is easier to count in its groups than in its total. 5/4 as 3+2 is three counts then two, accented on 1 and 4; 5/4 as 2+3 moves the second start to 3. The catalogue places Take Five and Mission: Impossible with 3+2.
7/8 as 2+2+3 is quick, quick, slow; 7/8 as 3+2+2 puts the long group first; 9/8 as 2+2+2+3 adds one more quick step before the long one. The click accents the start of each group and no instrument strokes sit under these rows, so tap every small unit quietly yourself, above all through a group of three.
Longer bars join the same pieces. 11/8 as 3+3+3+2 is three long groups and a short one, and 13/8 as 3+3+3+2+2 adds another short group. 15/8 as 4+4+4+3 is almost four even fours, except that the last group ends one eighth sooner. 10/8 as 3+2+2+3 shares the grouping of some named cycles elsewhere, but this row is only a counting pattern, not their strokes or history.
Walk 5/4 as 3+2 for four repeats, then switch to 2+3 without changing the small beat under your foot. Then take 7/8 as 2+2+3 slowly, saying “quick quick slow” without racing through the slow.
Start with 5/4 as 3+2, 5/4 as 2+3 and 7/8 as 2+2+3.
Take Five; Mission: Impossible.
This five is grouped 3+2, the shape “Take Five” made famous. Count “one two three, one two”, with accents at the start of each group. It should feel like one long step and one shorter step, not a bar of four with an accident attached. Walk the groups while speaking them, then play a repeating note only on the two landmarks.
Two then three: the other five.
Count it as 2 + 3, with the weight on 1, 3.
Money.
Count it as 4 + 3, with the weight on 1, 5.
The prog seven.
This 7/8 is grouped 2+2+3. Count “quick quick, quick quick, slow slow slow”, or simply “one two, one two, one two three”. The accents fall at the starts of all three groups. It appears often in progressive rock and in many traditions with more specific names. Practise one chord per group before filling the eighth notes. If the last three keep shrinking, step the groups rather than counting louder.
Seven with the long step first.
Count it as 3 + 2 + 2, with the weight on 1, 4, 6.
Blue Rondo à la Turk.
Count it as 2 + 2 + 2 + 3, with the weight on 1, 3, 5, 7.
Eleven, three threes and a two.
Count it as 3 + 3 + 3 + 2, with the weight on 1, 4, 7, 10.
Thirteen.
Count it as 3 + 3 + 3 + 2 + 2, with the weight on 1, 4, 7, 10, 12.
Two 4/4 bars with the final eighth omitted.
Count it as 4 + 4 + 4 + 3, with the weight on 1, 5, 9, 13.
The tresillo as a meter.
Count it as 3 + 3 + 2, with the weight on 1, 4, 7.
The Sama'i and jurjina ten, in the abstract.
Count it as 3 + 2 + 2 + 3, with the weight on 1, 4, 6, 8.
Round dance, the one North American indigenous row, is written as a 2/4 pulse with the first count accented. The catalogue describes a heartbeat drum with a heavy swing, which two equal boxes cannot show, and the row does not speak for every Round dance performance; it is a steady place to count one, two. Tap it softly beside a recording and notice where the drum sits around your taps, without making the performance obey the click. Without a recording, alternate a cycle of “one two” aloud with a silent one, and bring your voice back on the accented first beat.
Start with Round dance.
The heartbeat drum with its heavy swing.
Count it as 2 even units, with the weight on 1.