When I was a music major, while I was being classically trained on piano, I also listened to all sorts of music from blues to rock, folk music, piano rags and jazz . One of the albums I listened to over and over again was the Dave Brubeck Quartet’s album, Take Five. What made this album unique was the time signatures of the songs on the album. Duple meter (two beats to a measure … think fox trots, polkas, marches, in and most rock songs) and triple meter (three beats to a measure, waltzes being the most common example) is a main stay of most of our music, however, those meters were not found on this album.
Rather, this album was filled with music written in five beats to a measure, seven beats to a measure. The song, Take Five, composed by the quartet’s alto sax player, Paul Desmond, was a huge commercial hit (Google Take Five and listen to it).
I was studying music composed by classical composers, e.g. Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Debussy, who never used meters like that which was heard on the Take Five album. Out of all that listening to Brubeck quartet albums, I developed a great fondness for unusual meter, never thinking that some day I would be composing music with five beats to a measure or seven beats to a measure.
Over all my years of composing, I have strived to compose music in quintuple time (e.g. 5/4 time) and septuple time (e.g. 7/4 time). Like all music, some of the songs have been successful and some has not.
One of the first songs I composed with five beats to a measure was an odd kind of Mazurka, I wrote for my five grandchildren. A Mazurka is a Polish dance with three beats to a measure with a distinctive dotted rhythm. Chopin was well known for the Mazurkas he composed. However, I decided to play with the usual form and composed it with five beats to a measure, or, as I explained it to a friend, it’s like dancing as if you had three legs, not two. Here is the song:
Over the years, I have found that my most special songs, usually composed for my wife, Ruth, have been composed in 5/4 time. This song, in my opinion, is one of the best I composed as a present for Ruth in 2018.
A more esoteric song in 5/4 time was composed in 2017 for the Victims of Racial Violence (the presidency of Donald Trump with all its racial violence and mysogyny compelled me to compose 9 songs for the victims of his policies
From the same collection of music is a song I composed in 7/4 time for the Victims of Those Denied Medical Care (my revolt against the republican opposition to the Affordable Care Act). What makes this song all the more unique is that instead of it being composed in normal scales we often hear in music, e.g. major and minor scales, it is composed in a whole tone scale in which half steps in the scale are eliminated (in the normal major scale there is a half step between “mi” and “fa”, “ti” and “do”.).
Another song I composed in 7/4 time was the song “In the Beginning Was the Word,” from the collection of Advent/Christmas Music, “Songs for the Refugee Christ at Christmas.” The number seven is significant in religious theology and symbology (in case you were just thinking it was only significant in gambling dice games like Craps). In Jewish thought, Seven is the perfect number, e.g. being in Seventh Heaven. When Jesus is asked how many times one must forgive another person he answers Seven time Seventy times. In Catholic theology there are seven sacraments, seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, seven capital virtues with their corresponding seven capital sins, and so on. What is unique in this song, based on the Prologue of John’s Gospel, is that the 7/4 is divided in 3 beats followed by 2 beats followed be 2 beats. It sounds like 123 45 67. Here is the song.
In the collection of songs, A Paschal Journey, I composed the song “Mystagogy – On the Shores of Lake Tiberias.” The song is meant to be representative of the post resurrection account in John’s Gospel, of the Risen Jesus on the shore of Lake Tiberias (Sea of Galilee in the other Gospels), while the apostles are trying to fish. It is in this account that Jesus asks Peter three times,”Do you love me?” I wanted reflected in the song a rhythmic motif representing waves lapping up on shore. Try as I could, all the normal meter signatures did not work. However, 5/4 meter did. Here is that song.
In the collection of music “Musical Reflections on a Pandemic,” there is one song I composed in 5/4 meter. It is entitled “The Feast of Fools – A Pandemic Danse Macabre”. This song was inspired by all the idiots in my town who decided to have unprotected, unmasked graduation open houses at the height of the Covid Pandemic. Of course, whole families were infected and deaths occurred among those families. At one time, the line up of cars filled with adults and children at the Mayo Clinic testing area stretched down the highway. The sight of all these people who foolishly ignored medical science inspired this song. I composed it in 5/4 meter with the idea that the listener would feel unbalanced in the hearing of it. Here is that song.
In the past year, I have composed two more songs in 5/4 meter. The first is a Berceuse, which literally means a lullaby in French. Most lullabies (think Rockabye Baby) are in 3/4 meter. This one, though, is in 5/4 meter. Here is that song.
The second song in the same collection (Songs of the Servant) is far more dramatic and powerful. It is entitled Fantasia in B major. The powerful chords and melody have a regal, kind of unsettling effect upon the listener. Here is that song.
While there are many other songs I have composed in unusual meter, I conclude with this last song, “Canticle in Praise of Her.” This is a song I dedicated to the Holy Spirit. The song begins in the meter of 7/4. What is different from the other songs listed here, is the song changes meter in the middle. It goes from 7/4, moves to 2/4 and then segues again to 7/4. Here is that song.
I hope this little listening exercise in “alternative meters” intrigues you to seek out more music composed in different meters. If you would like more examples of these meters, begin with the Bernstein musical, West Side Story. The Prologue and the song, America, are beautiful examples of alternative meters. The piano and orchestral music of the Hungarian composer, Bela Bartok are also a trip through the alternative meters of Hungarian folk music. As I have gotten older I have found that in my composing of music, I derive a very special fondness for these two alternative meters.