RHYTHMIC figures and their values

One of the factors that gives music the most richness and expressiveness is the rhythm. Rhythm is a fundamental factor for us to follow and enjoy music, it is a very instinctive element that has a specific way of being written in musical notation. In this lesson from a TEACHER we will learn about rhythmic figures and their values, which are the fundamental basis of rhythm and musical reading.

When we speak of rhythmic figures we must also speak of another very important concept in music which is the “duration”. Duration is nothing other than the amount of time that a sound or silence remains. In the case of notes, it is the time that a sound is maintained, in the case of silence, the amount of time we must wait to play a note.

Music has its own language to define these durations, therefore we must learn about these figures that are symbols that give us indications of how to read the rhythm. To be able to write music it is also necessary to learn to draw these symbols.

Rhythmic figures of the notes

• Round = 4 times
• White = 2 times
• Black = 1 time
• Eighth note = 1/2 beat
• Half-Eighth note = 1/4 beat

Rhythmic figures of silences

Just like rhythmic figures for notes, rests have the same lengths and even bear the same name:

• Round silence = 4 times
• Silence of white = 2 times
• Quarter silence = 1 beat
• Eighth note rest = 1/2 beat
• Half-eighth note silence = 1/4 beat

You should know that there are many more musical figures of different durations, some even shorter such as the fusa and the semi-fusa. There are also other groups such as triplets and sextillos.

The figures of longer duration such as the round, the white and the black always have the same symbol, but for shorter musical notes from the eighth note there is the possibility of joining them so that the writing looks neater.

In this case, the notes are joined together and the bracket becomes a "stripe", justo at the end of the stem, connecting both figures. Generally, the maximum number to join eighth and sixteenth notes it's 4 notes, but it's not necessarily always like this. The fact of joining the notes by brackets does NOT mean that their durations are added, they are simply placed like this because it is cleaner and easier to visualize when we have many notes.

To distinguish the rhythmic figures in this case you must count by how many stripes are attached. The eighth notes only have one line connecting them, while the semi-eighth notes have 2.

As we mentioned before, a musical figure can indicate a note or absence this. We divide the figures into notes and rests. The musical notes are those that produce a sound with height and have a name and position on the staff (do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, si do), while a silence is when we must wait and we do not touch any note. Both resources, sound as well as the absence of it, are essential for music.

In the music the duration we measure it with time. Each musical figure is different to be able to distinguish how many times it lasts. What you must do to be able to read rhythm is to learn which symbol corresponds to each figure. You should also know that each musical note has a silence of the same duration. To make it easier for you to visualize it, we have created a table with the equivalences, mentioning: the name, the rhythmic figure, the silence that corresponds to it and the duration.

Anatomy of a musical note

The drawing of a musical note has 3 parts: Head, stem and bracket. We recognize the figure of the note depending on how these parts are drawn. Not all notes have all 3 parts, the most basic one has only the head.

Now that you have learned about rhythmic figures and their values, you are one step closer to understanding music and knowing how to read and write it. Remember that all new knowledge takes time and practice to understand and make it your own, so take some time to review it and practice drawing and recognizing the shapes. To help you practice we have included a printable file that you can download to draw these symbols.