Rock Perspectives Progressive Drumming Essentials Part 1: Understanding Odd Time Signatures by Aaron Edgar Before we start playing sick proggy grooves in 17/16, let’s start at the beginning and define time signatures. Time signatures tell us the length of a bar, or measure. This is done with a pair of numbers. The bottom number refers to a subdivision (4 = quarter notes, 8 = 8th notes, and 16 = 16th notes), and the top number tells us how many of those notes are included in one measure. Quarter-Note Meters The most common time signature is 4/4, where we have four quarter notes per bar. You aren’t limited to playing only quarter notes, though. You can use any subdivision you want, provided that the sum of those subdivisions equals the length of four quarter notes. Let’s give some quarter-note meters a try. First up is 4/4. Now let’s get away from […]