rhythm

1. Movement or variation characterized by the regular recurrence or alternation of different quantities or conditions: the rhythm of the tides.
2. The patterned, recurring alternations of contrasting elements of sound or speech.
3. Music.
   1. The pattern of musical movement through time.
   2. A specific kind of such a pattern, formed by a series of notes differing in duration and stress: a waltz rhythm.
   3. A group of instruments supplying the rhythm in a band.
4. 1. The pattern or flow of sound created by the arrangement of stressed and unstressed syllables in accentual verse or of long and short syllables in quantitative verse.
   2. The similar but less formal sequence of sounds in prose.
   3. A specific kind of metrical pattern or flow: iambic rhythm.
5. 1. The sense of temporal development created in a work of literature or a film by the arrangement of formal elements such as the length of scenes, the nature and amount of dialogue, or the repetition of motifs.
   2. A regular or harmonious pattern created by lines, forms, and colors in painting, sculpture, and other visual arts.
6. The pattern of development produced in a literary or dramatic work by repetition of elements such as words, phrases, incidents, themes, images, and symbols.
7. Procedure or routine characterized by regularly recurring elements, activities, or factors: the rhythm of civilization; the rhythm of the lengthy negotiations.

[Latin rhythmus, from Greek rhuthmos.]

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noun

The patterned, recurring alternation of contrasting elements, such as stressed and unstressed notes in music: beat, cadence, cadency, measure, meter, swing. See repetition.

A measured movement; the recurrence of an action or function at regular intervals.

The subdivision of a span of time into perceptible sections; the grouping of musical sounds, principally by means of duration and stress. With melody and harmony, rhythm is one of the three basic elements of music.

In Western music, time is usually organized to establish a regular pulse, and by the subdivision of that pulse into regular groups. Such groups are commonly of two or three units (or their compounds, such as four or six); the arrangement of the pulse into groups is the metre of a composition, and the rate of pulses is its tempo. Most Western music, from the late Middle Ages to the 20th century, possesses a regular rhythmic pulse and metre; these may be absent, however, from some types of earlier music, for example ecclesiastical plainchant, which apparently lacked a metric structure, leaving its rhythm to be realized according to conventions and as dictated by the verbal text. In some 20th-century music, composers have sought to avoid regular rhythmic structures in order to achieve a more flexible rhythm; in some cases their methods have been influenced by folk music lacking a regular metric structure. But even in periods when composers accepted ‘the tyranny of the bar-line’, they have used various devices to prevent dull or sterile rhythmic structures: syncopation (displacement of accent); shorter notes at stressed parts of the bar (as opposed to the more natural longer notes at accented points); phrases that avoid regular four-bar or eight-bar patterns; eliding phrases into one another or extending phrases; short-term displacement of accent (common in cadences in the Baroque era: see Hemiola); in vocal music, following a natural speech rhythm (either one that contradicts metric regularity, as in much recitative, or one that follows a broad metric structure created by a verbal text). Rhythm, as a fundamental element - no music can exist other than in time - has a part to play in many other aspects of music: it is an important element in melody, it affects the progression of harmony, and has a role in such matters as texture, timbre and ornamentation. It is fundamental to the dance, dance patterns, derived from natural rhythms of bodily motion, have dictated many of the rhythmic patterns that pervade Western music.

While in Western music rhythm is multiplicative (i.e. rhythmic patterns are derived by multiplying or dividing, normally by two or three), in many non-Western cultures they are additive; an eight-unit rhythm in Western music is invariably constructed on the basis 2 × 2 × 2, in Middle Eastern music it may well be 3 + 2 + 3.

rhythm, the patern of sounds perceived as the recurrence of equivalent ‘beats’ at more or less equal intervals. In most English poetry, an underlying rhythm (commonly a sequence of four or five beats) is manifested in a metrical pattern (see metre)—a sequence of measured beats and ‘offbeats’ arranged in verse lines and governing the alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables. While metre involves the recurrence of measured sound units, rhythm is a less clearly structured principle: one can refer to the unmeasured rhythms of everyday speech, or of prose, and to the rhythms or cadences of non‐metrical verse (i.e. free verse). See also falling rhythm, rising rhythm, sprung rhythm.

Any sequence of regularly recurring functions or events, such as certain physiological processes (e.g. see circadian rhythm). Locomotory movements may also have a rhythm as in the regular repetition of a stride sequence in running or the stroke action in swimming. A sense of rhythm and an ability to maintain a regular sequence during locomotory functions is an important skill in sport. See also timing.

The “beat” of music; the regular pattern of long and short notes. Certain kinds of music, such as blues or marches, have a very characteristic rhythm. Rhythm, harmony, and melody are elements of music.

A measured movement; the recurrence of an action or function at regular intervals.

• alpha r. — a uniform rhythm of waves in the normal electroencephalogram.
• beta r. — a rhythm in the electroencephalogram consisting of waves smaller than those of the alpha rhythm, having an average frequency of 25 per second, typical during periods of intense activity of the nervous system. See also electroencephalography.
• biological r's — the cyclic changes that occur in physiological processes of living organisms; called also biorhythms. These rhythms are so persistent throughout the living kingdom that they probably should be considered a fundamental characteristic of life, as are growth, reproduction, metabolism and irritability. Many of the physiological rhythms occur in animals about every 24 hours (circadian rhythm). Examples include the peaks and troughs that are manifested in body temperature, vital signs, brain function and muscular activity. Biochemical analyses of urine, blood enzymes and plasma serum also have demonstrated rhythmic fluctuations in a 24-hour period.
— It has long been believed that the cyclic changes observed in plants and animals were totally in response to environmental changes and, as such, were exogenous or of external origin. This hypothesis is now being rejected by some chronobiologists who hold that the biological rhythms are intrinsic to the organisms, and that the organisms possess their own physiological mechanism for keeping time. This mechanism has been called the ‘biological clock’.
• circadian r. — see circadian rhythm.
• circamensual r. — that which occurs in cycles of about one month (30 days).
• circannual r. — the recurrence of a phenomenon in cycles of about one year.
• circaseptan r. — that which occurs in cycles of about 7 days (one week).
• coupled r. — heartbeats occurring in pairs, the second beat of the pair usually being a ventricular premature beat.
• escape r. — a heart rhythm initiated by lower centers when the sinoatrial node fails to initiate impulses, its rhythmicity is depressed, or its impulses are completely blocked.
• gallop r. — an auscultatory finding of three or four heart sounds, the extra sounds by convention being in diastole and related to atrial contraction (fourth sound, presystolic gallop), to early rapid filling of a ventricle with an altered ventricular compliance (protodiastolic gallop), or to concurrence of atrial contraction and ventricular early rapid filling (summation gallop).
• idioventricular r. — a series of ventricular escape complexes occuring at a regular rate.
• infradian r. — the regular recurrence in cycles of more than 24 hours, as certain biological activities which occur at such intervals, regardless of conditions of illumination.
• nodal r. — heart rhythm initiated in the specialized junctional tissue, i.e. the atrioventricular node and the main (His) bundle.
• nyctohemeral r. — a day and night rhythm.
• pendulum r. — alternation in the rhythm of the heart sounds in which the diastolic sound is equal in time, character and loudness to the systolic sound, the beat of the heart resembling the tick of a watch.
• sinus r. — normal heart rhythm originating in the sinoatrial node.

  Electrocardiogram showing normal sinus rhythm in a dog. By permission from Darke P, Kelly DF, Bonagura JD, Color Atlas of Veterinary Cardiology, Mosby, 1995

• ultradian r. — the regular recurrence in cycles of less than 24 hours, as certain biological activities which occur at such intervals, regardless of conditions of illumination.
• ventricular r. — the ventricular contractions which occur in cases of complete heart block.

An essential of all poetry, the regular or progressive pattern of recurrent accents in the flow of a poem as determined by the arses and theses of the metrical feet, i.e., the rise and fall of stress. The measure of rhythmic quantity is the meter.

For other uses, see Rhythm (disambiguation).

Rhythm (from Greek ῥυθμός – rhythmos, "any measured flow or movement, symmetry") is the variation of the length and accentuation of a series of sounds or other events.

Contents 1 Rhythm in linguistics 2 Origins of human appreciation of rhythm 3 Rhythm notation and the oral tradition 3.1 African music 3.2 Indian music 3.3 Western music 4 Types 5 See also 6 Notes 7 Sources 8 Further reading

Rhythm in linguistics

Origins of human appreciation of rhythm

Rhythm notation and the oral tradition

Worldwide there are many different approaches to passing on rhythmic phrases and patterns, as they exist in traditional music, from generation to generation.

African music

In the Griot tradition of Africa everything related to music has been passed on orally. Babatunde Olatunji (1927–2003), a Nigerian drummer who lived and worked in the United States, developed a simple series of spoken sounds for teaching the rhythms of the hand drum. He used six vocal sounds: Goon Doon Go Do Pa Ta. There are three basic sounds on the drum, but each can be played with either the left or the right hand. This simple system is now used worldwide, particularly by Djembe players.

Indian music

Indian music has also been passed on orally. Tabla players would learn to speak complex rhythm patterns and phrases before attempting to play them. Sheila Chandra, an English pop singer of Indian descent, made performances based around her singing these patterns. In Indian Classical music, the Tala of a composition is the rhythmic pattern over which the whole piece is structured.

Western music

Standard music notation contains all rhythmic information and is adapted specifically for drums and percussion instruments. The drums are generally used to keep other instruments in 'time'. They do this by supplying beats/strikes in time at a certain pace, i.e. 70 beats per minute (bpm). In Rock music, a drum beat is used to keep a bass/guitar line in time.

Types

In Western music, rhythms are usually arranged with respect to a time signature, partially signifying a meter. The speed of the underlying pulse is sometimes called the beat. The tempo is a measure of how quickly the pulse repeats. The tempo is usually measured in 'beats per minute' (bpm); 60 bpm means a speed of one beat per second. The length of the meter, or metric unit (usually corresponding with measure length), is usually grouped into either two or three beats, being called duple meter and triple meter, respectively. If each beat is divided by two or four, it is simple meter, if by three (or six) compound meter. According to Pierre Boulez, beat structures beyond four are "simply not natural".^[1]. His reference is to western European music.

Standard notation of a clave pattern on audio clip clave pattern.ogg

Syncopated rhythms are rhythms that accent parts of the beat not already stressed by counting. Playing simultaneous rhythms in more than one time signature is called polymeter. See also polyrhythm. In recent years, rhythm and meter have become an important area of research among music scholars. Recent work in these areas includes books by Maury Yeston, Fred Lerdahl and Ray Jackendoff, Jonathan Kramer, Christopher Hasty, William Rothstein, and Joel Lester.

Grid notation of single a clave pattern

Some genres of music make different use of rhythm than others. Most Western music is based on subdivision, while non-Western music uses more additive rhythm. African music makes heavy use of polyrhythms, and Indian music uses complex cycles such as 7 and 13, while Balinese music often uses complex interlocking rhythms. By comparison, a lot of Western classical music is fairly rhythmically (or metrically) simple; it stays in a simple meter such as 4/4 or 3/4 and makes little use of syncopation.
Clave is a common underlying rhythm in African, Cuban music, and Brazilian music.

	Claves Four beats followed by three Clave patterns
Problems listening to this file? See media help.

In the 20th century, composers like Igor Stravinsky, Bela Bartok, Philip Glass, and Steve Reich wrote more rhythmically complex music using odd meters, and techniques such as phasing and additive rhythm. At the same time, modernists such as Olivier Messiaen and his pupils used increased complexity to disrupt the sense of a regular beat, leading eventually to the widespread use of irrational rhythms in New Complexity. This use may be explained by a comment of John Cage's^[where?] where he notes that regular rhythms cause sounds to be heard as a group rather than individually; the irregular rhythms highlight the rapidly changing pitch relationships that would otherwise be subsumed into irrelevant rhythmic groupings (Sandow 2004, p.257). LaMonte Young also wrote music in which the sense of a regular beat is absent because the music consists only of long sustained tones (drones). In the 1930s, Henry Cowell wrote music involving multiple simultaneous periodic rhythms and collaborated with Léon Thérémin to invent the Rhythmicon, the first electronic rhythm machine, in order to perform them. Similarly, Conlon Nancarrow wrote for the player piano.

See also

Meter (music) Prosody (linguistics) Riddim Morse Code

Soul (music) Time scale (music) Timing (linguistics)

Notes

1. ^ In Discovering Music: Rhythm with Leonard Slatkin at 5:05

Sources

• Hasty, Christopher (1997). Meter as Rhythm. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-510066-2.
• London, Justin (2004). Hearing in Time: Psychological Aspects of Musical Meter. ISBN 0-19-516081-9.
• Middleton, Richard (1990/2002). Studying Popular Music. Philadelphia: Open University Press. ISBN 0-335-15275-9.
• Narmour (1980). Cited in DeLone et al. (Eds.) (1975). Aspects of Twentieth-Century Music. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice–Hall. ISBN 0-13-049346-5.
• Sandow, Greg (2004). "A Fine Madness", The Pleasure of Modernist Music. ISBN 1-58046-143-3.
• Yeston, Maury (1976). "The Stratification of Musical Rhythm".

Further reading

• McGaughey, William (2001). "Rhythm and Self-Consciousness: New Ideals for an Electronic Civilization". Minneapolis: Thistlerose Publications. ISBN 0-9605630-4-0.
• Honing, H. (2002). "Structure and interpretation of rhythm and timing." Tijdschrift voor Muziektheorie [Dutch Journal of Music Theory] 7(3): 227–232.
• Lewis, Andrew (2005). Rhythm—What it is and How to Improve Your Sense of It. San Francisco: RhythmSource Press. ISBN 978-0-9754667-0-4.

v • d • e Musical notation and development Staff Bar & Bar line · Clef · Da Capo · Dal Segno · Key signature · Ledger line · Musical mode · Musical scale · Rehearsal letter · Repeat sign · Time signature · Transposition · Transposing instrument Notes Accidental (Flat · Natural · Sharp) · Dotted note · Grace note · Note value (Beam · Note head · Stem) · Pitch · Rest · Interval  · Letter notation Articulation Dynamics · Ornament (Trill · Mordent · Grace note) · Ossia · Portato · Accent · Legato · Tenuto · Marcato · Staccato · Staccatissimo · Tie · Slur · Fermata Development Coda · Exposition · Harmony · Melody · Motif · Recapitulation · Rhythm (Beat · Meter · Tempo) · Theme · Tonality · Atonality Related Chord chart · Figured bass · Graphic notation · Lead sheet · Eye music · Modern musical symbols · Neume · Tablature

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Common misspelling(s) of rhythm

• rhythem
• rythim
• rythem
• rhythm
• rhythim

Dansk (Danish)
n. - rytme, regelmæssighed

idioms:

• rhythm and blues    rhythm and blues (musik)
• rhythm method    rytmemetode (prævention)
• rhythm section    rytmegruppe

Nederlands (Dutch)
ritme

Français (French)
n. - (gén, Mus, Littérat) rythme

idioms:

• rhythm and blues    rhythm & blues
• rhythm method    (Méd) méthode des températures
• rhythm section    section rythmique

Deutsch (German)
n. - Rhythmus

idioms:

• rhythm and blues    (Mus.) Rhythm and Blues
• rhythm method    Rhythmusmethode
• rhythm section    Rhythmusgruppe

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - ρυθμός, μέτρο

idioms:

• rhythm and blues    ρυθμός και μπλουζ (κατηγορία ελαφράς μουσικής)
• rhythm method    αντισυλληπτική μέθοδος με την αποφυγή της συνουσίας κατά την ωορρηξία
• rhythm section    όργανα της ορχήστρας (χορού, τζαζ κ.λπ.) υπεύθυνα για το ρυθμό

Italiano (Italian)
ritmo

idioms:

• rhythm and blues    Rythm and Blues
• rhythm method    metodo basale
• rhythm section    sezione ritmica

Português (Portuguese)
n. - ritmo (m)

idioms:

• rhythm and blues    gênero musical (pop)
• rhythm method    método rítmico
• rhythm section    grupo de instrumentos

Русский (Russian)
ритм

idioms:

• rhythm and blues    ритм-энд-блюз, сочетание блюза с народной музыкой амер./афр.
• rhythm method    метод естественной контрацепции
• rhythm section    ударные инструменты

Español (Spanish)
n. - ritmo

idioms:

• rhythm and blues    estilo de música popular de los años 40
• rhythm method    método anticonceptivo, método Ogino-Knaus
• rhythm section    sección rítmica

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - rytm, takt

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
旋律, 韵律, 节奏

idioms:

• rhythm and blues    节奏和勃鲁斯
• rhythm method    安全期避孕
• rhythm section    节奏乐器组

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 旋律, 韻律, 節奏

idioms:

• rhythm and blues    節奏藍調
• rhythm method    安全期避孕
• rhythm section    節奏樂器組

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 율동, 운율, 리듬

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 律動, リズム, 音律, 調子

idioms:

• rhythm and blues    リズムアンドブルース
• rhythm method    受精期禁欲法
• rhythm section    リズムセクション

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) الإيقاع, الوزن الشعري‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮קצב, מיקצב, משקל, מחזור קבוע, ריתמוס, חוש קצב‬

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