Cut-time

Cut-time music has pulses that feel somehow “large,” in a sense that is not easy to objectively define. You feel it when you hear it.

The typical explanations of cut-time are based around the idea that it is “conducted on the half note.” But this just leads to more questions: what is a “half note,” and how can you tell by listening whether a beat is a half note?

In this series, I’m introducing an alternate term “double pulse,” which is more descriptive of the experience of a pulse of cut-time music, and which supports an analysis of how cut-time music actually works.

The “double pulse”

A double pulse is a unified rhythmic movement with two single pulses inside it. For an analogy, think of an egg with a double yolk inside.

The first single pulse may be experienced as a ‘call’ which is then followed by a ‘response’ pulse. This may take the form of an Oom-Pah, where the response (Pah) is strongly accented. Or the response may be weakly accented, or even completely silent (just implied).

The main point, however, is that when a double pulse is split in half, each of the halves is still a pulse, i.e. a conducting beat. In contrast, when a single pulse is split into two, the result is two light subdivisions. The light subdivisions are adornments to the single pulse, but do not carry the weight of being pulses.

When a song has double pulses, there are two chains of pulses: the chain of double pulses, and the chain of single pulses running at twice the rate. Both chains are needed to fully feel the time skeleton of the song. And each chain implies the other. You can conduct double pulses on your foot, to imply the underlying single pulses. Then the double pulses are expressed by the “down, down, down…” and the single pulses by the “down, up, down, up, …” Or, you conduct the single pulses, and express the double pulses by placing accents on every other single pulse.

Here is a way to experience the difference between single pulse and double pulse (cut-time) music. While singing, try to ‘conduct’ by walking to the slowest pulse that is available. You may need to artificially adjust the tempo in order to comfortably make one walking step per pulse. Then, if you naturally settle into some kind of step-bounce on each pulse, you are walking in cut time. Both step and bounce are downward movements expressing a single pulse. Step-bounce together is a unified rhythmic movement which makes a double pulse. But if you end up “marching” forward without extra movements, then you are expressing the music in single-pulse form.

Performing Over the Rainbow in cut-time

Now let’s put these ideas to work. Here is a chart showing the double pulse / cut-time structure for Over the Rainbow:

Some-       where       o-    ver the  rain- bow
foot        foot        foot           foot       
sweep tap   sweep tap   sweep tap      sweep tap   

way         up          high
foot        foot        foot           foot      
sweep tap   sweep tap   sweep tap      sweep tap   

Each ‘foot’ is a double pulse, which splits into single pulses called ‘sweep’ and ‘tap’. Sweep is the call, and tap is the response. You may think of this as pulse and counter pulse, like the push-pull of a piston.

To perform it, imagine the song and establish the tempo, with your foot tapping somewhere around once per second. Then play the melody by singing, humming, or thinking it. Next, introduce a percussion part with your hands and thighs, to articulate the alternations of sweep and tap. One simple way is to alternate strokes of the right and left hands on the thighs. Or, sweep could be like a guitar strum on the thigh that follows through to a tap on the thigh.

The speed of cut-time music

In relative terms, double pulses last for twice as long as single pulses. So the conducting for cut-time songs like Over the Rainbow, which takes place on the double pulse, will feel slow, with an expansive, leisurely expression.

But this comparison between double and single pulses only makes sense in the context of a single song. Double pulses in a fast song can run faster than single pulses in a slow song. For instance, many forms of Latin Music are in cut time, and the tempos can get quite fast. There, the fast double pulses will imply a chain of even faster single pulses. In this way, cut time can be used to make music that feels super fast.