Uncommon Notes
Up to this lesson, we have counted dotted notes, and notes as short as 32nd notes. This lesson will teach you how to count dotted whole notes, triple dotted notes, and notes shorter than 32nd notes.
Double and Dotted Whole Notes
The first note in this example is a double whole note. This note lasts for 8 quarter notes. A double whole note is mostly used in early music (music written before 1600). Double whole notes can be written 3 different ways:
We can also dot whole notes. One dot adds half of the note value, the second dot adds 1/4 of the note value, and the third dot adds 1/8 of the note value. This is easiest to see with the triple dotted whole, where you add the values of a half note, quarter note, and eighth note.
Debussy uses dotted whole notes in his prelude The Sunken Cathedral:
Double and triple dotted whole notes are rare in the classical repertoire as they require a time signature with more than 6 quarter notes per measure.
Rests
A double whole rest is written like this on the staff:
Dotted whole note rests would usually be written out as a combination of notes, or with the number of dots they have. If they are written with dots, they use the note value plus the dots:
Notes Shorter than 32nd Notes
Every time we add a flag to a note, it shortens the note by half.
We have already learned how to count 32nd notes in a previous lesson, so now we will learn about shorter notes.
64th Notes
64th notes have 4 flags, or 4 beams when connected. In 4/4 time, one measure can contain sixty-four 64th notes. One beat is the length of sixteen 64 notes. If we count 1 e + a, we count four 64th notes for each quarter of the beat:
These are the most common notes used when composers use notes shorter than 32nd notes.
128th Notes
The next most common short note is the 128th note. These most likely appear in music with a slow tempo. 128th notes have 5 flags or 5 beams if connected. They are twice as fast as 64th notes.
In the introduction to his Piano Sonata Op. 13, Beethoven uses 64th and 128th notes at a slow tempo:
As seen in the example above, sixteen 128th notes make up the length of one eighth note.
In 4/4 time, 128 128th notes can fit in one measure. Thirty-two 128th notes are played in one beat. Dividing the beat into 4, we see that 8 notes last for a quarter of the beat:
256th Notes
256th notes are rarely seen in classical repertoire. These are most likely to occur at a slow tempo. These notes have 6 flags or 6 beams when connected.
Mozart uses 256th notes in his 12 Variations on “Je suis lindor” (at the end of the measure):
It can be difficult to count the rhythm of 256th notes, so it helps to remember in this case that the notes are twice as fast as the 128th notes which occur before. It also helps to look at the other staff to see what beats it lines up with.
512th Notes
512 notes are also rare. These notes have 7 flags and would most likely be used in a slow tempo. They are twice as fast as 256th notes. 128 of these notes last the length of one quarter note.
Rests
To make equivalent rests for these notes, we stack eighth rests. The number of flags on the note equals the number of stacked eighth rests. The 64th note has four flags so the rest is 4 eighth rests stacked on each other, and so on:
Triple Dotted Notes
With dotted notes, the first dot adds half of the note value, the second dot adds 1/4 of the note value, and the third dot adds 1/8 of the note value.
The triple dotted half note is the most commonly used of the notes in the above example. Chopin uses triple dotted half notes in his Prelude in G Major Op. 28 No. 3. In this piece, just one 16th note with the triple dotted half note makes one measure in cut time:
Rests
Rests for triple dotted notes are either written with the dots, or with a combination of rests to equal the note value. If they are written with dots, they use the note value plus the three dots:
Practice
Become more familiar with these notes with the Uncommon Notes Worksheet:
Uncommon Notes Worksheet
Practice counting uncommon notes with this worksheet!
This worksheet includes the following uncommon notes:
- Double whole notes
- Triple dotted notes
- Dotted whole notes
- 64th, 128th, 256th, and 512th notes
2 page PDF download: 1 page worksheet + 1 page answer key
Download and print from your computer
For personal use only, do no…
Coming Soon:
More Compound Time Signatures
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