four-four time
1
3.8
- noun
- /fɔr fɔr taɪm/
- Specialized
:
compás de cuatro por cuatro
- In our music class, we learned to clap to the rhythm of four-four time.
Examples
-
The drummer kept a steady beat in four-four time throughout the performance.
-
Each of them simultaneously kept four-four time with one hand and three-four time with the other while they marched, changing every moment from four and three and six to five and seven, Bernard Shaw.
Fiction book (2002) -
The song is played in four-four time, making it easy to dance to.
Synonyms
1
5.2
A beat pattern in music with four beats in each bar, often shown as C
A time pattern in music with four beats in each bar
A way of counting music in groups of four beats
Surface Forms
Morphology
four-four + time
The phrase names the meter compositionally: 'four-four' signals the numeric pattern (four beats per bar) and 'time' denotes musical metre, so a learner who knows numbers and the musical sense of 'time' can infer it means a bar with four beats. This numeric + 'time' construction is common cross-linguistically and follows straightforward compositional patterns, making the meaning predictable.
Etymology
Four-four time comes from the numbers written at the start of music: 4/4, which shows there are four 'beats' in each 'bar'. So when a song is in four-four time, you count '1-2-3-4' again and again, and that is why it means music with four beats to a bar.