Waltz2u

Q in 4/4 is a quater note.
Q in 2/4 is eightth note.

To do any figure, like Walk SQQS, the total time has to be equal in both 2/4 and 4/4. So a Q in 4/4 twice longer than a Q in 2/4, so SQQS in 4/4 is twice longer than SQQS in 2/4. The dancers have to run twice faster? Unreasonable! I 'm still confused

Waltz2u

Well, since you can dance tango to music of either tempo and not notice the difference in the time signature (2/4 or 4/4) the practical result has to be the same in the end. The technique book says the tempo should be 33 mpm. You have the same number of measures of music per minute in either time signature. In 4/4 time that 33 mpm would be 132 bpm and in 2/4 time it would be 66 bpm. Each beat in 2/4 time takes up more real, clock time than each beat in 4/4 time since there are fewer of them per minute. Basically what happens then is that 4 (or 2) beats in 4/4 time take up the same amount of real, clock time as 2 (or 1) beats in 2/4 time. In order for you to not know the difference while dancing, a slow in 4/4 time must be 2 beats while it's only 1 beat in 2/4 time. The difference essentially cancel out in the end. If I attempt to make it a little more graphical:

4/4:  1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 . . .
2/2:  1 & 2 & 1 & 2 & 1 & 2 & . . .
S/Q:  S   S   Q Q S   Q Q S   . . .

Same number of measures per minute as you can see, but a different number of beats as you'd expect from the mpm/bpm conversion. This is how you get the difference in slows and quicks. Because the number of beats per minute are different for the two time signatures, the length of one beat is also different (one beat in 4/4 time takes less time than one beat in 2/4 time). In order for the dance to remain unaffected, slows and quicks taking the same amount of time in both time signatures, you have to make a S = 2 beats in 4/4 time but 1 beat in 2/4 time and a Q = 1 beat in 4/4 time but 1/2 beat in 2/4 time.

Does that help explain things? Sometimes the music part is a little harder to understand than the dancing. It's a little easier to just dance
than figure out music. I hope this helps.

--
James Marshall
marshall@astro.umd.edu
http://www.astro.umd.edu/~marshall

No, because the tempo of the 2/4 version is half the tempo of the 4/4 version. So you dance exactly the same speed.

Tap on your table 4 times, using a steady pulse. As you do this, count "ONE TWO THREE FOUR". Remember to count one word per tap. You have counted 4 beats in 4/4 time.

Now do the same thing... 4 taps on the table, at exactly the same speed as before. But this time, one word per tap, say "ONE AND TWO AND". Remember, the "ands" don't go in between the taps. Each "and" gets its own tap, so you've tapped four times and said four words. Now you've counted 2 beats in 2/4 time, at half the tempo.

Note that you took exactly the same amount of time to count 4 beats in in 4/4 as you did to count 2 beats in 2/4. The difference is, when you counted in 4/4, you were counting at twice the tempo of 2/4. That's because in 4/4, every tap was equal to one beat, whereas when you counted in 2/4, every tap was equal to 1/2 of a beat.

Now whichever version you counted, you would have danced the same QQQQ rhythm. The QQQQ took exactly the same amount of time, whether you said "QQQQ" or "1234" or "1&2&".

QQQQ
1234
1&2&

They all mean the same thing and take the same amount of time to say or dance... I don't know how to make it any clearer than that!

Sincerely,
Jonathan

Waltz2u

I hope this makes sense.

Sincerely,
Jonathan Atkinson