what it means that Peter Gabriel’s “Solsbury Hill” is written in 7/4 time?
In: 17
When writing music, you need to tell anyone who plays your piece three things:
* The pitch of each note
* The rhythm of the notes
* The volume of the notes
When we say “Solsbury Hill” 7/4 is written in 7/4 time, we’re referring to the rhythm of the notes. Let’s talk about the bottom number first, because it’s a bit more complicated.
When writing music, we break it up into parts called measures. Within each measure, we’ll place notes that tell the musician the pitch and timing of each note. These notes are broken up into fractions of a measure.
* The [whole note](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whole_note) is an open oval. This tells us to play the note for the entire measure.
* The [half note](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half_note) has an open oval with a stem. This tells us to play the note for half of the measure.
* The [quarter note](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quarter_note) is a filled oval with a stem.
* The [eighth note](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eighth_note) is a filled oval with a stem and a flag. The flags are sometimes connected along the tops/bottoms of the stems.
* The [sixteenth note](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixteenth_note) is a filled oval with a stem and two flags. Like the eight note, the flags might be connected along the top/bottom of the stems.
* There is a [thirty-second note](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirty-second_note), but it is not nearly as common. We’ll see why in a moment.
When we break up the measure, we count the beats: one, two, three, four, five, six, etc. The “4” on the bottom of the time signature tells us that the quarter note represents one full beat. If the time signature were 7/8, the eight note would be one full beat.
In addition to counting one, two, three four, we might need to break the measure up into smaller parts for the eight and sixteenth notes. For eighth notes, we add syllables to our counting: one-and, two-and, three-and, four-and, etc. For sixteenth notes, we count: one-e-and-uh, two-e-and-uh, three-e-and-uh, four-e-and-uh.
Rather than use thirty-second notes, most music will simply change the bottom part of the time signature and double the tempo (the rate at which you count).
From here, understanding the top part of the time signature is easy. It’s just the number of times we count per measure. So 7/4 would be: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, one, two three, four, five, six, seven, and so on. If we used 4/4 instead, it would be: one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, and so on.
[Solsbury Hill](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGaqmvIEyaI) is such a great example of 7/4 time, because there is a steady bass drum beat in the background of the intro. Try counting along with it the next time you listen to the song. Just note that you don’t start counting with the three guitar notes that lead in. Start counting at the first hit of the bass drum.
An interesting aspect of 7/4 time is that many artists will count it as two separate measures of 4/4 followed by 3/4. So it would be counted: one, two, three, four, one, two, three, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, and so on.
If you enjoy this kind of thing, I’d strongly recommend Rick Beato on YouTube. He has a video on [how to count odd meters](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kffnwaHtfzg) (another name for time signatures). Rick covers a ton of music theory content in a very accessible way. He’s a very down to earth guy with an incredible amount of music knowledge that he shares on YouTube.
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