In the vibrant world of dance music, a track’s rhythm and beat provide the power to make or break the dance floor. In this article in the Dance Floor Essentials series, we’ll explore the significance of beats and bars in light of Disco’s greatest trojan horse four-on-the-floor rhythm.
Table of Contents
Give Me a Beat, Give Me A Bar
What is a Beat in Music Theory?
In music theory, a beat refers to the basic unit of time – a pulse that underlies a musical piece. It’s the regular, repeating rhythmic pattern that provides the foundation for musical composition. We “sense” the beat by a series of evenly spaced pulses giving a perception of “timing” and “organization” to music. In fact, inside your chest is one of the fundamental metronomes to capture beat and rhythm in your life: your heart beat.
Different types of music – such as pop, rock, jazz, house music, disco and techno music music – often emphasize the beat with prominent instruments, such as the drums or percussion. For example, the kick drum in a disco track gives us a pulse and expectation while hi-hats accent and add intrigue and groove. Within these drums and percussion, however, is another treasure: tempo. The tempo of a piece of music is determined by the speed at which the beats occur. Faster tempos having more beats per minute (BPM) and slower tempos having fewer beats per minute.
There are a variety of types of beats, for example:
- Straight Beat: A simple, even-spaced beat where each beat is of equal duration.
- Swing Beat: Swing rhythm, a defining feature of jazz & blues, is characterized by its uneven division of beats, with the first beat in each pair being longer than the second.
- Latin Beat: Latin rhythms encompass a variety of complex patterns derived from Afro-Cuban and other Latin American musical traditions. We’re talking Samba, Bossa Nova, Salsa & The Like.
- Reggae Beat: Reggae features a laid-back rhythm with an emphasis on the off-beat, achieved through syncopation and “skanking” guitar patterns.
What is a Bar in Music Theory?
In music theory, a “bar” is a unit of organization for a beat (its technical name is metric cycle or measure). The origin of the word “bar” comes from the common practice of drawing vertical lines on the score to signify the completion of a metric cycle. A metric cycle is controlled by the time signature assigned to the musical staff. A common time signature in dance music being 4 by 4.
House and disco music follow a 4/4 time signature, meaning there are four beats per bar, each beat being a quarter note in duration. This steady four-beat rhythm provides the foundational structure for most house and disco rhythmic compositions – the repetition and evolution of musical elements such as basslines, melodies, and percussion patterns all relying on the persistent ever-reliable thumping of the kick.
Why do DJs count beats and bars?
Just like contemporary musicians, DJs use counting to time their performance. For example, beat mixing requires matching the tempos and phases of a given track. In order to train and use the skill of beat mixing by ear DJs have to be capable of counting the bars and beats in the track to grasp whether they must slow down or speed up the tempo to match current playback. Without the concept of beats and bars, there is no regularity or consistency to fall back on.
Beyond beat mixing, bars organize a piece of musical rhythm into into larger logical units; this gives DJs an opportunity to analyze their tracks and think about mix placement opportunities as well as transitions (want to learn more about mix placement strategies? Checkout our Beginner to Intermediate House/Electronic Music DJ course). DJs depend heavily on the pulsing kick drums to keep and count the beat, however, they need to also know how long they have until the track breaks down or moves to a build up which is measured in bars.
But before you get too excited about build ups, let’s explore house & disco music’s fundamental rhythmic pattern: four-on-the-floor.
Disco Music’s Trojan Horse – Four-On-The-Floor Rhythm
The vibration of a shaking sound system and bassline filled the foyer – heads, players, and podium heartthrobs tip-toe in an anxious fray desperate for release – the ticket puncher processes each one with a nod and their wildest dreams are unveiled beyond the velvet curtains.
The undertones of a funky bassline pound against the outer walls as a tight upper lip prays it will soon be time to let loose. The sound of an offset drum machine clap reflects off the back wall and through the curtain hitting with a SLAP – suddenly your head starts nodding and hips begin shaking with a tapping foot on the floor like a drum pedal: boom, boom, boom, boom; it’s the sound of Gusto’s “Disco’s Revenge“, and now you really get what they mean when they say “house is disco’s revenge”.
Disco music is arguably one of the major cradles of modern dance music. While you might envy festival headliners in their assumed stage power, it’s the original Disco music Disc Jock you ought to revere. The genre swept across 70s dance floors with its infectious pulsing and groovy basslines – notably the captivating “four on the floor” rhythm entrancing its audiences. The basis of four on the floor is characterized by the bass drum hitting on every beat visualized in the staff below:
The foundation of essentially all modern dance music.
Four-on-the-floor (4OTF) was pioneered by Earl Young, a Philadelphia-based drummer, who rose up through the Philly Soul era in the 1970s. In Young’s incubation, it soon became the cornerstone of disco music, infusing every track with an irresistible pulsating sensation that compelled dancers to move to the beat.
With disco music’s ascendancy in the 70s and 80s (and later decline), this rhythm became synonymous with inclusivity and gallant joy that a night dancing under the disco ball would later be remembered for alongside the major cultural themes in the “disco movement”:
- Inclusivity and Diversity
- Expression and Freedom
- Community and Connection
- Empowerment and Confidence
- Creativity and Innovation
- Celebration of Love and Romance
With syncopated basslines, powerful bursts of strings, punching brass and horns, electrifying pianos and synthesizers, and twinging electric guitars – the disco DJ possessed a powerful musical arsenal to captivate the dance floor in ritualistic celebration. As Disco’s allure gained commercial interest, it was mined for all the industry felt worth (and the public could stomach) in its scorching fanaticism and fabulous outfits; yet its ascendancy also sowed it seeds of its eventual fall.
As disco music became saturated with artists looking for a new bump to their career, the public was soon awash with excess and in turn dumped disco into heaping trash of every genre considered a “temporary fad”. Yet, as Gloria Gaynor 1979 Polydor classic prophesied, Disco was meant to survive in a beat that we haven’t been able to escape yet.
Disco wisdom was to infect all generations to come with Young’s four on the floor rhythm, the Trojan Horse employed for being “sent away” to the underground – where Disco waited to plot its sweet revenge oh so deliciously captured in Gusto’s 1995 release of “Disco’s Revenge”; hence House was and still is Disco’s Revenge.
Disco Fever is Forever
No matter what genre of house and (in some cases) techno you listen to, Disco music’s long call to unity and belongingness is present in that simple yet irresistible four on the floor beat. Whether you’re called to Jack, entranced in African polyrhythms that accent electronic grooves on the white isle, or counting beats and bars in your beat mix you are perpetuating the musical freedom that inspired Divas to call out
One Day We’ll All Be Free
References
- For an excellent history on the Disc Jockey see Last Night a DJ Saved My Life (Amazon Affiliate Link)
- If you’re looking for more music theory related to Michael Hewitt’s Music Theory for Computer Musicians (Amazon Affiliate Link) is a phenomenal resource
