Odd time signatures: how to count 5/4, 7/8 and 9/8

Odd time signatures have a reputation they do not deserve. The usual mistake is to count them as a long row of numbers, one two three four five six seven, and to get lost somewhere around five. Nobody actually hears seven like that, and nobody plays it like that either. An odd bar is a short phrase made of twos and threes, and once you know which twos and which threes, 7/8 is no harder to hold than 4/4. This page shows you the groupings for 5/4, 7/8 and 9/8, how to count them out loud, how to put them in your strumming hand, and how to set up the metronome below to click each one.

What makes a time signature odd

The top number of a time signature tells you how many units are in the bar, and the bottom number tells you which note value is the unit: 4 for a quarter note, 8 for an eighth note. In 4/4, 3/4 and 6/8, those units fall into equal groups, so the bar has a regular pulse your foot finds on its own.

In 5/4 or 7/8, they cannot. Five and seven do not divide into equal groups, so the bar is built from groups of two and groups of three, side by side. A group of three is a long step, a group of two is a short one, and the bar is the pattern of long and short. That is all an odd meter is. In traditional Balkan music, where these meters are everyday dance rhythms, the idea has a name, aksak, which describes exactly this alternation of short and long.

How to count 5/4 time

5/4 is the friendliest odd meter to start with. Five quarter notes, felt as a group of three and a group of two, or the other way round. Count the number of each group, not the position in the bar, and put the weight on every one. The bold numbers in the table are the accents.

3 + 2 feels like long, short. 2 + 3 feels like short, long. The bar is the same length both ways, but it breathes in a different place, so before you play a piece in 5/4, find out which one it is by listening for where the second accent lands.

The trap: the sixth beat

Every guitarist who has spent years in 4/4 has a body that wants an even number. In 5/4 it shows up as a tiny pause after the fifth beat, the time it takes for a sixth beat that does not exist. Clap the accents only, on the ones, while saying the whole count out loud, and keep walking: if the first clap of each bar arrives early or late against your feet, the extra beat is creeping in. Fix it there, before the guitar is in your hands.

How to count 7/8

Seven eighth notes, grouped in three ways. These are three different grooves, not three ways of writing the same one, which is why saying a song is in 7/8 is only half an answer. The useful question is which seven.

2 + 2 + 3 is short, short, long: the bar runs ahead and then settles. 3 + 2 + 2 is long, short, short: it starts heavy and speeds up toward the next bar. 2 + 3 + 2 puts the long group in the middle and feels the most balanced of the three. Start with 2 + 2 + 3, the one you will meet most, and learn the others by moving the long group.

Say it before you play it

Away from the guitar, say one two, one two, one two three, slowly, with real weight on each one. Then clap only the ones while you keep saying the rest. Then walk it. It feels silly, and it is the step that decides whether you will play 7/8 or count it. If you cannot say it and clap it at the same time, the guitar will only add a third thing to lose track of.

9/8: two very different bars

9/8 is a trap of a different kind, because it can be odd or perfectly regular. Grouped 3 + 3 + 3, it is three beats each split into three, the same family as 6/8 and 12/8, and it rolls along like a slow 3/4. Grouped 2 + 2 + 2 + 3, it becomes asymmetric: three short steps and a long one, and the long one at the end makes the bar lean into the next.

Clap the two versions one after the other, nine claps each, accents only on the ones. Same number of units, completely different music. If the 3 + 3 + 3 version is the one you need, it is the territory of compound meter, covered on the 6/8 metronome page: the counting carries straight over.

Putting the grouping in your strumming hand

Counting each unit with your head while your hand plays is the fastest way to freeze. Turn the groups into gestures instead. A group of two is down, up. A group of three is down, up, down. Then a bar of 7/8 in 2 + 2 + 3 is three small gestures in a row, and your hand already knows all of them.

Notice what happens at the end of the bar. The group of three ends on a down, and the next bar starts on a down too. Two downs in a row is correct here: in 4/4 the arm swings evenly forever, but in an odd meter it resets at the start of each bar. The same logic gives you 5/4 in 3 + 2 as down, up, down, then down, up.

Three passes, in order

1. Strings muted by your fretting hand lying flat across them. Every unit gets a stroke, and the ones get more weight. You hear the grouping with nothing else in the way.
2. One easy chord, E minor or A minor, the same strokes. Then let only the accents ring and keep the others light, which often sounds better than strumming everything evenly.
3. Two chords, one full bar each. This is where the 4/4 habit comes back, because the change arrives on a beat you are not used to. Slow down rather than give up the grouping.

Practicing odd meters with the metronome

Here is the honest part. The time signature menu of this metronome offers 4/4, 3/4, 2/4, 6/8, 9/8 and 12/8. There is no 5/4 and no 7/8 in it. What it does have is a Program mode, which plays a list of bars one after the other, each with its own time signature, and that is enough to build both.

One thing to know before you use it: this metronome gives every click the same length, whatever the bottom number of the signature says. A bar of 2/4 is two clicks, a bar of 6/8 is six clicks, and the BPM number counts clicks. So the tempo you set is the speed of the unit you are counting: quarter notes for 5/4, eighth notes for 7/8. If BPM is a fuzzy idea, what BPM means takes two minutes.

9/8, straight from the menu

The metronome above opens in 9/8 at 120, nine even clicks with an accent on the first. Under the beat dots, the Custom accents row has one box per click. Tick 1, 4 and 7 for 3 + 3 + 3. Tick 1, 3, 5 and 7 for 2 + 2 + 2 + 3. Changing the time signature menu clears those boxes, so set the signature first and the accents second.

5/4: a bar of 3/4, then a bar of 2/4

In the Play mode menu, choose Program. Paste the lines below into the box, press Apply, then Play. Each line is one bar: three clicks, then two, at 80 BPM, and every block starts on an accented click. What you hear is five even quarter notes with accents on one and four, which is 5/4 in 3 + 2.

bars:1 tempo:80 sig:3/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:3/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:3/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:3/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:3/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:3/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:3/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:3/4
bars:1 sig:2/4

For 2 + 3, swap the two signatures on every pair of lines. To change the speed, change the number on the first line only: the other lines keep it.

7/8: two bars of 2/4, then one of 3/4

Same steps. This time each click is an eighth note, so the tempo is set high: 140 clicks per minute is a slow, comfortable 7/8. You hear seven even clicks with accents on one, three and five, which is 2 + 2 + 3.

bars:1 tempo:140 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:3/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:3/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:3/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:3/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:3/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:2/4
bars:1 sig:3/4

For 3 + 2 + 2, put the 3/4 line first in each group of three lines. For 2 + 3 + 2, put it in the middle.

What the Program mode will not do

• It does not loop. When it reaches the last line, it stays on that block. The 5/4 recipe gives you 8 bars, the 7/8 recipe 6; after that the click falls into plain 2/4 or 3/4, which is your cue to stop. For a longer run, paste the same lines several times.
• Press Apply again before each Play. Stopping does not send the program back to its first line.
• The bar counter counts blocks, not your bars. One bar of 5/4 shows up as two, one bar of 7/8 as three.
• Every group start gets the same accent. The click cannot make the first one of the bar louder than the others, and the Custom accents boxes are reset at each block. Say that one louder yourself. It is good practice anyway.

Then take the training wheels off

A click on every unit is the right place to start, and the wrong place to stay. Once the groupings hold, go back to the menu and set a plain bar, then count the odd meter yourself over it. The longer route to the same goal, in any meter, is covered in how to practice with a metronome.

Common mistakes

• Counting in a straight line. One to seven with no accents is a list, and you will lose your place in it. Group first, always.
• Playing every stroke at the same volume. Without accents, an odd bar turns into a blur. The starts of the groups are what make it readable, for you and for anyone listening.
• Going too fast. At speed you recite the count without feeling it. Slow enough to say the numbers out loud is the right tempo.
• Sliding back into four. The extra beat at the end of the bar is the most common error of all. If you ever wonder where you are, stop, say the grouping, and start again from one.

And the reason to bother if you mostly play pop and rock in 4/4: working on groupings trains you to hear where accents fall, and that is exactly what syncopation is made of. Odd meters make your even ones more precise. For the rest of that work, see how to improve your guitar rhythm.