word | meter |
---|---|
definition | (1) The basic metric unit of length, equal to about 39.37 inches. (2) A systematic rhythm in poetry or music. |
eg_sentence | The basic meter of the piece was 3/4, but its rhythms were so complicated that the 3/4 was sometimes hard to hear. |
explanation | Meter is a metric measurement slightly longer than a yard; thus, a 100-meter dash might take you a second longer than a 100-yard dash. But the word has a different sense in music, where people aren't separated by whether they use the metric system. For a musician, the meter is the regular background rhythm, expressed by the “time signature” written at the beginning of a piece or section: 2/2, 2/4, 3/8, 4/4, 6/8, etc. Within a meter, you can create rhythms that range from the simple to the complex. So, for example, “America the Beautiful” is in 4/4 meter (or “4/4 time”), but so are most of the rhythmically complex songs written by Paul Simon, Burt Bacharach, or Stevie Wonder. In ordinary conversation, though, most people use “rhythm” to include meter and everything that's built on top of it. In poetry, meter has much the same meaning; however, poetic meters aren't named with numbers but instead with traditional Greek and Latin terms such as iambic and dactylic |
IPA | ˈmitər |
Tags: mwvb::unit:6, mwvb::unit:6:word, mwvb::word, mwvb::word-cloze, mwvb::word-reverse, obsidian_to_anki
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