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2.3.1: Duple Conducting Pattern

  • Page ID
    258465
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    Conducting Patterns

    Conductor from the back in AI art pen and ink

    Understanding basic conducting patterns will be beneficial in many areas of music:

    • Teaching
    • Performing
    • Dictation

    Every conducting pattern consists of a downbeat and an upbeat. The downbeat is what we hear as the strong beat of the pattern. If we are counting a pattern, we would call this "beat one." Some might describe this as a heavy-sounding beat. This downbeat is shown in a conducting pattern as the beat that starts about shoulder level and moves in a downward motion toward our waist.

    Outline of upper body showing the upwards movement of the arm for the upbeat. Coming from the waist up to the shoulder

    The upbeat is the beat that comes just before the downbeat. This is the beat that sounds the lightest. Some might describe this as the beat where you breathe in before producing a strong sound on the beat that is to come. Some think of this beat as a lift or an anticipation of the strong beat. This upbeat is shown in a conducting pattern by coming up toward the shoulder from the outside of the body.

    Pattern of Two

    The duple meter conducting pattern consists only of upbeats and downbeats. Since we have a pattern of two, each beat is either a strong downbeat or the upbeat preparation. In order for the upbeat to have an upward motion from the outside of the body, we end up with a pattern that looks a little like a backwards "J" when using our right hand.

    Duple conducting pattern from both directions

    Practical Application

    Now watch conductor Kalena Bovell (opens in a new window). Most of the time, she is using a pattern of 2.

    The following video contains music only. There is no text.

    QR code for the previous link

    Attribution:

    Conductor: AI generated image by the author

    Conducting pattern: Foundations of Aural Skills Copyright © 2022 by Timothy Chenette is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License


    This page titled 2.3.1: Duple Conducting Pattern is shared under a CC BY-NC 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Lauren C. Sharkey.

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