For me it’s time signatures in music. I grew up playing instruments, played in several orchestras, etc. But no matter how many times someone tries to explain time signatures to me, it makes no sense. I don’t understand why people place such importance on it. To me, notes have a pitch and a duration, maybe some dynamics. That’s it. I don’t understand why people try to needlessly complicate it. It doesn’t give you anything.
My wife will hear a song and go “Oh neat, it’s in 5/8.” And I’m like “How tf do you know that, and why does it matter?”
Math! I’m a software guy and generally find STEM topics highly intuitive. I do fine with the stuff through middle school - PEMDAS, algebra, that kind of stuff. But the higher levels concepts like logarithms and derivatives; no matter how many times they’re explained to me they just don’t quite click. I can plug numbers into formulas and get the answer I need, but I don’t understand what’s happening or why that particular formula is what’s needed.
These things really clicked for me when I actually needed to do what they do in various ways.
It doesn’t help that in math classes all the variables are single letter names. I can tell they never had code reviews on these math books lol
Ok good it’s not just me. I really wish I could find a way to understand it better. At this point in my life it’s not really necessary so I guess I’m ok then?
Skateboarding. None of it computes for me. My brother has been a lifelong skater and still rips it up at almost 40, and I see him do shit on the board and I just can’t figure out what the fuck is happening. It breaks physics, it’s like bee flight, none of that crap should be possible.
I watched him go up a very steep incline and do the thing where it’s a kickflip and a pop shove it at the same time, which is enough on its own to break my brain, but he and the board went up and landed at the same angle of the incline like it was flat ground, he and the board went up and down perpendicular to the incline without any vertical drag on the drop and landing. Gravity doesn’t fucking work that way! And how the fuck do their feet and the board just get back together after the board is seizuring mid air and just fucking land and keep going like there are magnets on their feet or something? It’s gods damned wizard shit.
Strapping a snowboard to my feet was pretty intuitive, just keep the downhill edge up. Hard agree, I even wore skater shoes but a basic Ollie was something my brain and limbs just…don’t do that
That’s funny you say that, because the only way I can hear music is by identifying the structure of the song. It seems to me that you only hear the individual notes. I hear in beats and bars, so figuring out the time signature is easy. I always know when a song isn’t in 4/4 instantly.
Driving stick. I’ve tried on several cars at this point, and have only successfully gotten moving without stalling like twice. The worst part is I can shift pretty smoothly once the car is in motion, but I just can’t seem to figure out how to get it in motion.
I found that knowing how the clutch works help me visualize what I needed to do to get the car moving. I fucked up a transmission back in 2000.putting it in gear without pressing the clutch down enough so I stayed away for a few years. When I got a brand new car years later I went back to manual and practiced on a small slope until I got the clutch balance just right and could do super steep hills without even hitting the brake.
You have a spinning plate on the motor and a non spinning plate on the transmission, you press the clutch to separate the plates temporarily, lock the non moving plate into a gear then slowly push the plates back together slowly enough that the moving plate will speed up. If you don’t do it fast the slow plate stalls the spinning plate. Balance the plates then you won’t stall, do it on a hill and balance it and you can keep the car in a state of not stalling but not moving either, do it wrong and you cook the clutch.
Press accelerate until the engine reaches ~1200-1500 rpm and hold this position no matter what. Now release the clutch slowly, until the car just barely starts moving. At this point you might have the urge to let go of the clutch completely, but no - keep holding the clutch in this position for 2-3 seconds more and then let go. Your car won’t stall.
Knitting. I just don’t have the coordination
Shopping. Walking around looking for stuff to buy.
This has NEVER made sense to me. I’ve practically never happened upon something I want to buy in a corporate store
I’ve done this lots of times, especially at malls, only because it’s considered “spending” money. The reality, though, is that I’ll rarely actually buy something.
Parents are really good at this because it’s their only alooone time
I understand time signatures in theory, but not in practice. I comprehend what they are and what they mean, but they don’t make sense to me. I don’t understand what they do or why they’re necessary.
Like I get it, the bottom number tells you how many beats are in a whole note. Most commonly 4, but sometimes 8 or something else.
The top number tells you how many beats are in a measure. In common time, that’s again 4.
But mathematically, wouldn’t that mean 3/4 time is the same as 6/8 time? They’re equivalent as fractions. But when I ask a musician they don’t explain it, they just tell me “No, they’re different. That’s 3/4, this is 6/8.” And usually with this undertone like “Are you stupid? This is so obvious, what part are you not getting?”
From what I gather, 6/8 time is usually done in pairs of triplets. So it does sound rhythmically different than 3/4. But no one ever tells you that, not even when the concept is introduced in textbooks on music theory. They just tell you “and this is 6/8 time,” as if you’re just supposed to know how and why that’s in any way different from 3/4 time…
From what I gather, 6/8 time is usually done in pairs of triplets. So it does sound rhythmically different than 3/4. But no one ever tells you that, not even when the concept is introduced in textbooks on music theory. They just tell you “and this is 6/8 time,” as if you’re just supposed to know how and why that’s in any way different from 3/4 time…
I think it is too. I figured it out when I read that Jocko Homo is in 7/8 and it’s very clear because of the staccato notes, 3 by guitar 4 by synth. Another way to think of it is the first beat is accented. So 4/4 is ONE two three four ONE two three four. 5/4 is ONE two three four five ONE two three four five.
I think a lot of musicians don’t really fully understand it so they can’t explain it. Kinda like how programmers can’t really explain casting. And don’t you programmers dare tell me about cows in a pasture or a barn or whatever that analogy is. Just translate your line of code with the word “cast” into a sentence that makes sense. You can’t.
Played for over 20 years, aced my music theory final while I was still in school. Have minimal issues translating and coordinating with other musicians professionally.
Me too bud.
They say it’s about groove and feel but that’s highly subjective and falls apart the second polyrhythms get involved.
In the end, anything can technically be written in any time signature, imh It just comes down to what’s easiest (or most obnoxious/ gimmicky) to read / write.
I mean I get why you would want to use 3/4 time instead of 4/4 time. For instance if you’re composing a waltz, you would want to use 3/4 time, because the rhythmic pattern repeats every 3 beats. Or for something like “da daa, da daa, da daa, da daa”
It’s more convenient to use a time signature that aligns with the repeating rhythm. But that only requires the top number.
To me, the bottom number has always been utterly meaningless. Sure you can fit two triplets in a 6/8 measure as opposed to one triplet in 3/4, but you could compose the same thing in 3/4 and just use two measures for the motif instead of one, and make it a faster tempo, and suddenly it’s played exactly the same way…
I am not a musician and there are MANY people that know MUCH more about music theory than me.
e.g. 6/8 time. 6 is how many beats are in a bar. 8 is how many bars. Why important? So we know when the music gets back to the start of the cycle… Kinda. There must be a beginning and an end. Why is No. of beats important? So we have an idea of the feel and how many notes roughly we can play within that. Why is 6/8 different to 3/4? Accents on a 3/4 the accent is typically on the 1 ² ³ 1 ² ³ and in a 6/8 the accent is going to mildly be on the 1 but more noticeable on the 4. Think MJ’s “The Way You Make Me Feel”. 6/8 has drive and the feeling of the accent on the UP beat.
Beyond this simplicity music is maths. Do you need to know the rules? No. Do whatever you want. But if you know the rules, you can exploit them; like musicians and composers do to create complex compositions and polyrhythms.
Hope this helps in any way.
No, the top number is beats per measure. The bottom number is how many beats are in a whole note. For example, in 6/8 time a whole note has 8 beats, making an eighth note one beat. As opposed to 3/4 time in which a quarter note is one beat.
But the exact same thing can be accomplished just by changing the tempo.
As for the accents, yeah, that’s what I gather the only difference is. But it’s never explicitly taught that way, and there’s nothing hardcoded into the logic of time signatures that suggests it must be that way.
Yeah a lot of music notation has implicit/hidden elements that aren’t ever really explained. A lot of things are done because someone “feels” like it should be that way, and no one questions it for whatever reason.
A non trivial amount of the reasoning is simplicity of reading and writing music. You could transpose everything to 4/4, but it would require a lot of weird patterns.
This is why I prefer to use trackers instead of sheet music when possible. All I want to look at is what pitch the notes are and how long they are. I don’t like key signatures either. It’s better, for me, for each pitch to have its own space.
Songs are made from repeating patterns of beats and melody. The time signature tells you what that pattern looks like. If you just memorise all the notes I suppose it matters less. But if you wanted to improvise like with a guitar solo or whatever that’s the rhythm you can use to improvise with.
It’s the rhythm equivalent of the key/chord progression for the melody. If you know the chord and when/how it changes through a song, and you know the basic rhythm building block you can just make up notes that are guaranteed to sound great with the other instruments playing.
I took piano lessons for many years and I could sight-read sheet music … sorta. As long as the notes were within the staves, I knew exactly what key to play. It was when notes were above and below the staves that I had to stop and count how many little lines were attached to each note to figure it out. Obviously that messed up my rhythm a bit lol.
I’m a programmer and I’ve spent thirty years writing music composition software and I never once even thought about incorporating traditional sheet music representation. It’s just so clunky and poorly designed for the job. And when you start getting into microtones it’s completely hopeless.
Walking
piano
Small talk. I’m just not interested.
I once went to a place to meet some people. The people I came to meet were in two distinct groups, chatting. I didn’t know which group to join, so I stood in between them, listening to both. First one was talking about something boring and stupid, the second the same. So I just… stood there. Outside both groups, staring at the floor, wandering if I should just leave.
I would have joined your group.
I probably would have stopped wondering and started wandering home after not very long.
Directions. I’m just clueless to the point it’s a problem.
Thank god for GPS. Even now people keep trying to give me directions and I’m like just shut up, I have a phone that will tell me where to go.
I cannot, and I mean cannot, flip a map in my mind. North has to be pointing north or my brain just keeps messing up.
There was a test in the back of Scientific American magazine a long time ago with pairs of 3d models (the stick and ball things people use to show molecular structures) and they turned them in different directions and asked “are these identical or mirror images” how many can you answer in 5 minutes.
I stared at it for an hour and couldn’t do even one. Like, I was crying by the end of the hour because I felt so stupid but my mind, it just couldn’t tell.
I’ve never had trouble reading but learned to read very young (barely 3 year old) like a language, sort of before even knowing the alphabet that well - it’s not a dyslexia situation. But I sure couldn’t see those differences in the quiz. At all.
I once dungeon-mastered a DnD campaign. For the map I just took a map of North America and rotated it 90°. Not one person noticed.
Could it be dyscalculia instead of dyslexia? From what I’ve heard poor sense of direction is a common symptom of the former.
I was not great at math in early school, rote memorization not my strong point but loved algebra, enjoyed calculus and actually work as an accountant. When in elementary school I could always rock word problems in math, better at understanding/applying than the literally calculating. So I don’t know, but not likely.
Pretty bad with right and left but honestly very good at moving around in real space - I orient myself (obviously) on north, south, east, west. I have a great sense of direction in the actual world.
Still not 100% on sarcasm, as an autistic person. Sometimes slips through the cracks for me when others use it. That’s despite me being a somewhat sarcastic person.
Choreography. Not just dance moves, but any physical activity where I watch someone do a thing and have to repeat it using my own body. Had a hell of a time learning to tie a necktie.
It’s a skill! If you’re interested maybe join a dance class, boxing/MMA class, pottery class, or do some improv!
Love and affection. As someone who’s parents have a bunch of psychological problems, paired with growing up poor as an immigrant. I never in my life have experienced either love or any sort affection for either family nor strangers. For context my mother is a prefect example of a sociopath and I’m 80% sure my dad is autistic. Neither of those conditions exactly scream empathy. I never heard the words ‘I love you’ spoken with the eyes, or any sort of meaning behind them. Listening to daily (and I’m not exaggerating here) screaming matches for 30 years has given me the impression that those words don’t really mean anything to them anyway. Never having had a safe place to develop those feelings and given that I’m not exactly easy on the eyes means that I have somehow managed to become full grown, mentally stable adult with empathy, and a yearning for affection and acceptance without a single fibre of love in my body. Never have I had an interaction other than quid pro quos, “I want something from you, you want something from me.” never “I want you, you want me.” I literally can’t imagine what it’s like waking up next to somebody, feeling emotionally safe or having somebody genuinely wanting to spend time with you. I know that there are currently literally billions of people for whom this the most normal thing in the world but for me that is borderline incomprehensible. I would want to wish that kind of lonelines on my worst enemy.
I’m a dude BTW.
