5.1 — Start Composing with ChordWalk: From Time to Music

Turn musical relationships into original rhythmic and harmonic compositions.

5.1 · Start Composing with ChordWalk

Musical ideas become compositions when they are organised in time.

You began playing in the interval lessons, where the Perfect Fifth became a movable power chord and thirds supplied major or minor identity. Start Composing with ChordWalk now develops that playable material: organise it with pulse and note values, shape it through rhythm and articulation, arrange its chord tones, and build an original composition you can perform.

Why it matters: Pitch and harmony supply the musical material. Time, arrangement and repetition give that material a purposeful form.

  1. Understand how musical time is divided.
  2. Hear and shape those divisions across four bars.
  3. Arrange them into an original rhythm, arpeggio and composition.
The journey ahead

From playable relationships to an original composition

Each lesson reveals one new idea. Features that come later remain subdued until they have been explained.

Note values and restsDivide musical time into sound and silence.
Pulse, tempo, beats and barsPlace those divisions inside a steady flow.
Time signaturesOrganise beats into recurring groups.
Gate, volume and syncShape duration, emphasis and change.
Arpeggio construction and movementArrange the ideas into an original composition and performance.
This introduction is silent. Use Next to continue to note-value relationships.
5.2 · Note-value relationships

One span of time, divided in different ways

In 4/4, one bar contains four beats. A note value can occupy the complete bar or divide it into smaller, equal events.

1 whole = 2 halves = 4 quarters = 8 eighths = 16 sixteenths = 32 thirty-seconds

Listen for this next: Smaller note values create more event positions inside the same four-beat bar. The bar itself does not become longer.

Dotted notes

A dot adds half of the original note's duration.

Dotted quarter = 1½ beats
Triplets

A triplet divides one beat or span into three equal parts.

3 equal notes in the time of 2
Four-beat bar · proportional view

The same bar, progressively divided

Note valueSymbolUK nameBeats in 4/4EventsOne four-beat bar

Every coloured sector is one event. All six rows span exactly the same amount of musical time.