Triplet drums

• May 17, 2018 - 23:24

Hi,
Just trying to create a simple drum part with 8th-note triplets on a closed hi-hat, kick on 1 and 3, and snare on 2 and 4 in 4/4.

  1. I select 8th note in the Note Input thing at the top.
  2. I select Notes>Tuplets>Triplet

Doing just this changes the Note Input to 16th-note even though I selected 8th-note. Which of course adds 16th-note triplets. I want 8th-note triplets but it won't let me.

Any help with this? It seems like it would be such an easy thing to do.

Thanks!
~Frank

Comments

• May 17, 2018 - 23:31

An eighth note triplet takes one beat, so choose a quarter note duration then use Ctrl+3 (or Notes>Tuplets>Triplet) to divide into triplet.

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• May 18, 2018 - 02:39

Got it, thanks for the reply. Although it's weird for me to think of an 8th note triplet taking one beat. I would think 3 8th triplets would be one beat, no?

So if I wanted to make a whole bar of 8th triplets (12 notes) I'd have to keep resetting the Note Input to quarter note and set the Tuplets to Triplets on every beat? Which would be a total of 4 times for just one bar. There must be a way to set it and forget it until a change is desired, no?

Thanks again! I'm slowly learning.

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• May 18, 2018 - 07:16

Haha! ...
You are in a maze of twisting little passages, all different.
You are in a maze of little twisting passages, all different
You are in a little maze of twisting passages, all different
etc...

You wrote:
Although it's weird for me to think of an 8th note triplet taking one beat.
An 8th note triplet is comprised of three 8th notes, taking one beat.

You also wrote:
I would think 3 8th triplets would be one beat, no?
3 8th note triplets would be 3 beats.
3 8th triplet notes would be one beat.
1 8th triplet note would be 1/3 of a beat.

I guess it's a matter of semantics/interpretation.
Three triplet 8th notes would be one beat.
One 8th note triplet would be one beat.

Five quintuplet 16th notes would be one beat.

The important point:
Select a note or rest that equals the full duration of the desired tuplet group.

BTW:
If you want to make a whole bar of 8th triplets (12 notes) you can put 4 quarter rests in the measure, select them all and press Ctrl + 3 to produce a whole bar of tuplets (or create one tuplet and copy/paste it at will).
Regards.

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• May 18, 2018 - 16:02

As mentioned, the full triplet takes a beat, and that is how you enter tuplets in MsueScore - start with the full duration. And you are right - one downside of this method is that it is a little extra work to enter long sequences of triplets. If you have a lot of these, you might consider whether the piece is more suited for compound meter (eg, 6/8), but if you want to keep it in simple meter (eg, 4/4), then you could first enter quarter rests to fill the region, then select them all and hit Ctrl+3 to turn them all into triplets at once.

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