The beat in music is the **steady pulse** that remains the same throughout the whole composition of a piece. It is used to indicate the **basic unit of time** in a soundtrack². As beats are combined to form measures, each beat is divided into parts. The nature of this combination and division is what determines **meter**. Meter is a way of organizing beats into groups, usually by accenting some beats more than others. Meter can be classified as duple, triple, quadruple or more depending on how many beats are in a group?.

 

 

A common way of indicating meter and beat in music notation is using a **time signature**. A time signature consists of two numbers written at the beginning of a piece or a section. The top number tells you how many beats are in one measure. The bottom number tells you what kind of note is considered one beat?. For example, 4/4 means that there are four quarter notes per measure, and 3/8 means that there are three eighth notes per measure.

 

The beat and measure structure of a song can vary depending on the genre, style and mood of the music. Some songs have simple and regular structures, while others have complex and irregular ones. Some songs also change their structure throughout to create contrast or surprise. One common song structure is called **AABA**, which consists of four sections: A section (verse), A section (repeat), B section (bridge) and A section (return). Each section can have different lengths, but usually they are 8 or 16 bars long.