What does syncopation mean in music?

Theory & harmony

Syncopation

Syncopation is rhythm that places emphasis where the metre does not expect it, on a weak beat or between beats, creating a pull against the underlying pulse.

It only works if the underlying pulse is still felt. A syncopated passage played by someone who has lost the beat does not sound syncopated; it sounds wrong. This is why the standard practice method is to keep counting or tapping the straight pulse while playing the displaced rhythm against it.

Notationally it appears as ties across beats, rests on strong beats, and accents on off-beats. In a string section it is also a bowing problem: the natural weight of a down-bow lands on the beat, so a syncopated accent often needs an up-bow accent, which has to be made rather than allowed.

It is fundamental to jazz and most popular music, and it is far older than either, Baroque hemiola and Brahms’s cross-rhythms are the same idea.

Time signature: A time signature is a pair of numbers showing how many of a given note value fill a bar; their grouping indicates the metre and main beats.
Measure: A measure, called a bar in British usage, is the span of music between two barlines, containing the number of beats set by the time signature.
Up-bow and down-bow: Down-bow moves the bow from frog to tip and is marked with a bracket symbol; up-bow moves from tip to frog and is marked with a V.
Metronome: A metronome is a device that sounds a steady pulse at a chosen number of beats per minute, used to establish and gradually increase tempo in practice.

Every term in this glossary is taught in context somewhere in Arco's curricula, on the staff, on the keyboard, and on your own fingerboard at the same time.

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