For some time now, I have been describing what you see below as "Eighth-note-triplets". I've watched a couple of YouTube vids recently where they seemed to refer to them as "quarter-note triplets". One, obviously would refer to the note value used to depict the triplet (in this case, eighth-notes), the other would refer to the time value for the entire triplet (1 beat in X/4 time).

Is this one of those toe-may-toe/toe-mah-toe things or is there a "correct" way to reference tuplets - based on their notation or based on the time value being subdivided into the tuplets?

Thanks!

In MuseScore , you would make a ‘quarter note triplet’ to get the triplet 3-tuple with an eighth note type stave that’s spans a quarter note . I’m note completely sure what the official name of that entity is. I call it a quarter note triplet though [emoji51]


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

That's an eighth note triplet in which you're fitting three eighth notes into what would usually be the span of two eighth notes. A quarter note triplet would be, for example, a measure of 4/4 containing a half note followed by a grouping of three quarter notes.

I've heard it referred to as a quarter note triplet using the rationale that it fits into the space of a single quarter note. I find that more confusing as there is no visible quarter note in the span and I've never heard it described that way in my studies (early grade school through university).

With all that said though, the end result is the same as far as your ears go and the most important part is, of course, that you play/notate it correctly.

Thanks, Glenn. That's the way I've always thought of it. I'm assuming the times recently that I've heard it described as "quarter-note triplets" the speaker may have mis-spoken and not realized it. Describing them as eighth-note triplets makes more sense. In drumming, I first encountered sixteenth-note triplets that occupy the same temporal space as an eighth note, but different instrumental disciplines sometimes interpret things differently. As a guitarist, I'm used to seeing a swing feel notated as eighth-note triplets (or 12/8), never as dotted quarter or a combination of an eighth followed by a sixteenth, yet in drumming either one accompanied by a "swing" notation interprets those as I would with eighth-note triplets or 12/8 if notating it for guitar.



Heh. I tell my drum teacher that sometimes I feel like I was born playing triplets!