It's not really the adding of emphasis that makes it an off-beat - it's an off beat because it's an off beat, and whether you emphasise it or not is up to you.monkfish wrote:I'm starting to understand it a lot better. But I fear my understanding is still very vague and can't properly comprehend the terms off-beat" and "off-beat eighths" -- because I'm sure an off-beat is just adding emphasis and attention to a note that would usually be weak,, but don't understand how or why it would be eighths or sixteenths for that matter. Also, if it's not duration, then what does "on sixteenths", and "on eighths" mean in relevance to a common DAW note editor? If it's position, where is the starting point?
Imagine some HARD GERMAN TECHNO.
First you have four kickdrums per bar:
OONCE OONCE OONCE OONCE (repeat x 32)
These are hitting on the four quarter notes in the bar. And because it's a bar of 4/4 (which means there are four quarter note beats per bar), they're the basic 'on' beats.
Now the open hihat comes in:
OON-TSS OON-TSS OON-TSS OON-TSS (repeat x 32)
The OONs are still hitting on each of the quarter notes, or the 'on' beats. But the TSSs fall halfway between the quarter notes.
To put it another way, there's are eight hits per bar, so you've got hits on the eighth notes. The OONs are on the on-beat eighth notes, and the TSSs are on the off-beat eight notes.
If you bring in the closed hats
UH-ka-ti-ka UH-ka-ti-ka UH-ka-ti-ka UH-ka-ti-ka (repeat until everyone's drugs wear off)
you've now got a beat on every 16th note.
The UHs are still on the 'on-beat eighth notes' and the tis are still on the 'off beat eighth notes'. But the kas are halfway between eight notes - they're even more off-beat.
So to talk about it in 16th notes you'd say that the UHs and tis are on the 'on beat 16ths' and the kas are on 'off beat 16ths'.
But I think generally 'the off beat' refers to the off beat eights.