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For a note in 4/4 time, "whole" means an entire (or 'whole') measure of beats: 4 beats. In 3/4 time, though, a whole note would be written as a dotted half note tied to a quarter note. For a rest, "whole" always means an entire measure. That symbol hanging from the second line means "Do not play at all during this measure."
There may be any number of beats in a measure but the most common by far are multiples of 2 or 3 (i.e., a top number of 2, 3, 4, or 6). Likewise, any note length can be used to represent a beat, but a quarter note (indicated by a bottom number of 4) or eighth note (bottom number of 8) are by far the most common.
Since it is equal to four quarter notes, it occupies the entire length of a measure in 4 4 time. Other notes are multiples or fractions of the whole note. For example, a double whole note (or breve) lasts twice the duration of the whole note, a half note lasts one half the duration, and a quarter note (or crotchet) lasts one quarter the duration.
Most time signatures consist of two numerals, one stacked above the other: The lower numeral indicates the note value that the signature is counting. This number is always a power of 2 (unless the time signature is irrational), usually 2, 4 or 8, but less often 16 is also used, usually in Baroque music. 2 corresponds to the half note (minim), 4 to the quarter note (crotchet), 8 to the eighth ...
The top "4" indicates that there are four beats per measure (also called bar). The bottom "4" indicates that each of those beats are quarter notes. Measures divide the piece into groups of beats, and the time signatures specify those groupings. 4 4 is used so often that it is also called "common time", and it may be indicated with rather than ...
Whole note: usually 4 beats. Whole rest: usually a full bar. Not always the same as a whole note. Slightly better answers: Whole note: the number of beats it gets is equal to the number on the bottom of the time signature, except in compound time. In compound time, a DOTTED whole note gets beats equal to HALF of that bottom number.
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Basic time signatures: 4 4, also known as common time (); 2 2, also known as cut time or cut-common time (); etc. In popular music, half-time is a type of meter and tempo that alters the rhythmic feel by essentially doubling the tempo resolution or metric division/level in comparison to common-time. Thus, two measures of 4 4 approximate a ...