Convert from 3/4 to 4 4 time

• Sep 16, 2023 - 16:09

Hi,
Is it possible to convert a song that is in 3/4 time to one in 4/4 time, other than manually extending each note - very tedious!!!

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• Sep 16, 2023 - 16:25

What are you expecting to happen? If you have a song in 3/4 then to convert it to 4/4 you will have to decide which notes you want to change the duration of. So first, tell us what you propose for that first step, then someone can advise how to change the duration of the notes you have decided to change. But it is unlikely to be an easy process. Unless that is you just want to have all the notes keep their same duration but have a 4/4 time signature so that the effective downbeat changes position in each measure.

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• Sep 17, 2023 - 08:10

If you are on Windows you could use AutoHotkey to automate the process of increasing the duration of a series of measures. Dependent on your use case this could make the conversion less tedious.
On the testscreen with a score of 10 staves in TimeSig 3/4 the macro adds one beat to 100 measures in 65 seconds. You can also choose to add 2, 3 or 4 beats. In any TimeSig.
See the pdf for more info.
Edit 1: Some cosmetic changes in .txt file
Edit 2: Added a gif with quite a few frames deleted to keep it smaller than the limit of 4MB.

Attachment Size
Increase Measure Duration.pdf 124.49 KB
Increase_Measure_Duration.txt 4.28 KB
Increase_Measure_Duration.gif 3.28 MB

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• Sep 17, 2023 - 08:29

Thank you all for your comments. FBXOPWKDOIR2 is quite right, you just change the timing from 3/4 to 4/4 , but all that does, is it divides the notes in the song into sets of 4 beats - that just moves measure ends after 4 beats instead of three. This totally messes the song up, and I now realise the point SteveBlower is making is that if you want the timing to sound OK i.e the same as it did in 3/4 as in 4/4 you actually have to change each of the three crochets in a 3/4 measure, from 1 unit of time to 1.333 units of time. This is impossible, of course. But I figured there is a way around it. See the attached MuseScore piece. If you play this back you will see that the music in the first measure, which is in 3/4 sounds exactl;y the same as that in the second, the 4/4 measure, but you also have to change the tempo, as I did from 120 to 160. Fortunately tempo values can be changed from any number to any other, but you can't do this with notes

Attachment Size
conversion test.mscz 7.86 KB

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• Sep 17, 2023 - 13:08

Your need for triplets is evidence that the score really ought to remain in a triple meter.
Your original shows 3 pairs of eighth notes in 3/4. Getting rid of the staccato means that this in 3/4:
measure1.png
becomes this in 4/4:
measure2.png
where each note is two thirds of a beat - so 6 notes are twelve thirds = 4 beats (and thus a full 4/4 measure).
Triple meter seems better suited to represent this timing.

On the other hand...
When I read your thread's title: "Convert from 3/4 to 4 4 time", I was thinking you wanted to change the piece from triple meter into 4/4 doing something like this:
Melody-Meter3.mscz (for MuseScore 3)
Melody-Meter4.mscz (for MuseScore 4)

Regarding 3/4 (waltz) time and changing time signatures, have listen to the ending shift in the "waltz" refrain from 3/4 to 5/4 (or 3/4 to 3/4+2/4) in this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0jMhedM_-I

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• Sep 17, 2023 - 13:52

Thanks very much. I do understand what you say - Let me explain my dilema. I have written a score in 4/4 and was looking to add a better bass. I was scouting around in my MuseScore files and happened to listen to another song with a bass line that I liked, but it was in 3/4. I can't just copy this 3/4 into a fresh stave of the song that is 4/4 timing and expect it to just simply 'work'. It would sound funny. So I was wondering if there was a way to convert this 3/4 bass line so that it sounds right when incorprated somehow into this 4/4 song, without going through the excessively tedious business of trying to stretch the duration of each note in the 3/4 song (increase it by 1.33333) to fit in the 4/4 song. Maybe I should just let 3/4 songs alone and don't try to meddle with them or some how adapt/fit or whatever, into a 4/4 song. Like mixing oil with water and expecting something better than either!!! I will check out Melody-Meter3.mscz (for MuseScore 3). Thanks you for your efforts. Henry

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