Bars and Bar Lines:

What are Bars and Bar Lines?: When writing a sentence we use punctuation to help break up the words we are writing into sentences. Bars have a similar function in music. They help to break up the music into readable chunks. A bar will contain a certain number of notes depending on the time signature (See Unit 1 Lesson 6). We use bar lines to show the start/end of a bar.

At the end of a section of music you will tend to find a double bar line and then at the end of a piece you will find a final bar line (as shown in middle left picture).

We can also use repeat marks when we want a section of music repeated. As you can see on the bottom left we place repeat marks in. The music within the repeated bars will be played through once and then the musician will go back to the beginning of the repeat marks and play throught the section again and unless specified will carry on with the piece once they have finished playing the repeated section.

We can then take this one step further by adding first and second-time bars. The repeated section of music may end with a bracketed section with a number above it. This means we play the first bracketed bar and then repeat the section. However when we reach the first-time bar we skip it and play the second time bar.

Example:

Here we have a short piece of music demonstrating the use of bar lines, along with repeats. You can clearly see how when the first time bar finishes it returns to the beginning of the repeat section and then plays through to the second-time bar where the piece ends.

Bar lines.mov

Why do we need bar lines?:

Bar lines are important because it helps to break up the music into readable chunks. Without it a musician won't be able to tell when a section finishes. Repeats are also important because they help to condense the music, making it easier to read. Music without bars is like reading a book without punctuation.