Unit notation

Most of musical notation is severe overkill for what is needed to notate dance rhythms. The Universal Unit System of Skippy Blair uses a simplified rhythm notation that only uses those elements necessary for dance rhythms. It is much easier to learn than the standard music notation, and it works very well in the context of teaching dance. However, since in this course we will be seeing all sorts of nitpicky details regarding rhythm, I am using regular musical notation.

Units in a nutshell

The universal unit system starts from the observation that, with the exception of waltz, all dance music can be split into 2-beat increments. Any larger segment, 4, 6, 8 beats, can really be divided in groups of 2 beats, while dividing in single beats loses the essential binary character of the music.

A 2-beat unit is indicated with a rectangular box.
There are two main positions where something can happen: the first and the second beat. If you don't actually take a step there, a slash is put there as a place holder. A slash is like rest in normal notation.
If you do take a step, a big dot indicates so. Two dots, two steps.

One step in a unit means a slash on the other beat.
It gets trickier if you step between the beats. For a step between the beats, use a smaller dot. This is the notation for 1&2.

The last example illustrates an important point. In the right column you see that inserting an & count in between beats 1 and 2 changes the notation of the note on beat on. In the left column you do not see any changes in the big dot that indicates the step on the first beat. Traditional music notation expresses how long each note lasts; unit notation expresses when it occurs.

Now it gets tricky. I ended with the example of 1&2. To show you 12& or &12 I need to tell you a big difference between unit notation and regular music notation. In normal music notation, a measure of 2/4 time starts on beat one, and includes everything up to beat one of the next measure. A unit ends on beat two, so it may include material that comes before beat one.

The 12& rhythm, which fits in one measure of two-quarter time music, spills over into a second unit.
On the other hand, the &12 rhythm is normally considered to have a pick-up note, but it comprises exactly a single unit.

Rolling count

One aspect of the Universal Unit System that is a source of bemusement to me, and which no adherent has ever been able to explain to me, is the so-called rolling count. Skippy Blair insists that each beat, each quarter note, is divided in a 1&a count. Or rather, since units start before beat 1, &a1. Now, this makes sense in swing, but in samba it is subtly wrong, and in chacha it is, in my estimation, completely wrong. I will not go into this any further.

Units, pro and con

There is something to be said for unit notation.

On the other hand, unit notation is not equiped to deal with the intricacies of precisely where in between beats a step falls, halfway between 4 and 1 in chacha, at two thirds of the beat in swing/jive rhythm, or at three quarters of the distance between 1 and 2 in samba.

One might even have a philosophical objection to including steps before beat 1 into a unit, and rolling steps after 2 into the next. Where it works fine is in the common 12 &34 5&6 syncopation in West Coast Swing. If the & before 3 is taken as part of the &34 unit, we maintain the double-triple-triple structure of WCS.

In other dances, however, it is not so natural. The Chacha rhythm in unit notation has nothing resembling a chacha in it. Even worse is International Samba, where the reverse turn can be counted both as 1a2 and 12&. Now, does it make sense that a slight shift in the timing of one of the steps leads to a drastic rewrite of the rhythm?

Even in WCS one can find objection. The popular and-point-and-point syncopation would be notated &5&6&. In unit notation, the last & becomes part of the next unit, so that the following pattern suddenly starts on the wrong foot. Illogical.