What is 16 bars in music?

What is 16 bars in music??

• I want to audition for theater and they want 16 bars?? Ive read what 16 bars are but i still do understand it at all!! Can someone explain to me or give me a good example!?! Thanx

• Answer:

  16 bars is another way of saying 16 measures in music. Music has time indicators, like 4/4 or 3/4 or 6/8, etc... 4/4 would mean that there are 4 beats a measure, quarter note gets the beat. 6/8 means there are 6 beats a measure, 8th note gets the beat. So... for 16 bars in 4/4, you count to 4 sixteen times. Each measure has 4 beats, they want 16 measures. Since you are auditioning for theatre, I assume they want you to sing something short, about 16 bars? Is this right? Or possibly they want to see you dance to something really short? Usually this is enough for one verse and a chorus. 16 bars usually equates to 2 eight measure phrases, or one long phrase with the melody repeated. They want to get a sense of your vocal range, projection, and most importantly, if you can stay in key. It doesn't mean that if you pick "My Girl" that you have to sing it in the original key, but they want to hear that you have some idea of pitch... can they recognize the melody? That's what they're looking for if it's for vocals... if it's for dancing, they just want to see how good your rhythm is and how you move. I wish I could tell you how many seconds 16 bars is... but that all depends on the tempo... fast or slow? Try to keep it around a 1 to 1.5 minutes, but don't stop in the middle of a phrase unless they tell you to do so... finish the chorus or verse. Anyways, hope this helped!