4/5 beat weaves and how they got that way

Can anyone out there explain how you count beats with the 4 and 5 beat weaves? I've read discussions in the archives and have seen people say things like "the 5 beat weave is really the samething as the 4 beat weave". This confuses me because it doesn't appear that way from the descriptions on the websites.

Can someone tell me the proper beat patterns for both hands? For example: the 3 beat weave has both hands do a 2:1 pattern (2 on the cross, 1 on the open).

Is it the case that for the 4 beat weave the right hand does 2:2 and the left still does 2:1? Or are both hands always mirror images of each other?

I'm trying to understand how the beat counts go so I can understand what I'm supposed to be doing. I can't quite make out how it all works from the descriptions.

Basil,

I hope this page explains it enough
See Counting the beats

Regards

Malcolm

doh. I swear I searched the site several times before I posted I can't believe I missed such a useful page.

Maybe there should be a link to that from the lesson pages for the various weaves. Just an idea.

Basil,

I actually wrote that page after reading your post. I will add extra links from the lessons pages. Glad it has helped

Regards

Malcolm

Nice job Malcolm Getting some science in there...

In case anyone is still confused on 4-beat versus 5, I tend to think of it this way:

For 4-beat weave, you are doing different stuff on each side of the body. For instance you can wrap your wrists around each other on your right side, thus doing 4 beats on the right instead of 3.

Then you (seemingly) do the normal 3-beat weave on your left side. The difference though is that when you bring both of your hands back to the left side to unwind them, they are still twisted around each other.

Thus, the act of undoing your wrists is an added beat, giving you a total of 4 on the left side also.

When you twist your wrists on both sides, you not only get the extra beat of twisting your wrists on each side, but the extra beat of untwisting them. This is what gives you a total of 5 beats on each side.

Hope that helps...
Shawn