Syncopation 1

Syncopation, in music, is the displacement of rhythms so the musical emphasis is on the weak beat. In this excerpt from Count Ferdinand Waldstein’s Sinfonie in D, movement one, the first and second violin parts use a syncopated rhythm to emphasize the off-beat of the music while the bass line keeps a steady eighth note pulse. Eighteenth century galant composers commonly used syncopation in their music, giving their compositions musical interest.