Counting Time

Counting time means focusing on the concept of time, which is expressed in the music score in the value of the individual notes and signatures,  such as 4/4 meaning each quarter note has one beat and there are four beats to the measure.  2/4 time means 2 beats to the measure, each quarter note getting one beat.  The top number represents how many beats in a measure and the lower number tells what type of note gets one beat.  A quarter note or a half note or an eighth note get one beat in the measure if it is represented as the bottom note in the signature.  The top note tells how many beats are in a measure.

There is also a vocabulary (usually written in Italian).that tells the vocalist or instrumentalist how quickly or slowly or with what feeling the piece or a particular section of the piece was intended to be played.  Some common are.....adagio-slowly...appassionato-passionately...gustoso-with happy emphasis an forcefulness.  There are hundreds.  These are stated in the beginning measure or atop the score or inside.

Take a piece of music from John Thompson 1,  in fact, use the entire book and starting from the beginning, place the music on the table and use a pencil to tap out the time to the entire piece.  One and two and three and four.  Or  one and two and three and one and two and three and-how ever the time signature  at the start of the piece of music tells you to do.  Go to the next John Thompson book, Book 2 and the next.  It makes very good practice.

Notes are of the same value or a different value.  The following copied from Wikipedia.

Note	British name / American name	Rest
	Large (Latin: Maxima) / Octuple whole note (or octuple note)
	Long / Quadruple whole note (or quadruple note)
	Breve / Double whole note (or double note)
	Semibreve / Whole note
	Minim / Half note
	Crotchet / Quarter note
	Quaver / Eighth note For notes of this length and shorter, the note has the same number of flags (or hooks) as the rest has branches.
	Semiquaver / Sixteenth note
	Demisemiquaver / Thirty-second note
	Hemidemisemiquaver / Sixty-fourth note
	Semihemidemisemiquaver / Hundred twenty-eighth note
	Demisemihemidemisemiquaver / Two hundred fifty-sixth note
	Beamed notes Beams connect eighth notes (quavers) and notes of shorter value, and are equivalent in value to flags. In metered music, beams reflect the rhythmic grouping of notes. They may also be used to group short phrases of notes of the same value, regardless of the meter; this is more common in ametrical passages. In older printings of vocal music, beams are often only used when several notes are to be sung on one syllable of the text – melismatic singing; modern notation encourages the use of beaming in a consistent manner with instrumental engraving, and the presence of beams or flags no longer informs the singer. Today, due to the body of music in which traditional metric states are not always assumed, beaming is at the discretion of the composer or arranger and irregular beams are often used to place emphasis on a particular rhythmic pattern.
	Dotted note Placing a dot to the right of a notehead lengthens the note's duration by one-half. Additional dots lengthen the previous dot instead of the original note, thus a note with one dot is one and one half its original value, a note with two dots is one and three quarters, a note with three dots is one and seven eighths, and so on. Rests can be dotted in the same manner as notes. In other words, n dots lengthen the note's or rest's original d duration to .
	Multi-measure rest Indicates the number of measures in a resting part without a change in meter, used to conserve space and to simplify notation. Also called "gathered rest" or "multi-bar rest".

Durations shorter than the 64th are rare but not unknown. 128th notes are used by Mozart and Beethoven; 256th notes occur in works by Vivaldi, Mozart and Beethoven. An extreme case is the Toccata Grande Cromatica by early-19th-century American composer Anthony Philip Heinrich, which uses note values as short as 2,048ths; however, the context shows clearly^{[original research?]} that these notes have one beam more than intended, so they should really be 1,024th notes.
The name of very short notes can be found with this formula: note, where is the number of flags on the note.

Breaks

	Breath mark In a score, this symbol tells the performer or singer to take a breath (or make a slight pause for non-wind instruments). This pause usually does not affect the overall tempo. For bowed instruments, it indicates to lift the bow and play the next note with a downward (or upward, if marked) bow.
	Caesura Indicates a brief, silent pause, during which time is not counted. In ensemble playing, time resumes when the conductor or leader indicates.