"I want the claps to be quarter notes," he said.
And now, look at this" - during the second chorus - "just quarter notes.
It denotes a silence of the same duration as a quarter note.
Thus, a quarter note in cut time is only half a beat long, and a measure has only two beats.
The time signature also indicates that every beat is a quarter note.
Therefore every single digit in a beat is a quarter note.
The last bar has two quarter notes and a half note.
They maintain the speed not of the bar but of the quarter note.
In this entire first half, the quarter note functions as the basic rhythmic unit.
But you must pay attention to the quarter notes and the half notes.
