How it works
A 13/4 metronome counts the quarter note, thirteen to a bar. This one raises beat one only and sets no grouping for the other twelve.
Read the full guide
Start
Tap the pad, or press Space. One click in every thirteen is higher and its dot larger: that is beat one. Count the others the way your music groups them. Tap again to stop.
Change the tempo
Tap the number under the pad and type the quarter-note tempo printed in your music, or use minus and plus. Any whole tempo up to 1000 plays, and the bar stays at thirteen.
Questions and answers
Does 13/4 have a usual grouping?
Not one the signature tells you. Wikipedia's list of works in unusual time signatures prints a grouping for only one 13/4 bar, 2+9+2, which is why this pad stresses beat one alone.
13/4 or 13/8: which metronome do I need?
Go by the lower figure in your music. In Wikipedia's Time signature article a lower 4 stands for the quarter note and a lower 8 for the eighth note. The 13/8 page clicks eighth notes grouped 3+3+3+2+2; this one clicks quarter notes and groups nothing.
How does a score show the groups in 13/4?
Through its shorter notes, if any. Wikipedia's Beam article says a beam joins notes to show rhythmic grouping and that only eighth notes or shorter can be beamed, so thirteen plain quarter notes carry no such sign: follow your part's accents and phrasing.
Which pieces have bars of 13/4?
Mostly longer works with a bar or a passage in 13/4, going by Wikipedia's list: bar 276 of Stravinsky's Requiem Canticles, the one grouped 2+9+2, and bars 356 and 517 of Louis Andriessen's De Staat.
Why can't I hear the metronome?
First see whether the phone is muted: the ring switch, the volume, or Bluetooth earphones still paired in another room. The bar can be followed by eye meanwhile, thirteen dots lighting left to right with the large one on beat one.