Laurie wrote: >Frank Evil Grin Nordberg challenged "Can anybody come up with a clear and >consise definition (in twenty words >or less) of the difference between musically relevant and purely notational >features?" > >A difference between two pieces of notation is musically relevant if and >only if it means they should sound different. >(20 words) > >Thus writing in a different key and inserting accidentals to correct is not >musically relevant. > >Writing something in bass clef rather than treble clef with many legers is >not musically relevant. > >Putting guitar chords above the staff rather than below is not musically >relevant. > >An instruction to play a note on fret 9 of the G string instead of the open >E string is musically relevant.
I agree. However, some features of musical notation which are not musically relevant are nonetheless important beacuse they make the music easier to read (e.g. bar lines and beams) or because they make the notation more compact and efficient (e.g.repeats and the broken rhythm marker in abc). The criterion of musical relevance is certainly something we should consider when discussing extensions to the language, but I don't think it's of overriding importance. Phil Taylor To subscribe/unsubscribe, point your browser to: http://www.tullochgorm.com/lists.html
