[abcusers] Re: abc post-processing scripts
On Sat 07 Oct 2000 at 02:04PM +0200, Frank Nordberg wrote: 2. A script for halving and doubling the note values. abc2abc will do this (as long as you have a fairly recent version). James Allwright To subscribe/unsubscribe, point your browser to: http://www.tullochgorm.com/lists.html
Re: [abcusers] Re: O'Neill errors
Frank Nordberg wrote: A problem with the O'Neill tunes is that many of them doesn't seem to have a clearly defined tonal centre at all. Ah, that's interesting. I think it's one of the great interests of the tunes, rather than a problem, but of course Frank's talking about notational questions, not musical interest here. [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: and I realize I am in the minority on this, but I continue to feel that the K: field should describe the number of sharps or flats without naming a tonic and/or a mode. Well, if you'll amend that to "...the K: field should *be able* to describe the number of sharps or flats without naming a tonic and/or mode" you might not be in the minority. At least you wouldn't be alone, for I'd agree. But I think it should also be able to describe the tonic and/or mode, along with a quite few other possibilities. Cheers, John Walsh To subscribe/unsubscribe, point your browser to: http://www.tullochgorm.com/lists.html
Re: [abcusers] MacMIDI2abc
Phil said: "I don't think most users appreciate the difficulty of the task of getting notatable music out of MIDI files. " Oh, I do, I do! Muse will have a go at this but I am currently working on improving it (because a customer sent in a bug report and it's one of those things that every time you look at it you realise how inadequate whatever you do is). Tempo following is my current thing - if the music does an accelerando you should NOT notate it as progressively shorter and shorter notes, but should follow the performance. Some people have a tendency to play short notes too short and so speed up every time there's a string of 16th notes - again, one should recognise this and handle it. Laurie To subscribe/unsubscribe, point your browser to: http://www.tullochgorm.com/lists.html
[abcusers] O'Neill's/modes in the K: command
Wendy Galovich says - ..And thank you Bryan, for indirectly acknowledging through your wording here that there ARE legitimate reasons for *continuing* to sup- port the tonic/mode system as a choice, apart from the need to have other choices as well. I have DIRECTLY acknowledged that in the past and it has always been my point of view. I don't want to use the tonic/mode system myself but if it suits others that's fine. If you can find anything I've said otherwise, please quote me. I withdrew from the discussion a few months ago because I got fed up with trying to explain what I meant to people who had clearly stopped listening and who seemed to regard a sharps/flats K: command as anathema. It's "WE, who like it the way it is" that seem to want to deny choice. Bryan To subscribe/unsubscribe, point your browser to: http://www.tullochgorm.com/lists.html
Re: [abcusers] Re: O'Neill errors
John Walsh wrote:
| Frank Nordberg wrote:
| A problem with the O'Neill tunes is that many of them doesn't
| seem to have a clearly defined tonal centre at all.
|
| Ah, that's interesting. I think it's one of the great interests
| of the tunes, rather than a problem, but of course Frank's talking about
| notational questions, not musical interest here.
It's interesting, but as for it being a problem, I'd say that the
current buzz phrase "Deal with it!" applies. Traditional Irish music
has a lot of examples of tunes without a clear tonal center. Usually
the feel is as if the tune were "wavering" between two (or sometimes
three) tonal centers, with none the main center. It can't be fixed;
it's part of the style. The tunes like this aren't the "norm"; they
are a minority. But they are definitely part of the tradition and
something that you need to be familiar with if you want to really
understand the style. This can bother people coming from other styles
that always have clear tonal centers. It is a minor problem with ABC,
which wants you to specify a tonic note. So you just pick one of the
likely tonics, and tell yourself that it's not a major sin.
One of my favorite examples is the well-known Blarney Pilgrim. I just
checked with my tune finder, and there are 35 instances on the Web.
About 2/3 are in G; the other 1/3 are in Dmix. The tune is highly
ambiguous about which is the tonic center. I've found that, although
it can be harmonized with chords, I like it better with just a quiet
drone, and the drone note should be D. But this doesn't mean that D
is the tonic, because a drone on the 5th is quite normal in Irish and
Scottish music. The tune is almost pentatonic, but there are a few C
naturals. To most ears, this would put it in G major, but to ears
attuned to the Mixolydian scale would make it Dmix. And the fact that
it starts and ends on the low D is probably a point of tension to
many ears ("It's not resolved"), but a perfectly satisfying ending to
ears attuned to this style of music.
| [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
| and I realize I am in the minority on this, but I continue to feel
| that the K: field should describe the number of sharps or flats
| without naming a tonic and/or a mode.
|
| Well, if you'll amend that to "...the K: field should *be able* to
| describe the number of sharps or flats without naming a tonic and/or mode"
| you might not be in the minority. At least you wouldn't be alone, for I'd
| agree. But I think it should also be able to describe the tonic and/or
| mode, along with a quite few other possibilities.
Agreed. This is what I've done with my doctored abc2ps that accepts
the extended syntax
K:tonicmodeaccidentals
As a computerized music notation, one of the nice things about ABC is
that it allows you to state the tonic and mode, unlike standard staff
notation. This is useful for searches, especially when transcribers
get it right. But it's more limiting than
K:accidentals
This should be allowed, for various reasons. Frank has pointed out
one of the musical reasons: There are musical styles that lack a
clear tonic. For such music, requiring a tonic is inappropriate and
misleading, and leads to "false positives" in searches.
This is a different argument from the usual one based on transcriber
ignorance: It's better to see just K:^f than, for example, K:G when
the correct key is K:Em or K:Adorian or K:Dmix. K:^f is a way of
saying "I don't know what the tonic is, but the f's are (mostly)
sharp. With Irish music, you do see cases where what you'd like to
say is "Well, all the f's are sharp, but it's not clear whether the
tonic is G or D, and a few bars seems to have A as the tonic center."
I doubt that we'd want to have an explicit ABC notation for this.
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Re: [abcusers] accidentals in ()
At 10:18 AM 10/8/2000 +0200, you wrote: Anyway; how do I get the brackets 'round the accidental in abc? I have the same question. Unfortunately, it appears to be not possible using any of the variants of abc2ps. We could allow syntax similar to that used for triplets, such as "v(^c", to be rendered as a sharp sign in parens. This is not ambiguous because this is not a legal notation for slurs. John Henckel alt. mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Zumbro Falls, Minnesota, USA (507) 753-2216 http://geocities.com/jdhenckel/ To subscribe/unsubscribe, point your browser to: http://www.tullochgorm.com/lists.html
[abcusers] wish-list of scripts
Frank Norberg asks for: 1. A rebarring script 2. A script for halving and doubling the note values. 3. A script for identifying written out repeats and replace them with repeat signs. 4. A script for removing superfluous accidentals. 5. A script for converting accidentals to key signature. 6. A script for resolving awkward uses of and , e.g. changing |G3/2ABc/2| into |GA Bc| 7. A script for regrouping eight notes etc. I'd love something like these, too. I'd add to this wish-list these three items: 8. A script for formatting with four (or whatever) bars per line, with intelligent treatment of anacrusis and multiple endings 9. A script for extracting chords and making chord charts (Anselm Lingau's is a good start). 10. A script for "beautifying" abc by putting white space in to improve readability and by lining up things vertically. I realize that some of these things are already done by various programs. But a nice suite of scripts would be great. Robert Bley-Vroman Honolulu To subscribe/unsubscribe, point your browser to: http://www.tullochgorm.com/lists.html
[abcusers] K: command
Phil Taylor says - If this change in standard becomes accepted, the vast majority of users will use it not just for the ambiguous tunes where it is appropriate, but for ALL transcriptions. You want to stop this change in standard because it is something the vast majority of users want? As I said in my reply to Wendy Galovich's comments, it isn't me that wants to restrict peoples choices. And John Chambers says - (Hey, keep quiet about this trickery. With a bit of care, we can sneak this into enough ABC software that it will become indispensible. ;-) Better, let's get it into the standard. Then everybody will be pressured into taking it up. Bryan To subscribe/unsubscribe, point your browser to: http://www.tullochgorm.com/lists.html
