Regarding my proposal for chord notation:
Jack Campin said:
>...it allows no way to write a bare octave...
Fair enough - I'm happy to add "8" to the list.
This begs a question though. How precise should the
chord notation be? One expects the same chord notation
to be interpretable by (at least!) banjo, guitar, mandolin
or keyboard and they will typically play the notes in
different octaves and quite likely in different inversions.
Bert Van Vreckem seemed to agree when he said:
> ..There's only six strings and four fingers. ;-) Chords
> are approximated by dropping some notes...
>...Why are the accidentals given that way?...
For histerical (sic) reasons. Even though it is possible
to translate the chord names between tadpole and ABC
I would rather it were not necessary. It's one more
thing to go wrong, so I like it the way it is.
>...Is this an appropriate moment to suggest throwing
> in roman-numeral and figured-bass notations as well?
Yes, it's the right moment, but I vote against it. I want
to reduce the number of ways to write it. I just think
that they are not ABC. On the same grounds, I don't
want to allow writing f in the melody as (1,1) - that's
fret 1 on the first string. It's a valid idea, but it's not ABC
>...Parsing "F sharp minor" to print "F#m" should be easy.
No, it's impossible - because the range of things that
might mean F#m is unlimited. Would FSM be the same?
How about the same but in Italian? All one can do is to
have a certain set of notations (the new standard) which
is guaranteed to be OK and then whatever else any
particular package can make work (no guarantees).
I know someone who notates minor chords in lower
case, so he'd write it as f#.
Frank Nordberg wants the modifier list to include
(I think)
6
m-6
m6
69
7
7+
maj7
m7
dim7
9
-9
9-5
11
+11
m13
mmaj13+11
13-9
but he didn't explain what they meant and until someone does we can't really
consider them. (I would hope that there will never be anything to prevent
these things being written, but they won't be playable, transposable, etc.
unless and until they are well defined).
Bert Van Vreckem said:
>...Aren't `5' chords root+fifth?...
Yes, but they were what I added, not in the original draft standard.
>[paraphrased by me]...I would like a way to define other chords
> at the start of the file or song, e.g.
> [insert unassigned letter here]:m13 = [1 b3 5 b7 9 11 13]
> Hence, Dm13 = D F A c e g b; Gm13 = G Bb d f a c' e'; etc.
> The last line in the chord regular language then becomes
> <modifier> = m|m7||maj7|dim|aug|!|4|5|6|7|9|<predefined chord>
> <predefined chord> = string
So how about:
<guitar chord> = <silence>|<chord>
<silence> = X
<chord> = <root>[<modifier>][/<bass>]
<root> = <note>
<bass> = <note>
<note> = <note letter>[<accid>]
<note letter> = A|B|C|D|E|F|G
<accid> = #|b
<modifier> = m|m7||maj7|dim|aug|!|4|5|6|7|8|9|<predefined chord>
<predefined chord> = string
together with something (which Bert sketched) for the header to define any
of the <predefined chord> strings.
Laurie
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