"Laurie Griffiths" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > I've been off sailing. Let me try (below) to clear up the tempo thread for > the last week. > Do we have a concensus? Can we adopt this yet? > > Laurie > > Jack Campin: > One extra thing you get in actual scores: multiple names for the same tempo, > which in your notation might be > > Q:allegro=>Tempo I > > Laurie: > I am not in favour of this. The more levels of indirection the trickier it > is to follow what's intended. So you'd have to do a little more writing. > For instance: > Q:120=>allegro > Q:120=>Tempo I
That's not always good enough... Imagine something like: X:1 % Arbeau didn't give any tempo indicators. However, Pavanes are processionals Q:processional ... X:2 % This is an Italian 15th Century Balli. I need to document it as having a % "Bassa Danza" tempo, because that's what the period source material said. % That's a processional pace Q:processional=>Bassa Danza Q:Bassa Danza ... Then, when I play it back, I tell my player that "processional" tempo is 60bpm, and both the pavane and the balli are played at the correct speed. If my dancers complain that that's too slow, no problem, just adjust "processional" to 70bpm, 80 bpm, etc, and all is right again. > John (jhoerr) > Does this mean that a transcriber can't specify a tempo without also > defining it metronomically? > > Laurie: > That depends on the program. For a player program one might get a warning > to the effect that it is going to play it at a default tempo because it > doesn't understand the given tempo. For a printing-only program one might > get no complaint. From a syntax checker one probably should get a > warning. At most a warning, in my opinion. I'd even suggest that the warning should be very low-level, or only available as an option. I sort of like the idea of "playback hints", or a way of clarifying, within the notation, what is meant if the player doesn't know itself. Assuming a q: field for tempo hints, I would see it being interpreted as "If no Q: field exists, use the default tempo for playback. If a Q: field exists, use it for the tempo. If the program does not understand the value for the Q: field, look for a q: field. If no q: field exists, use the default tempo, optionally generating a warning. If a q: field exists, use it's value for the tempo. If the q: field exists and the player does not understand it's value, generate an error. When displaying a tempo, use the value of the Q: field, if one exists". Along those lines, the Bassadanza example I gave above would simply use Q: Bassa Danza q: processional If the program knew how to play Bassa Danza's, it would do that, otherwise, it would play it as a processional. -- Buddha Buck [EMAIL PROTECTED] "I will not die an ironic death" -- Scott Ian, lead singer for the metal band Anthrax, after bioterrorist attacks using anthrax. To subscribe/unsubscribe, point your browser to: http://www.tullochgorm.com/lists.html
