On Tue 28 May 2002 at 08:32AM -0400, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > James Allwright wrote: > > >The inconsistency is deliberate. The point is that when you play > >a hornpipe or anything else with dotted rhythm (or swing, or > >whatever you want to call it), keeping a 3:1 ratio is rather > >harder than keeping a 2:1 ratio and doesn't really add much > >musically apart from a certain pedantic pleasure in knowing that > >you are playing exactly what your notation says. This is why > >abc2midi makes the assumption that a>b is meant to be played as > >a 2:1 ratio. I think this is in accordance with the original > >spirit of '>' even if this is not spelt out in the standard. > > It sounds like you're saying that ">" cannot be used to notate the > first notes of "Mari's Wedding" to play as I've always heard it > played. This would be unacceptable. >
No-one else has used Mairi's Wedding to define the meaning of ">". What ">" and "<" gives you in abc2midi is a notation for tunes in 6/8 masquerading as tunes in 4/4. This covers hornpipes and probably strathspays (though I can't tell since I don't get to hear very many of those). This is not a mistake. Perhaps you should tell the generations of musicians who have notated 6/8 tunes in 4/4 that that is unacceptable. Actually, having abc2midi as an "unacceptable" program is kind of cool. I like to think of it being a bit of rebel software :-). James Allwright To subscribe/unsubscribe, point your browser to: http://www.tullochgorm.com/lists.html
