I've read with great attention and interest the last thread about
microtone. Although I'm not an expert in this field, I'm
interested in writing notation for persian music, and playing it
as well.
I regret I haven't worked much on this project (including
transcribing music) recently, but I had a page about what I've
done so far : http://anamnese.online.fr/iran/persian_music.html
I haven't looked for a complicated to set solution, and this way
it's not practical to use. I couldn't program myself a new program
so I've just redefined some %%deco for Abcm2ps and I've recompiled
Abc2midi to play it roughtly.
I've used at that moment the same idea proposed here :
>I think the best solution would be to use the !...!
>symbol notation to add extra symbols to the abc
>language. Something like !sharp1!, !sharp2!, !sharp3!
>etc.
The only advantage is it's backward compatible with old notations.
But it's a pain to write and not really readable (see example
below)
So I've used !koron! and !sori! (koron is for between flat and
full note, while sori is between sharp and full note) for this.
After the note I've put !=! it is for telling Abc2midi that it has
to come back to the normal pitch bend (in order to "close" a note
with this otherwise the rest will be detuned). As I said it's not
fine to use.
I've also set another kind of symbols, for western music (in fact
it's the general symbols for 1/4 tone), it's just !b! and !#! ,
with also the use of !=! for abc2midi. Not better :)
You can have a look at the display here :
X:1
T:Daramad of Shur
L:1/8
Q:1/4=135
M:no
K:C
%%MIDI program 111
d !koron!e !=! g f !koron!e !=! d c _B A G A d2 {c}_B2 {A}G2 |
G A c _B A G F !koron! E !=! D !koron! E !=! F G A c {_B} A2 {G}
F4 |
FFF A2 G2 {F}!koron! EEE !=!G2 F2 {!koron! E !=!} DDDF2 !koron! E2
!=! |
http://anamnese.online.fr/iran/daramad_shur.png
The output from my customed abc2midi, but since it's pitch bend,
it's not nice to hear (there is also a pb of rythm, but it's
because original has some free rythms) :
http://anamnese.online.fr/iran/daramad_shur.mid
and the original :
http://anamnese.online.fr/iran/daramad.mp3
For western music, the other notation I used is here :
http://anamnese.online.fr/iran/ton_plinn_melanie.png
http://anamnese.online.fr/iran/test_breton.pdf
and the outputs :
http://anamnese.online.fr/iran/tonPlinn.mid
http://anamnese.online.fr/iran/tonPlinnMelanie1.mid
http://anamnese.online.fr/iran/tonPlinnMelanie2.mid
I haven't managed to put some of those 1/4 tones in the key
signature.
Some comments on the previous posts :
To make it short, I think too Buddha Buck's notation is the
easiest
>Actually, I could suggest another notation: _#C, where # is a
single
>digit, means flatting C by that many eighth-tones. For finer
control,
>_##C, where ## is a pair of digits, means flattening C by that
many
>cents, or 100ths of a semitone. ^#C and ^##C have analogous
>defintions, but sharpening instead.
>The note halfway between E and F could be represented as ^2E,
^50E,
>_2F,
>or _50F. F itself could be ^E, ^4E, ^0F, ^00F, F _8G, or __G
(or, if
>you really wanted, ^^^D).
I only suggest something else in addition. It can be somehow
misleading (it could be the same as %%MIDI ratio n m ), but I
know some oriental music (persian music for ex.) can have variants
in 1/4 tone, it's not a fixed 1/4 tone. It can be for ex. 45% or
35% of a half-tone, that depends of some scales and various
parameters I don't really know (I've just find something about it
http://users.rcn.com/christopherchapman/persianintervals.html). If
it appears also in some other trad. music, it could be interesting
to allow to define this ratio in the header, and then use a
general 1/4 tone definition for the notation in a tune, ex ^2G
it'd be quicker to write than ^35G if we can define earlier that
the ratio is 35th of a semitone.
This definition could be for ex :
%%quartertone [note] [ratio for flat] [ration for sharp]
(I suggest this %% notation since there are not that many letters
left, and %% notation is more readable)
So the previous example could be :
X:1
T:Daramad of Shur
L:1/8
Q:1/4=135
M:no
K:C
%%quartertone B 35 50
%%quartertone E 42 55
d _2e g f _2e d c _B A G A d2 {c}_B2 {A}G2 |
G A c _B A G F _2E D _2 E F G A c {_B} A2 {G} F4 |
FFF A2 G2 {F}_2EEE G2 F2 {_2 E } DDDF2 _2E2 |
it'd mean _2B = _35B and ^2B = ^50B (real 1/4 tone) while _2E =
_42E and ^2E (and ^2e as well etc.) = ^55E while default for
example _2A would remain the same (50/50)
This way it's more intelligible to understand how the scale is
constructed (we can see the particular notes in the header)
>Or, to be consistent with the rest of abc, we could just put a
length
>after an accidental. So _2/3A would be an A that is flatted 2/3
of a
>semitone. Similarly ^1/2A, ^/2A and ^/A would be a note
halfway
>between A and ^A.
is also a good idea. Since I'm not a software developper, I
wouldn't mind if all of those ideas would be included in the abc
standard :)
But maybe Buddha Buck's notation would be enough.
>1. The step size should be defined in a special field in analogy
to the
>default fraction specified in the L: field (as Irwin Oppenheim
>suggested)
which fields are left ? Since some software have already used
them, a %% notation could be easier.
>2. _# and _## resp. ^# and ^## should denote step sizes in
respect to
>the default fraction
yes
>3. _### or ^### should denote deviations in cent (with a leading
0).
>Example: ^098A.
I think it's a good idea too, I've heard of cents too in persian
music, but I don't know much about this.
>These deviations should be printed above the notes (without
leading 0)
>just like chord symbols (this is standard in some microtonal
>literature).
good idea too, if it's an option
>Nevertheless, it would be nice to see whether or not there could
some
>agreement in the abc community on microtonal notation.
I think it's the main thing that lacks in abc to be fully
complete.
>Wouldn't a resolution of an 1/8th note be sufficient
>for musical notation?
maybe for most of them, but not for all kind of musics (are there
also 1/50 tones in for ex. chineese or japaneese music ?)
I see also from the software Scala this kind of ratio for persian
music (and even those can differ from a tune to another tune) :
Persian Tar Scale, from Dariush Anooshfar, Internet Tuning List
2/10/94
17
!
256/243
27/25
9/8
32/27
243/200
81/64
4/3
25/18
36/25
3/2
128/81
81/50
27/16
16/9
729/400
243/128
2/1
>How do these special symbols (^1 ^2
>^3 ^5 ^6 and maybe ^7) look---do you have an example?
>How do they sound---are it exact eighth-tones?
I've spent some time on internet to find some, I enjoyed my tour
(especially on http://www.microtonal.org/music.html), but so far
I've seen nothing related to music with notes and bars, like we
know it.
Some clues here ? http://www.microtonal.co.uk/notakey.htm
There is also this software that handle microtones :
http://www.xs4all.nl/~huygensf/scala/ It looks powerfull and
interesting
Sorry, it was a too long post...
Eric.
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