[James O'Briant:]
>He wanted the music itself printed on two facing pages,
>so there would be no page turns, even though this meant more than a
>dozen staves per page -- far too dense for easy readability.
It could be a problem, though, requiring the player to turn the page in the
middle of the piece, couldn't it? (That would depend on whether there were
convenient rests in the piece where the page could be turned.)
A lot of piano music has 12 staves per page, occasionally 14, which doesn't
sound too dense to me, although that would to some extent depend on the nature
of the music, and especially the number of leger lines or other markings that
were above or below the staff. But that would surely have to be balanced
against the inconvenience of requiring an awkward page-turn that could be
avoided.
Another possibility might have been to have three pages joined together in
a row, so that you can unfold them and have all three visible on the music stand
at once.
>My own opinion is that composers and arrangers (of which I am one)
>should leave the engraving and printing details to the publisher, unless
>there are specific details which will directly impact the performance of
>the music.
As long as the notation is not actually wrong or misleading, I feel
composers should be allowed reasonable freedom about notation. Of course
inconsistencies or careless notation have to be edited, so it becomes a matter
of where you draw the line. I would agree that this can be difficult to
determine; but I at least would tend to draw the line closer to composer freedom
that some others would who have posted on this thread. My starting point would
be: "publishers should not tell composers how to write their own music"; and
then you would depart from that in cases where the composer's notation was
definitely deficient or confusing, or just obviously careless.
So, for example:
(a) The use or non-use of naturals in key-signature changes should (in my
opinion) be determined by the composer (especially if he or she definitely wants
a particular method), and not overridden by the engraver or publisher.
(b) Someone mentioned the use of unorthodox beaming (that is, not according to
the textbooks) to indicate articulation, and they were completely opposed to it.
Nevertheless, lots of composers have done this, and the results are often (to
me, at least) very clear to read. I don't think this should be overridden by a
publisher.
(c) [quoting from Daniel Dorff from here onwards:]
>Richard Wernick likes indicating a 5-beat note by putting a rhythmic dot
>*before and after* a whole note, and so on for smaller values,
I would definitely think this should be honoured. In fact, I once
experimented with using a dash after a note to indicate adding one quarter of
the note's value, instead of half, and feel that this would be far more readable
in quintuple time than using ties all the time. (I don't often use quintuple
time, so I never had to decide whether to continue using this regularly.)
Another innovation of this sort might consist of something to add half of
the value of an already dotted note, so that, for instance, you could have a
single note modified in this way to occupy the full duration of a 9/8 bar -
although I never got as far as inventing a symbol and *doing* it. (I'm
essentially somewhat conservative, and might consider such things, but have to
gird myself a bit to actually do them.)
(d)
>The kinds of things I'm talking
>about composers allowing us to standardize are conventions like slurs going
>over a whole tie rather than going just to the beginning of it, as some
>composers do in manuscript,
Maybe I could accept standardization of that - but maybe that's only
because the "correct" way on this is what I always do anyway. But as long as a
notational element is clearly deliberate and consistent, and according to the
composer's wishes, I am at least wary of having it compulsorily overridden.
(e)
>or carelessly spelling a phrase with sharps in
>one measure and the same music in flats in the next.
Probably this could be corrected, unless there's a reason for the change in
sharps and flats. For example, you might be modulating around the circle of
5ths, and an enharmonic change might be needed at some point; and in this case I
would probably accept the composer's choice of that point.
I noted before a hypothetical instance where sharp and flat notation for
the same note could be accepted (tremolos on G-Ab and A-G# in different parts).
But I suppose that isn't a "careless" misspelling - just an unusual one.
(f)
>... whether to use accidentals on every note including repeating pitches,
I commented earlier on how the exact meaning of "repeating pitches" could
be a bit fuzzy around the edges, no matter how you defined repeating pitches. I
would accept a composer's system of accidental usage, but the music would have
to be completely unambiguous.
(g)
>And then there's piano notation where many composers have varying ideas about
>how hand division should be shown on two staves,
I think the composer should be allowed his or her way on this. If there
was needless inconsistency on this, I might discuss it with the composer and
suggest changes, but don't feel it's something to be compulsorily overridden.
I'm a pianist, so I am familiar with the notation of piano music. I have
used different systems for indicating hand division, maybe even sometimes within
the same piece. I don't like clef changes that are easily avoided, so I
sometimes allow left-hand notes to go on the upper staff, or right-hand notes to
go on the lower one. Sometimes, though, I put notes on the staves strictly
according to which hands play them, even to the extent of beams crossing from
one staff to another and using leger lines in between the staves. But this
doesn't work well if there are more than about 3 leger lines or perhaps 4 at a
pinch. Different solutions seem to work best in different textures or styles.
If a particular passage was such that frequent clef changes couldn't be
avoided in one or both hands if notated on the conventional two staves, I would
sooner add a third or even fourth staff to the system than have the frequent
clef changes. I don't often have to do this, though.
I also don't like frequent changes between 8va and loco, because they
destroy the visual melodic shape of a part. Sometimes I have used a third staff
to accommodate parts (mainly very high) that range up and down a lot: the top
staff might be 8va or even 15ma, and the next one down normal treble, and I'd
spread the notes over these two staves in preference to starting and stopping
8va's all the time. Notating the right hand entirely in 8va or 15ma might be a
solution, including the lower notes which don't in themselves need it - but that
doesn't work if some left-hand notes have to be included on a treble staff.
In short, I work out the methods to use for dealing with very high notes,
hand distribution, and so on according to the needs of the particular passage.
There are many considerations to balance against each other, and I put a lot of
thought into it, and I would not be pleased at a publisher overriding this
simply for the sake of house style. The music is in my style - not the
publisher's style. I know best how to make the notation reflect my own
intentions.
(h)
>and to what extent pedalled notes should be
>shown through ties in following measures.
Again, the composer's choice should trump house style. I show pedalled
notes by tied notes for the full duration that I intend them to sound (at least
for the bass line, melody, and important inner parts), and I would not accept an
engraver overriding that against my wishes. This one would be quite important
to me, as it is a part of my whole approach to how to use notation to show my
intentions.
Some composers never use ties like this, and ties always indicate notes
that are to be manually held for their full sounding duration. (Pretty well
anyone before about Liszt or Debussy.) Lots of composers inconsistently use a
mixture of these two methods in the same passage of music. I don't like this
especially; but I would have to allow it, if I want the right to my own method
and want to remain consistent.
I've noticed that some composers have such a distinctive style of notation
that you can recognize their music at a glance without even studying it closely.
Composers of this sort I can think of offhand would be Debussy, Liszt, Ives,
Satie, Mompou, Grainger, and Sorabji - amongst others. Perhaps they do use
idiosyncrasies that are not normal, perhaps even "incorrect", and perhaps they
might violate many publishers' house styles, maybe sometimes basic textbook
rules too. I strongly feel that composers who do have such individual
notational styles should be allowed to keep them. Rarely is the departure from
orthodoxy enough to pose noticeable difficulties in reading the music, with one
possible exception I'll come to soon.
Whether these composers "should" do this is another matter, and I would not
presume to sit in judgement on this - even where, as is sometimes the case, the
idiosyncrasies are ones I don't especially agree with, and would not use.
That said, there might still be genuinely difficult instances where you
might want to remove idiosyncrasies for good reasons. For instance, to come to
the exception I just mentioned: in Sorabji's "Opus Clavicembalisticum", a long
and complex piano work, there are mannerisms which I at least do find to be real
obstacles to reading the music. (I don't find such mannerisms to be obstacles
in any of the other composers I named as having idiosyncratic notational
styles.) The mannerisms of Sorabji's include the following:
* Writing "I" or "II" with caret signs above or below them, and using these
like clefs at the beginning of a staff or in the middle of a staff, to indicate
1- or 2-octave transposition of the music up or down - instead of the normal
"8va", etc. signs with dotted lines extending forwards. This greatly increases
the already-huge mental load the player has to carry.
* The music is mostly written on 3 or 4 staves, sometimes even 5, and I think
this is entirely unnecessary for *some* systems (and entirely necessary for
others). Moreover, the distribution of the notes on these staves is erratic,
chaotic, and inconsistent, and just plain difficult to read. I think some notes
are just poked in on some staff wherever there happened to be room for them at
that point.
There may be other things in this score, too; but this at least gives an
idea of the idiosyncrasies that Sorabji uses which make this already very
difficult music even more difficult to read.
In spite of what I said before, this is one instance where, if I were a
publisher about to reprint this music, I would be at least tempted to re-edit
its notational style. But, in cases where a composer's notation is altered, I
would feel that any edition so modified should be labelled as "édited by
<whoever altered the notation>" (preferably with detailed annotations in the
back of the changes made), and not masquerade as the composer's original text.
The composer's original text is just that: the original text, as written.
It seems that some want to standardize notation to some universal norm, and
if those "some" happen to be publishers, they insist on that norm in the scores
they publish. While I can understand this from one point of view, I don't see
how universal standards that are any more than a particular house style can be
achieved while there are so many opinions on what practices are best. Who's
going to decide what the universal standards are going to be? And on what
grounds?
I suspect everyone who's commented on notation here recently would just
think that their own preference would be the best standard - including myself,
if I were to choose a standard. But I, for one, wouldn't like to see some kind
of "notation police" vetting all scores before they can be accepted for
publication.
Regards,
Michael Edwards.
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