What's the standard rest for a whole measure in 6/1 (2 groups of 3 whole notes)? And for a half measure (3 whole notes)? Centered or not? This is early 17th century stuff (and I don't want to halve the values, but I assume the question would be the same with 6/2).
Ross doesn't answer these questions.
(I'm afraid Robert already answered them, though, but I can't manage to find this in my files. Apologies.)
Dear Dennis,
As you know, by the early 17th century what we call bar lines were becoming more common. However, in some music, they were used more to show larger divisions, not what we think of as measures. If I were transcribing music of this kind as a performing edition, I would probably reduce the values by half. If I wanted to keep the note values, I would use two or three bar lines for a 6/1 section depending on the apparent beat arrangement (perhaps using dotted bar lines for the ones I added). However, if you want to keep the bar lines where they were originally, I would suggest using two dotted double whole rests if the bar would be conducted in 2 or three double whole rests if the bar would be conducted in 3. Since you speak of half measures, the division is probably in 2. I would suggest one dotted double whole rest for a half bar, not centered.
I have seen some editions of instrumental works such as canzonas that use the ordinary whole rest when the meter is 4/4 or 2/4, then continue using the ordinary whole rest in 3/2 sections, assuming that the whole rest in any sized empty bar means "whole," not just 4 quarters' worth. This is really confusing. I know that some people don't like dots on rests, but there are times when it's the only logical way to go. There are others who use the "whole" rest only for 4 quarters' worth and insist on using smaller rests for empty bars in 3/4, 3/8, etc. However, I can see the logic in using a combination of rests to show the beat division in asymmetric meters (5/4, 7/8, 3+2+3/8, etc.) for a few bars to alert the performers to the unequal divisions.
My $0.02 worth.
Hal -- Harold Owen 2830 Emerald St., Eugene, OR 97403 mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Visit my web site at: http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~hjowen FAX: (509) 461-3608 _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
