On 19 Mar 2005, at 12:10 AM, Christopher Smith wrote:
I was ready to capitulate on the numbering-all-complete-measures issue, but this went over the edge. You can say
Measure numbers have NOTHING TO DO with the form.
all you like, but in standard even-numbered forms, especially when written in lead-sheet format, many jazz musicians depend on the measure numbers to orient themselves.
Do any of the tunes in The New Real Book series have any measure numbers at all?
Is it hard to orient yourself when playing from a lead sheet from one of those books?
Now, why is that? It's because the charts are laid out intelligently, with new sections beginning new systems, and proper use of double bars and rehearsal letters. Nobody minds the lack of measure numbers, because measure numbers don't actually do the work you are claiming they do. Or rather, they are only pressed into service for that purpose if the copyist did a lousy job with the layout and section markers (double bars, rehearsal letters).
I know you understand about aligning the phrases with the beginnings of systems for readability; this is exactly the same.
I disagree. The first -- aligning the beginnings of phrases with the beginnings of systems and marking them with double bars and rehearsal numbers/and or letters -- is absolutely standard practice, is instantly obvious at a glance, and is still useful in situations where you aren't shackled to cycling through a 32-bar AABA form.
Measure numbers just can't do that kind of work. They are not instantly visible at a glance (even when every measure is numbered) and they aren't reliable indicators of where you are in the form, precisely because even in the arrangement of a standard, you may -- or, working today, you almost certainly will be -- dealing with all kinds of extended or truncated phrases, introductions, interludes, interjections, etc.
Even if you have a chart that is absolutely slavishly literally 32-bar AABA all the way through, how many choruses does it take before the measure numbers cease to twig anything in the mind of a player? I'll accept that 1, 9, 17, and 25, but 73? 81? 113? Come on.
Yet, as Hiro said, if one is not composing in symmetrical phrases, it won't matter.
Again, I think it is an absolutely terrible idea to have one numbering system for pieces with symmetrical 8-bar phrases all the way through, and a different numbering system for pieces without.
- Darcy ----- [EMAIL PROTECTED] Brooklyn, NY
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