On Oct 21, 2006, at 11:35 AM, Noel Stoutenburg wrote:
Also, of consideration in choosing a typeface (font) for lyrics is what a typographer calls the "x-height". [...]
More generally, x-height is correlated to size/readability ratio in almost any context. Two of the most common default typefaces for viewing Web content -- Verdana and Georgia, commissioned by Microsoft and designed by Matthew Carter specifically for screen viewing -- were designed with a large x-height for that very reason. But since they're also designed wide, they aren't particularly well-suited for lyrics.
Since lyrics present a situation where readability is important and space is at a premium, a large x-height is definitely important. One of the reasons I don't like Times for lyrics is that its x-height, while not especially small, is not particularly large either.
One example of this is Arial / Helvetica, which are very similar in appearance.
There are also familiies that have the same name but are actually quite different; there are several different "Garamonds", for instance.
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