On 11/29/2014 2:04 PM, Steve Parker wrote: > >> Also, as Chris says, parentheses make accidentals more difficult to read. > > The opposite of my experience. > When someone has brought some unknown Sondheim to an audition, there are > better things to do than to keep skipping back in the measure to see why the > Db I was about to play has an accidental on it. I register the parentheses as > a ‘check’. > >> I also think the "looking back" problem is overstated. > > Not from me. I find a big difference in reading one over the other. > I don’t play either wrong, but then I’m used to sight-reading all sorts of > flysh*t that no-one would ever recommend as good practice. >
That's how it works for me. I figure it is the musician's responsibility to know what key they are in and play accordingly. I don't need the cautionaries and I only put them (and one want to see them) in cases where a person (me) is likely to make a mistake. But the last thing any arranger should want to do is INDUCE a mistake when a mistake otherwise wasn't going to happen. Terrible practice, IMHO, to throw in cautionaries without parentheses. Inexcusable. If you are worried about clutter, leave the &^%^& things out altogether. If stuff is so atonal that there are accidentals everywhere, that's exactly what the keyless notation is for. Upgrade to 2014 and do the job properly. I should note that I occasionally play in a concert band or other settings where it is necessary to share a stand -- sometimes three players on a stand. I may not have a good enough look at the music to see exactly what is beside the note. If there is an accidental, then I will guess based on the context and be right > 95% of the time unless the engraver threw in a gratuitous accidental without parentheses. Even if I don't have a good look I can usually tell if there are parentheses. And likewise, when marking parts, if you have to write in your own cautionaries in order to not make a mistake, please write them ABOVE or BELOW the note so it is obvious it is a reminder and not a real accidental. And for those who say "it must be OK because nobody has every complained about it", well, I have never complained about it either, I just cuss under my breath at the writer, so I don't think it is safe to judge based on the feedback. It is my job to play the music as well as I can, even if the person doing the notation created a real mess. And by real mess, that certainly isn't limited to cautionary accidentals without parentheses. That is just a problem that is very easy to avoid. The bigger problems I see are very poorly written rhythms and lack of structural clues. _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [email protected] https://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale To unsubscribe from finale send a message to: [email protected]
