Re: transpose, transposition, and relative

[David Raleigh Arnold]

On Thursday 03 February 2005 07:42 am, address@hidden 
wrote:
> address@hidden wrote:
> > address@hidden writes:
> > > So - can I respectfully suggest we have a big bug here - either
> > > in the manual or in the implementation of transposition. And imho
> > > the bug should be in the implementation - by changing the
> > > implementation
> >
> > Can I respectfully mention that I still don't understand what
> > you're trying to achieve?  What do you want to see in the notation,
> > what do you want to hear in MIDI, and what do you want to enter in
> > .ly ?
>
> Okay. I'll try and explain. But I think I've worked out what's going
> on, and why (not saying I agree with it, though).
>
> Transposition works the way it does because certain instruments (the
> Horn in particular) sometimes change pitch while playing. (Horns swap
> a crook, trumpets and clarinets swap instruments.) This, obviously,
> is a nightmare for lilypond if you're trying to output both a score
> and a soundtrack.
>
> I'm coming at it from a very different angle. I don't give a damn
> about MIDI, and I'm using lilypond as a music-typesetting program
> (which, indeed, I thought it was). And I play an instrument which, in
> a different way, is as unusual as the horn changing pitch half-way
> through a piece. Depending on the whim of the composer (well, not
> quite), music for me can be written in C or in Bb. When I'm looking
> at my .ly files, I can't say "that's the trombone, therefore those
> notes are concert pitch". When I saw the \transpose directive, I
> missed the bit about "midi only", and thought "great - I can enter
> the notes in Bb, and that will tell lilypond how to convert it to C".
>
> I *really* *don't* *want* to have half my music with a "\transpose bf
> c" directive in it, and the other half with "\transpose c bf" in it.
> The current option is to transpose all the Bb parts in my head as I
> enter them (or work out how to get that editor to do it for me). It'd
> be nice if lily could do it for me.
>
> So I'm coming at it from the point of view that "lily is a
> typesetter", I have multiple parts in multiple transpositions, and I
> really do not want the hassle of having to remember which parts are
> in which transpositions - I want everything internal to lily to be in
> C.
>
> Now bear in mind I'm a programmer by trade, and I missed the warning
> about "midi only" :-) It really seems inconsistent to me for
> \transposition to convert one form of output (sound) to concert
> pitch, while not converting the other (paper).
>
> Basically, the fly in the ointment is those damn instruments that
> change transposition mid-piece :-) Either we enter the notes
> transposed, and have hacks to cope with outputting midi at concert
> pitch, or we enter the notes at concert pitch, and have hacks to cope
> with outputting music as a playable part.
>
> Coupled with the fact that a concert-pitch score makes finding
> accidental misprints much easier (intentional double-entendre), I
> would much rather think in concert pitch, and transpose transposing
> instruments on output. I also think the current implementation of
> \transposition is inconsistent (yes I know - now I understand, I
> think the reasons are very sensible...)
>
> So. I understand the "why". I don't really think it's right, but the
> alternative is just as bad. Can we add a property that says "apply
> transposition to printed output" or "transpose notes according to
> transposition on input" (either implementation would work)? And where
> do I start looking if I want to encode this myself? Not having got to
> grips with lily internals properly yet, I'd be inclined to adjust
> notes by instrumentTransposition as the parser reads them, but I
> don't know how viable an approach that is.
>
> Cheers,
> Wol

What's missing is an editing tool.  Lilypond code would be required
to make something that did languages, etc., or a transposer would have 
been
written by now.

The simpler task of filling in missing chromatics on the basis of the
key signature has been done at least twice.  daveA

-- 
The only technical exercises for guitar which are worthy of the
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daveA         David Raleigh Arnold          dra..at..openguitar.com