Re: Compound time signature style

[Hans Aberg]

> On 7 Nov 2014, at 10:08, David Kastrup <address@hidden> wrote:
> 
> Hans Aberg <address@hidden> writes:
> 
>>> On 6 Nov 2014, at 21:42, David Kastrup <address@hidden> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Hans Aberg <address@hidden> writes:
>> 
>>>> You wanted \compoundMeter to be numeric, so I gave a possible
>>>> algorithmic structure, reiterating discussions of the past on LilyPond
>>>> lists. Once one has that, the time signature derives from that, the
>>>> question you are asking about.
>>> 
>>> I guess I am just too far below the intelligence of your target audience
>>> to understand even a single sentence of what you are saying.
>>> 
>>> It seems like we need an interpreter between mathematician and engineer.
>>> Is there a physicist around?
>> 
>> Carl Sorensen worked on this stuff back in 2012, and implemented
>>  \set beatStructure = #'(4 3 4)
>> Before one had to write something like
>>  \set beatGrouping = #'(4 3 4)
>>  #(override-auto-beam-setting '(end * * 11 16) 4 16)
>>  #(override-auto-beam-setting '(end * * 11 16) 7 16)
>> 
>> The new beatStructure is simpler, but it fails capturing the hierarchy of 
>> subaccents.
>> 
>> So this is the question one ends up with when trying to implement
>> automated forms of compound meter time signatures.
> 
> The question was when to use 4/4 and when to use C in a time signature.
> This is not related to the accent structure of the music as much as it
> is to the century of its origin and the conventions used in its
> respective music field.  Math does not provide answers to the particular
> distinction this thread is about since the math behind C and 4/4 is
> quite the same.

The “+” notation I think is quite recent, possibly invented by Béla Bartók and 
Vinko Žganec for the description of Balkan meters. So the use of anything else 
than numerals is a modernity.