Re: Corrected: Beaming in LilyPond

[Andrew Bernard]

Hi Simon and Filip,

The Bach MS in question is a handwritten autograph - not an engraving. As I mentioned, engraving and handwriting are two quite different media. I think it's a category error to conflate the two.

This topic interests me because I work with a New Complexity School composer who is extremely attached to his self created music handwriting style, very idiosyncratic and individual, non standard, and different, that he developed over decades. When I first started working with him he demanded in no uncertain terms that I make lilypond emulate his handwriting down to the last detail. He had always refused to have his work engraved because nobody could do it in any other program. After two years of struggle, I finally convinced him that engraving is engraving and writing is writing, and what you lose in 'personality' you gain in clarity. Along the way, I did develop a big library of code to get closer to the appearance he wants, including our own custom font and so on. So we now have a compromise that I thin is clear and he thinks looks like his work.

The works published by JS Bach in his lifetime do not resemble his own handwriting. he had to write quickly and fast to meet deadlines. I am sure he understood copper engraving is a different medium altogether.

So I agree with you Simon, but its not one engraving style versus another, it's engraving versus handwriting.

I guess it's a bit like LilyJazz. Jazz people seem to want engraved scores to look like handwritten sheets done with a biro. But this always looks terribly 'faux' to me.

Andrew

On 6 April 2018 at 04:52, Simon Albrecht <address@hidden> wrote:

If you mimick the stem lengths and directions of the manuscript in LilyPond, your engraving will still differ from Bach’s manuscript in many ways. It’s a totally different style of engraving, which follows different rules.