Rhythm notation idea: color for count vs. duration.

[Joseph Austin]

Hi all,
I've been exploring alternative notations for rhythm.
I'm focusing on indicating timing with a time-proportional staff, putting note-heads at the proper count position,
and using implicit stop at the next note instead of explicit duration indication.
That leaves note-head fill/color and stem graphics available to indicate other things.

In trying to sing syncopated music, I find it helpful to know whether the note occurs ON a count or BETWEEN counts,
e.g. assuming 8 1/8 notes to the measure, 1 3 5 7 (odd positions) are ON-count and 2 4 6 8 (even positions) are OFF.
[for 16/16ths I would double the ons and offs.]
So consider coloring the note-heads accordingly, say: black for 1 3 5 7, white for 2 4 6 8, "gray" for anything else.
(I don't recall seeing this proposed before, but at my age, that wouldn't be the first thing I've forgotten.)

With my oriented-triangle noteheads, I can even orient the "arrow" to the count, like a clock.
1 3 5 7 would be "up right down left" , and the whites could be oriented in 45 degree angles between.

Or until I change the font, I'd orient the white up right down left on counts 8 2 4 6,
treating the off-beat as anticipating (iamb) rather than following--what do y'all think of that?

I'm not sure what would be the best way to handle 3/4 and 6/8,
or more commonly, 4/4 "swing" re-notated as 12/8: 1 e & 2 e & 3 e & 4 e & as black gray white black gray white etc...
(where there's normally no "gray" except where the full count is a triplet)?

I haven't tried it yet, but it should be easy enough to do with my own software.
Finale probably wouldn't let me divorce color from timing.

I'd assume I could also do it with LilyPond, since Twinnote etc. use color separate from timing.

Joe Austin
DrTechDaddy.com

[Doug Keislar]

Joe,

Interesting suggestions.

Music notation is produced not only by computers but also by humans with
pencils, etc. Are you taking that into account, or are you designing a
notation system that is solely to be generated on a computer?

Doug

[Joseph Austin]

Doug,
Personally, I'm concerned with "reading" and "understanding,"
in the sense of being able to perform or analyze the music from a score,
which I think is better achieved with machine-printed (or displayed) scores.

So I'm focusing on ways to make printed scores easier to produce,
rather than on ways to make handwritten scores easier to read or write.

I suppose if any of these notations were to become popular,
people would develop a way of adapting them to writing by hand.

Joe

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[Music Integrated Solution]

On Mon, Mar 11, 2013 at 1:44 PM, Joseph Austin <drtec...@gmail.com> wrote:

> I suppose if any of these notations were to become popular,
> people would develop a way of adapting them to writing by hand.
>

Joe,
Your just-made prophecy has already been fulfilled, because the piano
roll notation “is already popular” and “already has a method” (at
least) of handwriting, what is to be seen is how relevant handwriting
would be having so many devices at hand.

Enrique.

[Music Integrated Solution]

In other words Joe, your logical predictions are not that far away,
after all what matters most is the Manual Transcription process and
not handwriting per se, we may transcribe music manually while still
aided by computers (devices), handwriting is just a form of MT, and
not that I don’t care about it but with a new era comes a new order of
priority, and I know that is part of our convergence zone.

Anyway TN is not a good model for MT but that is another story.

Enrique.

[Music Integrated Solution]

On Mon, Mar 11, 2013 at 10:44 AM, Joseph Austin <drtec...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi all,
> I've been exploring alternative notations for rhythm.

Joe, search for ‘space time’ notation, it seems to me you are also
working around it; if conversation stopped because I was not clear
enough, here it is a bit better, I guess…
http://musicintegratedsolution.blogspot.com/2013/03/closing-gap-between-piano-roll-notation.html


Enrique.

[Joseph Austin]

Enrique,

After a few readings, I think I understand your approach.
You're assuming each measure is divided into 3 or 4 counts (quarter notes)
and each of those can be conceptually divided into 12 smaller intervals,
so you can describe the timing of any count as a series of integers summing to 12.
Or, you can divide it with appropriate-length line segments,
using occasional numbers to clarify the length when it can't be accurately estimated visually.

This seems to work well for normal rhythms, but the real challenge is handling syncopation.
The RHN traces depict this quite well, with the traces crossing the bar and count lines.
But the numeric representation is a bit messier--the parentheses alert the reader to ties,
but if there is syncopation across several counts in a row--a common situation--one could lose track of the beat.

I seemed to have a similar problem just eliminating ties--even though the note-starts or IOIs are correct,
I think the performer also needs to understand how the note-starts relate to the fundamental beat.
A simple sequence of durations doesn't do that.
I suppose that's why TN breaks beams at counts and ties across count boundaries.
[One of my timing examples used full-count beams to represent counts but attached noteheads only at the start ticks.]

Now it may be that we perceive rhythms as a pattern of durations, and that works OK for solos,
but when you have two or more syncopated "duration patterns" progressing simultaneously, (e.g. left-hand right-hand parts,
or separate choir voices)
it seems to become more important to relate the note-starts to the beat than to the previous note in your part.

So I'm beginning to believe that "syncopation" is not actually a property of a single sequence of tones,
but it more analogous to a "chord", in that it relates to the simultaneous progression of two (or more) different timing sequences.

If that is true, syncopation could not be adequately represented by a "lead sheet" or any single sequence.

In practice, the melody is heard relative to a drum or bass track which keeps a steadier beat,
but not necessarily all evenly-spaced intervals.
That's why I think that TN is fundamentally challenged in representing contemporary rhythms.

In terms of your RHN, I suppose that could mean the "count lines" (the quarter-note intervals)
might not always be a quarter-note apart.

Joe Austin
DrTechDaddy.com

[Music Integrated Solution]

On Fri, Mar 15, 2013 at 6:32 PM, Joseph Austin <drtec...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Enrique,

>
>
> This seems to work well for normal rhythms, but the real challenge is handling syncopation.
> The RHN traces depict this quite well, with the traces crossing the bar and count lines.
> But the numeric representation is a bit messier--the parentheses alert the reader to ties,
> but if there is syncopation across several counts in a row--a common situation--one could lose track of the beat.
>

The example with IOI codes only is a method for description of rhythm
but not for notation; in notation I don’t use large numbers but
demarcation of beats and measures.

I think the bottom line of the post is that the RHN methods allow
improving the readability and manual form of notation as an expansion
(accretion) to a contemporary, natural and consolidated form of
notating music that represents musical notes with traces.

I consider some accretion is justified for that form of notation,
after all what most of all are doing is accreting a form of notation
while thinking we are proposing reform or providing an alternative; I
have come to believe:

“There is no such thing as reforming or providing an alternative to a
consolidated form of music notation, all we do is accreting it.”

Staff notation took centuries to be what it is now; I don’t think it
will take that long for this kind of trace notation that started in
the fifties.


Enrique.

[Joseph Austin]

Enrique,
Is time speeding up?

At the turn of the millennium, there were many lists offered of the most significant events of the second millennium;
the Gutenberg Moveable-Type Printing Press was always at the top or very near it.

When similar lists are made at the end of the next millennium,
I'll predict the whole suite of technologies we call computer-internet-world-wide-web
with be near the top of their lists.
(But I suspect we have not yet seen the crowning fruits of this evolution: true "artificial" intelligence.)

It seems to me that music is evolving to the point that "traditional notation" is no longer capable of keeping up.
IMHO, the most crucial limitation of TN is paper, that is, it is static, visual and spatial.
Music by nature is dynamic, aural and temporal.

In one sense, music itself is an information encoding, apparently used as a "language" by many species, particularly birds.
We can now preserve and reproduce music in the dynamic, aural, temporal dimensions,
so the static, visual, spatial representations will more and more become mere archaic "shadows" of reality.

If all the attention that is now placed on learning to "read" printed music
were instead re-directed toward training the ear and aural memory,
and performing from "memory" or even "imagination" (which professionals already do), wouldn't we be better off?

Is it unreasonable to suppose that, in the near future,
we could do a "Google Search" of the recorded repertoire of mankind's music
by playing or humming or whistling a tune instead of entering "notes"?
And do a thematic or harmonic or rhythmic analysis of that repertoire
by analyzing the encoded audio directly instead of through the medium of symbolic notation?

I think our efforts at "improving" notation will ultimately be more beneficial
for what they lead us to discover about the structure of music
than for any contribution to archiving or performing or instructing.

Joe Austin.

[Music Integrated Solution]

Once upon a time, reading and writing spoken languages was a privilege
of a few, the trend has been the continuous increment of literacy,
once everybody knows how to read we could see what is next, then we
don’t have to guess what will happens with music.

Regarding literacy, music is way behind most languages; I think the
natural process should be also to increase literacy to the level of
other languages, and that is still far away; we are probably in an
equivalent of Hamlet times, then a simpler concern will correlate
better,--- to accrete, or not to accrete, that is the question.


Enrique.

[Joseph Austin]

Enrique,
I hope I'm we're taking this forum too far afield of its purpose, but--

I'd say that even the "spoken" level of the music "language" is woefully under-developed.
Perhaps even less so now that in earlier times.

Have we perhaps elevated "literacy" to a level that it inhibits, rather than promotes,
the development of language fluency?

I think one could argue that that has happened in foreign language instruction,
at least in countries such as the United States.
We insist on "correct" grammar, and concentrate on reading and writing over speaking and listening.
But the process in ineffective. True foreign language fluency a rarity in my country, at least among "native" speakers.

Much of our music education treats music reading as an eye-hand coordination exercise,
rather than an aural exercise.
I'd say we should understand what we hear before we learn to read it,
and we should be able to turn our imagination into sound before we learn to write it.

I coud also point out that in earlier times "literacy" served a purpose of archiving and dissemination of knowledge
that is now largely fulfilled by electronic media.

That's not to say we should not continue to develop "written" notations,
but that we should not forget that we are ultimately notating sound patterns,
and only secondarily notating for instrumental mechanisms to produce sound patterns.

Consequently, we should be as diligent in enhancing our instruments
to make it easier to produce sounds people like to hear
as we are in enhancing our notations to make it easier to learn and play musical compositions.

Joe Austin

[Music Integrated Solution]

On Mon, Mar 18, 2013 at 10:41 AM, Joseph Austin <drtec...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Enrique,
> I hope I'm we're taking this forum too far afield of its purpose, but--
>

No, I don’t think we are. Understanding why in hundreds of years we
have not even accreted staff notation with the chromatic idea should
be an interest of everybody that engages in such task.

Probably we are not going to jump and burn stages, it make sense if
the natural process of accreting and pruning should improve diatonic
staff notation first.

However what I prefer naming as ‘trace notation’ is a much more recent
and less elaborated form of notation, which is usually credited to
composer Earle Brown in the form of space-time notation and he
probably could be a sort of Guido of our times.

While ‘staff notation’ has centuries, ‘trace notation’ has decades and
has already replaced (or is preferred) staff notation for some
purposes; I bet in a few decades it will play a more important roll,
whether with the accretion proposed by the RHN or another one, but it
certainly is in an early stage and has some more to offer.


Enrique.

[Music Integrated Solution]

On Mon, Mar 11, 2013 at 10:44 AM, Joseph Austin <drtec...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi all,
> I've been exploring alternative notations for rhythm.

Joe, regarding your explorations I think there are two basic methods
for the notation of pitch and time, (1) symbolic notation and (2)
spatial notation, which allow variants and combination; out of them we
have two distinctive form of notating music in common use, which are
TN (staff-notation) and PRN (trace-notation) that may continue to
evolve but I do not envision another distinctive form of notation in
common use in the future, at least until I see a reason why.

The idea of representing musical notes with traces (or bars, stripes
?) is perhaps the most important innovation in music notation after
staff notation, its implementation was de facto in early computers,
and it had been previously used by composers.

My intention is to create awareness that the proportional or spatial
notation of time is a different idea which may also be used on staff
notation or other music notation methods, however many people perceive
trace notation bound to spatial notation.

The RHN is bound to trace-notation but not to the spatial notation of
time though they are not incompatibles.
The flexibility of detaching from the spatial notation of time when
necessary expands the scope of trace-notion and could make it play a
more important role in the future.

I have been deliberately using the word ‘trace’, any better suggestion?


Enrique.

[Music Integrated Solution]

Looking back at some scores it seems that the representation of
defined musical notes with traces as a music notation system was not
exactly the idea of Brown or other composers in the fifties because
they used the lines as extenders rather as a form of time notation
usually of undefined musical notes.

Then probably the use of traces (bars) representing defined musical
notes in a music notation system was done for the first time in early
80’s, given that the use of punched paper rolls for piano players was
not intended or used as a music notation system. (?)

What makes what I intend to call trace-notation a more recent event in
a very early stage and the RHN probably the first improvement over the
idea, but I still believe trace-notation could be a milestone in music
notation whoever its Guido was.

Enrique.