Graham and fellow Lilyponders:
I have been following the discussion of Graham's planned departure from
the Lilypond team and other recent discussions on the extent to
document code in style sheets and tweaks. I began using Lilypond in the
summer of 2007, after rejecting demo versions of the major commercial
notation software. It has been a rocky transition from pencil and paper
to digital notation. The output from version 2.11.35 is quite good and
much better than 2.10. I would like to contribute back to the Lilypond
community which has been very helpful to me, but, unfortunately, I
cannot *commit* at this time. This doesn't mean I cannot help, just
that I cannot commit. (The truth is, my life is in shambles financially
speaking --- no different than many other musicians?)
No offense to everyone who has worked on the documentation for
Lilypond, but the documentation is the weakest component of the
package. The index often lacks entries for my questions. The entries
more often than not, do not address my problems. The coded examples are
often "too clever" and don't illuminate my ignorance. Obviously
everyone wants to make the documentation equal to the programming. That
is why the GDP is underway.
Suggestion:
Collect a team of "Lilypond MUSIC Consultants." This could be the
general lilypond-user group or a subset. Volunteer members would agree
to answer questions. The GDP team should *not* spend time researching
answers to musical or notational questions IF they can find a "local
Lilypond user" who knows the answer. For instance, take the questions
below:
On Jan 6, 2008, at 2:58 AM, Graham Percival <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Concrete example? Well, there's "falls and doits" in Expressive
marks. I have no clue what these are. Something for jazz
singers? Saxophonists? Maybe they're used in Baroque notation?
Or a special mark for accordion players?
Is the current doc section acceptable? I have no clue. Judging
from the picture and the input, \bendAfter does *something*. But
I don't know what it's doing, nor what else the doc should say
here. Maybe people who use \bendAfter would also want a link to
the ancient notation articulations? Or the vocal "aligning
syllabels" ? I have no clue.
For example, f somebody writing the GDP had a question about falls or
doits, he (Graham in this case) could simply post to the "Lilypond
Consultant" list,
What is a fall?
What is a doit?
And, a user responds:
A fall is a downward glissando while decrescendoing from an initial
pitch to an indeterminate pitch below. There are long falls (gliss down
an octave) or short falls (gliss down a fourth). I primarily see them
in jazz notation.
A doit is an upward glissando of about a fifth from an initial pitch.
The notes fade as the pitch rises.
Falls and doits can be played (or faked) on most instruments not just
saxophones. I've never seen a fall or doit notated in baroque notation
(baroque notation is pretty lean).
In a few months, if GDP is still progressing, we'll be tackling NR
2 specific notation. These problems will be even worse then. I
honestly think that I've /never/ seen any classical guitar sheet
music. How am I supposed to supervise work on this section? I
can check submissions for accordance to the doc policy, but I
certainly can't judge the *contents* of those docs.
Now what about the poor GDP helper who gets assigned work on
Guitar music? I don't think that any of the current helpers play
guitar, so they'll have the same problems that I face.
(nothing personal against guitars... I know virtually nothing
about everything else in NR 2, including vocal music)
Many of the volunteers begin their emails saying "I know almost
nothing about music notation, but I'm willing to help if you think
I can without embarassing myself". I am completely baffled about
all these volunteers -- I mean, I'm incredibly happy about
them, but baffled nevertheless. Why do so many people want to
help after reading nothing more than the lilypond tutorial? And
conversely, why is it that nobody who actually *is* familiar with
music notation and lilypond volunteers?
Responding to Graham's public expression of ignorance, I will share my
own: I am completely baffled by Lilypond code at least half the time. I
don't understand Scheme. I don't get make-event. I don't understand
when I code
\once \override Score . RehearsalMark #'self-alignment-X = #-1
which should left justify the RehearsalMark to the time signature (I am
leaving out other code here), the rehearsal mark is *not* left aligned.
I finally shifted the rehearsal mark 7 spaces leftward until is was
properly aligned.
What I do know is various musical instruments, musical styles, and
musical notation:
piano
pipe organ
classical guitar
saxophone
clarinet
viola
accordion
recorder
trombone
tuba
voice
familiar with Renaissance, Baroque, Classical, Early Romantic, Jazz
(all styles), 20th century, and contemporary melodic music; unfamiliar
with Late Romantic, atonal, serial, or skitchy-doodle music (where the
bars stop and start, microtonal notes, wiggly lines "suggesting"
pitches, staves laid out in circles, spirals, crosses). I recognize
skitcy-doodle music when I see it, but I don't know what it means and I
couldn't notate it.
A general *alert* to the GDP team: music notation is NOT standardized.
Shock. Horrors. It's true, Virginia. For the past year, I have
consulted all the notational references listed in the Lilypond manual,
other old and current notational references, and scores of scores
(sorry!). Nothing is standardized. There is general agreement that the
notation should be legible and informative. The variations in notation
stem from region (Germany, England, USA, etc...), genre (classical,
folk, pop, etc....), intended use (general public, performance,
recording studio (and here jazz, classical, country ...), age (music
for kids is printed larger than for adults, instrument (percussionist
parts should be printed larger than standard parts because the
percussion often is farther from the music!). I am conflicted in regard
to notation. I want to keep the flexibility of Lilypond to tweak the
output to my needs. Yet, I want to introduce some consistency in output
to improve the quality of printed music for all the composers who don't
want to tweak their output. I think minimally this would require a
number of style sheet packages (like LaTeX packages) which (a) address
all the issues appropriate for the intended output (e.g. contemporary
conducting score style sheet; contemporary study score style sheet;
contemporary condensed score style sheet); and (b) at the same time,
make the issues user tweakable. For instance, you will read in
*numerous* works on music notation that Staff Size 5 is a certain
vertical height or such. Or that orchestral parts are printed on paper
of certain dimensions. None of this is true in the following sense:
I've measured many pieces of music (staff height, margins, paper) and
the dimensions are neither uniform nor standardized. Perhaps such
issues are not terribly critical, but I like to think that just as in
writing the music, the details are important, so too in the
presentation of the music.
I am sure there will be many interesting thoughts in regard to my
comments. I look forward to reading them.
Cheers,
Jeremiah
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