[MEI-L] [Extreme] non-standard key sigs

[Roland, Perry D. (pdr4h)]

Don,

My apologies.  I misread section the section labeled "Extreme accidentals and key signature".  In my haste to locate any examples, I understood section 3a. to apply to key signatures.  So, as I was saying ... :-)

Key signatures containing double flats and sharps appear to be "as rare as hen's teeth", as my grandma used to say.  So, MEI need not take them into consideration -- as "logical" key signatures.  What I mean is that once you've gone around the circle of fifths past 7 flats or sharps, it becomes easier to represent the key / tonal center enharmonically.  Of course, Ted is right -- the "circle" of fifths is really a spiral, but thinking of it as a circle is an assumption that simplifies a great many things.  I guess one can write enough double or triple flats, for example, to get to the key of G major, but it's easier/better for both the composer and the performer to switch to 1 sharp in order to capture tonality.

Even so,  one can encode these key signatures *visually* using <keySig>.  Perhaps this is a better example the one I gave before illustrating key and key signature "confusion/ambiguity/contradiction" -- <keySig> says one thing while @key.sig (@key.fifths if the name gets changed) says another.

Yes, Ted was in attendance at Dagstuhl.

--
p.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Byrd, Donald A. [mailto:donbyrd at indiana.edu]
> Sent: Saturday, September 06, 2014 2:39 PM
> To: Music Encoding Initiative; Roland, Perry D. (pdr4h)
> Subject: Re: [MEI-L] [Extreme] non-standard key sigs
> 
> Perry, you say, w/r/t double flats or sharps in key signatures, "The
> examples provided by Don
> (http://www.informatics.indiana.edu/donbyrd/CMNExtremesBody.htm#pitc
> h)
> may be the only ones, I don't know." Actually, I don't give any
> examples _in key signatures_ there. But reading it a rang a bell, and I
> discovered this in a 2009 file of material for my Extremes list:
> 
> ---- BEGIN ----
> Key signatures of up to one triple-flat + six double-flats = 15 normal
> flats (!) appear in Dumitrescu (2007), pp. 141-170. However, it's not
> clear this qualifies as CMN. (contributed by Hook, who comments: "This
> is a modern realization of a 16th-century motet. The original
> manuscript was written in a circle. The author doing the reconstruction
> argues that the proper way to perform it requires adding flats at each
> repetition, and this is where that brings us by the third page.")
> 
> Dumitrescu, Theodor (2007). Constructing a Canonic Pitch Spiral: The
> Case of  _Salve Radix_. In _Canons and Canonic Techniques, 14th-16th
> Centuries_, ed. Kateligne Schiltz and Bonnie J. Blackburn (Leuven:
> Peeters), pp. 141-170.
> ---- END ----
> 
> I'll add it to the Extremes webpage. But I'm not sure how seriously MEI
> should take it! ...Say, don't we know Ted Dumitrescu from Dagstuhl??
> 
> --DAB
> 
> 
> On Fri, 5 Sep 2014 21:55:59 +0000, "Roland, Perry D. (pdr4h)"
> <pdr4h at eservices.virginia.edu> wrote:
> >> [---- SNIP ----]
> >> Since <keyAccid> allows encoding any of the accidentals in
> >> data.ACCIDENTALS.EXPLICIT, it seems we can already strike a nice balance
> >> between ease and properness by understanding <keySig> as an
> indication
> >> of visual appearance. In this situation, @key.sig and @key.sig.mixed
> >> would help determine the pitch class of following notes, and <keySig>
> >> would determine the written appearance of the key signature.
> >>
> >> Notably, this solution doesn't account for logical key signatures with
> >> double accidentals.
> >
> > Neither Read nor Gould explicitly address the possibility of key
> > signatures requiring double flats or sharps.  Gould (p. 94) writes,
> > "[a]ny *sharp or flat* may be selected as a key signature to alter
> > all octaves of the selected pitches".  Her list doesn't include
> > double flats or sharps. Read (p. 140) says double flats and sharps
> > must be written wherever they're needed, implying that they are not
> > to be included in the key signature.  Likewise, Stone's Music
> > Notation in the Twentieth Century doesn't include any examples of
> > double flats or sharps in key signatures.  The examples provide by
> > Don
> >
> (http://www.informatics.indiana.edu/donbyrd/CMNExtremesBody.htm#pitc
> h) may
> > be the only ones, I don't know.  In any case, as evidenced by Gould
> > and Read's statements, such key signatures stretch the limits of what
> > a "logical" key signature is to the breaking point.  Currently, they
> > can be encoded using keySig/keyAccid, but not @key.sig -- we may just
> > have to live with this limitation for a!
> >  while.
> >
> >> I'm sure there's something else I'm missing too!
> >
> > We must be missing the same thing.  :-)
> >
> > --
> > p.
> >
> >>
> >>
> >> Christopher
> >>
> >> On 09/05/2014 02:49 PM, Roland, Perry D. (pdr4h) wrote:
> >> >
> >> > Comments below--
> >> >
> >> > --
> >> > p.
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >>
> >>
> >
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> >
> 
> 
> --
> Donald Byrd
> Woodrow Wilson Indiana Teaching Fellow
> Adjunct Associate Professor of Informatics
> Visiting Scientist, Research Technologies
> Indiana University Bloomington