User:Basemetal/sandbox/Discussion1

Where can I find a table like this?
Do you now where I can find a table like this (hopefully better made) giving the spellings of all diatonic and chromatic tones in the commonly used major keys?

Thanks

Contact Basemetal here 21:28, 5 February 2014 (UTC)


 * I took a stab at the table.
 * Perhaps this would be part of the topic of scale degrees. There you will find shorter versions which feature only the diatonic functions and roman numerals. The problem with the above table may be that it is difficult to determine where to end. For example, why does the above table not include ♯3 and ♭4? Hyacinth (talk) 09:20, 9 February 2014 (UTC)


 * But are there such things as ♯3 and ♯7, ♭1 and ♭4? But are there such things as ♯3 and ♯7, ♭1 and ♭4 in major keys ? I don't think they exist. I don't think they exist in major keys . I don't think, for example, that E-sharp, B-sharp, F-flat and C-flat really exist as chromatic alterations in C major ? Have you ever seen lowered 4th and 1st degree or raised 3rd and 7th degree used in analysis? Have you ever seen lowered 4th and 1st degree or raised 3rd and 7th degree of major keys used in analysis? Contact Basemetal here 20:54, 9 February 2014 (UTC)


 * If I may intrude on this discussion: I don't know about analysis, but it is very difficult to see how he C♭ in the baritone voice at the beginning of Benjamin Britten's Canticle IV: Jorney of the Magi can be anything other than a ♭4 in G minor, resolving in bar 6 to the B♭ of a first-inversion tonic triad. Britten was extraordinarily skillful at discovering imaginative intervallic relations of this sort, and the first two notes in the piano accompaniment to this same piece supplies my favorite example of unambiguous diminished octaves, G♯2/ G♮3, resolving to A2/F♯3. (Furthermore, when the bass settles on this F♯, the chord above it includes a second diminished octave: it is a "doubly diminished-fifth ♭8" chord—that is to say, from the bass upward, F♯, A, C♭, E♭, F♮—a cousin of the "diminished dominant seventh" of jazz theory, and the diminished octave cannot plausibly be regarded as an enharmonically spelled because of its stable use in an arpeggio in the countertenor voice shortly afterward). It would not surprise me in the slightest if someone were to find examples of ♯3, ♯7, and ♭1 elsewhere in Britten's output, especially in the music he wrote after the Second String Quartet.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 23:14, 9 February 2014 (UTC)


 * In major keys? I was saying nothing of minor keys. I was questioning the existence of raised 3rd and 7th and lowered 4th and 1st in major keys . In any case the C-flat is given by the table as a lowered 2nd degree of B-flat major. So there should be no problem with C-flat as a chromatic tone in G minor. Contact Basemetal here 23:35, 9 February 2014 (UTC)
 * It would be less plausible to find a ♭4 in a major key, I'll grant you (since its natural progression is to the minor-third degree), but Britten's scores would still be the place I would start looking. Another likely composer is Peter Maxwell Davies. Of course, as soon as you have crossed over into 20th-century extended tonality, even the question of whether you are in the major or minor mode may be doubtful, which is why so many composers do not specify a key at all in the titles of their works.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 00:43, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Clearly the table is for clear cut cases. I was wondering where in WP someone could get simple information as to how to spell accidentals according to the key they're in. That's what I was asking Hyacinth about. Now when one doesn't know if one is in major or minor, if one doesn't have an unambiguously defined diatonic set to one's key, if the questions of spelling become complicated and/or ambiguous then of course such a table loses most of its point. Hyacinth questioned why I didn't include columns for ♯3, ♯7, ♭1 and ♭4. Responding, for clear cut cases, the only ones for which this table may be useful, I answered that those degrees do not exist. I still question that in clear and unambiguous C major you'd ever need to spell F as E-sharp, C as B-sharp, E as F-flat or B as C-flat and if that's the case then I think one is entitled to say ♯3, ♯7, ♭1 and ♭4 do not exist in major. If that's wrong and there are examples to the contrary in music from common practice period I'd like to know about them. 20th c. music was not the kind of music I thought this table was for. This said I enjoyed very much your observations regarding Britten's Journey of the Magi (and I went immediately to YouTube to listen to it again) so if you do have examples which do not fit in with my claim, even from non common practice music, even from 20th c. music, I'd be delighted to hear about them, but I would not say such examples immediately would invalidate my answer to Hyacinth. Now after the Journey I went to listen to the Death of Saint Narcissus and I discovered that when an Italian tenor sings it I can make out none of the words. Contact Basemetal here 01:46, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Although there is a certain danger here of making "clear-cut major key" depend on a definition that excludes any chromatic notes at all, I do take your point. There is an issue of where to draw the line, and of course theorists do not agree on things such as whether or not a piece of tonal music ought to be analyzed solely in one key, or if modulations may be considered to take place, and this has a direct bearing on your question. Modulations can always be invoked to explain the presence of this or that chromatic note (unless modulations are not deemed to exist), which only leaves the question of how far modulations may carry the tonality, and this is the nub of the problem. Handel and Haydn should present no problems, Schubert and Berlioz are probably still safe, and so on, until we reach more doubtful cases in the later 19th century, such as Wagner, or Puccini, or … Schoenberg?—so where do we finally draw the line? The classic distant-key conundrum dates back well before the Common Practice Era, and this is Adrian Willaert's compositional jest in response to a request to resolve a dispute about whether the whole tone can be divided into equal semitones: a setting of Horace's fifth epistle, "Quid non ebrietas", in which the final cadence results in the tenor coming to rest on 𝄫2 against 1 in the cantus. Of course, this piece isn't in a major key, either, but I think the principle is well illustrated by it.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 03:51, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
 * So now we even have to entertain 𝄫2:-) Whew! Doubly-lowered 2nd degree. It would show better what you and Willaert are proposing if we write the scale degrees in the order of the cycle of 5ths rather than like I did within the octave. So here:

II𝄫, VI𝄫, III♭, VII♭, IV♭, I♭, V♭, II♭, VI♭, III, VII, IV, I, V, II, VI,  III♯, VII♯, IV♯, I♯, V♯, II♯, VI♯, III, VII


 * These are the scale functions you'd have to accept exist if you accept a doubly-lowered 2nd degree and you insist both voices are in the same key/mode. Incidentally what signature does Willaert's tenor have and what signature his cantus? Contact <font style="color:blue;font-family:Courier-New;">Basemetal <font style="color:red;font-family:Courier-New;">here 05:11, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
 * The cycle of fifths is precisely the key here. Willaert compose the counterpoint in such a way as to force the tenor around the circle of fifths until it has traversed it twice. The signature of all four parts is one flat (transposed Dorian) but, by the time the end is reached, the tenor has been obliged progressively to add flats (descending cycle-of-fifths) until A has become A. The joke, of course, is that in order for the final octave to be true, the succession of flatting semitones must accumulate to the correct interval. Whether this is to be managed by using theoretical equal-tempered semitones, or by an ad hoc accumulation of various differently sized semitones is naturally up to the performers.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 05:34, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
 * It's always fun to converse with you. You almost always point to new directions (at least for me). The old Fleming is quite popular on YouTube. A search on his name returns something like 3000 results. There are dozens of videos of "Vecchie letrose" but none of "Quid non ebrietas". I had to be content with an 11 seconds sample of that 2 mins work at the Allmusic site :-( To see how remote (on the cycle of 5ths) the case you mention is, consider that if he had chosen to work in A-flat dorian (a not unreasonable 6 flats signature, or would it have been for that time?) then he would have had to use a B-triple-flat for his doubly-lowered 2nd degree. Speaking of which, there is a minute number of cases of very remote accidentals (C-double-flat, F-double-flat, B-triple-flat, E-triple-flat; E-double-sharp, B-double-sharp, F-triple-sharp, C-triple-sharp). Some of them are listed at Don Byrd's site. I wonder if you've ever looked at any such case. Maybe they are less remote than they look (if the sections where they are found use incomplete signatures because the composers did not want to use double-accidentals in the key signature) but still, they seem to be cases which would not be covered by my table. The earliest example I found in Don's list was a C-triple-sharp in a 1805 work by Antoine Reicha (to use his French name:-) <font style="color:#C0C0C0;font-family:Courier New;">Contact <font style="color:blue;font-family:Courier-New;">Basemetal <font style="color:red;font-family:Courier-New;">here 19:18, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Before about 1620, key signatures rarely if ever venture beyond two flats, and sharp signatures are unknown. This originates from the tone system of chant theory, where the gamut encompasses both the "round" and "square" B (that is, B-flat and B-natural). Especially in the fifth and sixth tones (Lydian and Hypolydian), where the "round" B occurs more often than the "square" one, a one-flat signature may occur. In addition, chants could be transposed—which meant up a fourth. This of course automatically adds a flat to the scale, and this is usually reflected by a one-flat signature—very rarely, in the case of the fifth and sixth tones, a two-flat signature. "Doubly transposed" chants were also possible, but this reaches the allowable limit of two-flat signatures. At this point, the system of musica ficta takes over, which means that all other necessary or desirable sharps and flats must either be written in as accidentals, or simply be provided by the performer, following well-established rules. ("Opposite transposition", for example, which means down a fourth instead of up, must be accomplished without the use of either signature or accidentals, because sharps are entirely outside the system of musica recta.) It is the system of ficta upon which Willaert relies for his little jest: strategically placed flats in the cantus oblige the tenor to follow suit, but the two parts are so constructed that the cantus can spring back to the naturals, while the tenor must keep on adding flats, until at the end the entire line is being performed a whole tone lower than notated. Of course when certain music theorists sing the final cadence, it will not come to rest on an in-tune octave but instead (because of their stubborn insistence on theoretical exactitude) on the badly out-of-tune augmented seventh. Willaert's position is clear: no composer or singer with an ounce of musical nouse would do such a foolish thing—theory be damned! I'm afraid I do not know of an online source for the score of "Quid non ebrietas", but the primary musicological treatment is Edward Lowinsky's 1956 article, "Adrian Willaert's Chromatic 'Duo' Re-examined," in the Tijdschrift voor Muziekwetenschap 18:1–36.
 * I was not previously aware of Rejcha's (to use the Czech spelling ;-) use of extreme accidentals, but it does not greatly surprise me, considering the metrical extravagance of some of his piano fugues. I have also not known about Don Byrd's website. Thank you for calling my attention to it.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 20:09, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
 * From the way you put it I take it you had no trouble finding Don Byrd's site. Incidentally, I don't know if you know, but Don Byrd was the designer of one of the first computer music typesetting programs. Moving from Don Byrd's "rooster" (which, coincidentally is a bird) to Willaert's "donkey" -- are you familiar with the French phrase du coq à l'âne? -- how do you pronounce "nouse"? Rhymes with ... ? (browse? blues? prose?). Regarding the "Quid non ebrietas" score: would this contain the score? Or is it just text? They won't let me look at it. Maybe you'll be luckier. To add a comedy note to all of this: you know that the movable do system has no syllables for degrees ♯3, ♯7, ♭1 and ♭4. The designers of that system were apparently of the opinion that you can at least ignore those remote functions for the purpose for which they had designed their system (just like I thought I could ignore them for my table for the reasons I gave above). Now some guy by the name of Kentaro Sato (this article he apparently wrote himself in 2006 -- eight years that article has been around! -- and it contains not one single reference to one single independant verifiable source, for which reason I've nominated that article for deletion), well our Sato thought that it was vital to have syllables for those tonal functions too so he added the "Sato System" to the article Solfege (granted not the best written in the whole of WP). I've deleted that insertion of the "Sato System" not because I did not agree with the necessity to have syllables for those degrees but because I have never heard of the "Sato System" and the only reference provided was his own website. The same Sato has a "Sato System" for orchestration and had added a link to his website to article Orchestration which I've also removed. Mercifully he did not try to actually inject a description of the "Sato System" for orchestration into that article. Now, has anyone ever heard of a composer called Kentaro Sato? The only data I got on Google was from the very WP autobiography Sato had managed to create in 2006 and expand little by little over the years (with never a shred of any reference to any source whatsoever). Did I miss something? Am I being unfair out of ignorance to one of the great young composers of the 21st century? <font style="color:#C0C0C0;font-family:Courier New;">Contact <font style="color:blue;font-family:Courier-New;">Basemetal <font style="color:red;font-family:Courier-New;">here 21:20, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
 * No problem finding Don Byrd's website, no. It is very entertaining, thanks again for bringing it to my attention. I was not familiar with the French idiom, either, so again, thanks.
 * "Nouse" (I have also seen it spelled "nowse") rhymes with "house". It comes from the Greek word νοῦς (rhymes with "loose"), which means "intellect" or "wit", but in English has more the sense of "know-how" or "wisdom born of experience" (as opposed to "book learning"). A similar colloquialism drawn from either French or Spanish is "savvy".
 * I don't seem able to access that article, either, but it appears to be a review (in Early Music Performer magazine, December 2010) of a new edition of the score, so it does not likely include that score. I'm not sure I like the suggestions, found in the sidebar to that page, for where I might find a copy: The top item in the list is the library of my local county jail!
 * I think I have only just heard of Kentaro Sato, though perhaps it was from his Wikip[edia article, or from one of his interventions on music-theory articles like the ones you mention. He certainly exists (to judge from a quick Google search, which does actually turn up a little beyond his Wikipedia article and Facebook entry) but, like so many composers in American academia, he seems to have succeeded very well in keeping his head below the parapet. I think you are right to question his notability on the strength (or, rather, weakness) of his biographical article, though I hope someone will prove your concerns are unfounded. Every composer deserves all the help he can get, though out-and-out self-promotion on Wikipedia is not the way to do it.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 00:33, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Hi Hyacinth. How are you doing? You had two noisy guests, didn't you? We've left. But I thought I'd stop by to see how you were enjoying the silence:) <font style="color:#C0C0C0;font-family:Courier New;">Contact <font style="color:blue;font-family:Courier-New;">Basemetal <font style="color:red;font-family:Courier-New;">here 17:42, 11 February 2014 (UTC)


 * After consideration I would say the chart above is not on Wikipedia because Wikipedia is not a handbook, and otherwise I'm doing okay. Hyacinth (talk) 09:32, 12 February 2014 (UTC)