Representation and Manipulation of Music Documents in SceX

José Paulo Leal

Outline

Representation and Manipulation of Music Documents in SceX

José Paulo Leal

1993, Electronic Publishing - Origination, Dissemination and Design

Abstract

We present the ideas underlying Sc E X, a music typesetting system that we are developing at the University of Porto. The focus is on the languages used for representing music documents and on the graphic editor that provides a means for their preparation.

Figures (8)

Figure 1. Beginning of Mozart’s Sonata in C Major, KV 545 We now briefly present some of the features of SVL and SSL (see [9] for a complete de- scription). We take as an example the first two bars of Mozart’s Sonata in C Major, KV 545, fiir Anfanger (‘for beginners’ ; [10]) shown! in Figure 1. They are also the basis of the ‘sim- ple example’ given in sub-section 1.2 of [5].

Figure 3. Beginning of bar 30 of Fauré’s Prélude op. 103, 3 However, from a closer inspection of the context one might say that the doubled note belongs to a different voice, and therefore this is a case of semi-contrapuntal treatment of parts. The fact that bars in SVL may be omitted altogether (by using suitable numbers) makes it easy to have ‘intermittent’ voices for dealing with semi-contrapuntal treatments and also for contrapuntal music having sections with different numbers of voices (see an example of this below). > Note that a chord is denoted by a sequence of notes/rests between parentheses. The \stup and \stdn commands control the orientation of note stems (either up or down).

These situations are sometimes hardly distinguishable from one another. For instance, in the accompaniment line of Chopin’s Scherzo op. 31 [11] starting in bar 65, shown in Figure 2, we have the first d doubled. Figure 2. Lower staff of bar 65 of Chopin’s Scherzo in B minor, op. 31

Chords (with notes of different durations) seem also to be appropriate to deal with hold- ing of notes when the idea appears to be that of creating special sonority effects, as in the first notes of bar 1 of Brahms’s Intermezzo op. 117, 2, [13] in Figure 4. Figure 4. Beginning of Brahms’s Intermezzo op. 117, 2

Figure 5. Lower staff of bar 89 of Contrapunctus V of the Art of the Fugue A different kind of difficulty results from the need to assign symbols to each voice. Our first, maybe surprising, example is from Die Kunst der Fuge [14]. Figure 5 shows the lower staff of bar 89 of its Contrapunctus V.

Probably the more problematic cases appear in music for keyboard and result from th separation of notes between the two hands not being coincident with a separation betwee! oarts or voices. This is obvious in Figure 6 that shows bar 38 of Brahms’s Intermezz« yp. 117, 1 [13]. Figure 6. Bar 38 of Brahms’s Intermezzo op. 117, 1 The reinstatement of the first theme begins in this bar. In the beginning of the piece we can identify three parts: the main theme, an accompaniment line in octaves on the right hand, and another accompaniment line on the left hand. This leads to the use of three SV L voices. But in the reinstatement the main theme altemates between the two hands and the accom- paniment lines become fragmentary. The following is a quite satisfactory rendering of bar 38 in SVL. and for the tenor

Figure 7. Beginning of Brahms’s Intermezzo op. 118, 1

References (14)

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