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Thanks for the info, Chris. That's what I thought too, so when btb wrote C# Bb G I understood that he was placing the C# on the bottom, which would mean that there was a BIG mistake in the score. Once he wrote it out vertically, I had to make certain that chords are read the way I thought.

Have you played both versions?

Yes, I did read the # sign as belonging to the B. What makes it hard to tell is that the two sharps touch each other. In a handwritten manuscript style store that would be a non-no. I've stared at the cross-hatches until I was cross-eyed.

John?

Yes, Chris is right. I was only commenting on the example btb posted in a general sense, that of moving voices (voice leading). In pulling out my score, which I worked on back in my college days, I see that I corrected the score in pencil at that time to what Chris said, that the correct notation should have been, G, Bb, & C#. The 3rd voice is decending chromatically.

Sorry for not catching that on my first post.

By the way, my reference score is the Edition Peters, #8800. It's not dated, but I purchased it used in 1960 and it originated from L. Spiegel & Sohn in Wiesbaden. I know that Peters has since rereleased the Lyrische Stuecke, and perhaps corrected some of the engraving errors. Also, other publishers "borrowed" the plates for printing national editions. btb's edition appears to be the original Peters.

Something to consider:

Anomaly #3 only applies to piano music, and the discrepancies between treble and bass clef only exist if you have to read both.

One of the powerful things about our current system of musical notation is that it can be applied to a very wide range of instruments.

Okay. I see now the three moving voices and can understand why it's written as is (copy mistake aside.) Thank you all for your responses--a bit surprised there were so many, even.

It is worth remembering that the piano came into the picture long after choral voices, strings, woodwind and brass had established their orchestral presence ... all of whom can work off a single stave ... it’s easy to read a single-note outline.

The pianoforte however got the short end of the stick ... having to read multi-note combinations simultaneously from two separate staves .

It was an interesting exercise, and I see I still have a few things to learn. These discussions are beneficial in so many ways.

originally posted by btb:

The choral singers have to read the grand staff, as a soprano I need to know what the tenors and basses are doing (and in addition, very often there is the piano/organ part on two staffs beneath it that you should put some attention to as well)

Different clefs is only a problem if you expect clefs to be fixed. The whole point with the clef is that once you know the clef you "solve" the pitch of every note on the sheet. The clef is there to make a reference and to get the notes wisely distributed on, or close to the five lines. It is natural that the cello needs the C located higher on the staff than the violin.

If you play the organ you might have to play with G-clef in right hand C-clef in left and F-clef with your feet...

And just to say, I heard "Troldtog" (Grieg 54 no 3) live played by Andsnes yesterday, so it's possible...

Ragnhild

This is a very good point, Ragnhild. And just to clarify, when you say "key" I take it you're referring to "clef" (as in G clef, C clef, F clef). Just so we don't have any misunderstandings
(I believe "key" and "clef" are the same word in some languages - correct me if I'm wrong)

Hi Currawong !

To explain my confusion

Key in Norweghian (to open the door) is "nøkkel".
We call the clefs F, G and C-nøkkel.

Key as in "G major" is in Norweagian "toneart" (might be translated with "note-family").

Thank you for noticing my confusion, I will go back to edit (just to make everybody wonder about yor comment )

This probably just proves that everything one has not learned yet is difficult

Ragnhild

How nice for Ragnhild to give a Norwegian flavour to the chat ... but what we were saying was that the orchestral voices (including choral)
have a less demanding sight-reading task than piano ... reading as they do, a succession of single notes off a single stave ... you neatly describe the need for each of the orchestral voices (in your case soprano) to be ever watchful on the grand stave of what the others are about ... to make sure that you don't miss your soprano cue.

But just a thought on the compact ability of notation to convey information ... without it we might have to labour a description of the music with

Grieg’s Opus 54/3 "March of the Dwarfs" is largely written with 8th notes (quavers) ... the others being dotted 1/4 notes ( crotchets) and 32nd notes (demisemiquaver) for the racy flourishes.

In the key of D minor the 8 key signature notes are D(1), E(2), F(3), G(4), A(5), Bb(6), C(7) and D(8)... (here's a verbal description of the content of measures 1 to 10)

m1: the LH starts a rhythmic alternation of notes D(1) and A(5) to allegro moderato tempo and carries steadily on to the end of m10 ... this observation enables attention to be focussed on the RH role.

m2: same as m1 ... ending with the RH entrance with a 5 note flourish (32nd notes) using the first 5 notes of the minor keynote signature
D, E, F, G, A.

m3-5 : the RH starts a chordal 8th note motif with a chromatic slide from the top keynote D to the edgy C# (B nat/E/C#) ... but with the lower two voices (D and F) remaining constant.

m6: the edgy C# (B nat/E/C#) chord repeats in 1/4 note format and picks up another 5 note flourish ... this time the top 5 notes of the key signature ... G, A, Bb, C, D.

m7-9: As with m3-5 a chordal chromatic slide from G with lower notes G and Bb remaining constant down to an edgy C# chord (E, A, C#).

m10: repeat of the edgy chord (1/4 note)

But if, in the broad light of day, we reluctantly admit to the 6 listed anomalies ... is there a better way to notate keyboard music to make the sight-reading an everyday skill like reading a newspaper?

Well, btb, I can tell you your posts are much harder to follow than the actual music

Keystring,

I'm finally getting what you said much earlier in this thread, Keystring: "Betty, writing about the notes being divided. It should have been obvious - "breve" "semibreve", "quarter" "half"
"hemi" "demi" ... everything speaks of fractions. Yet we do the opposite. We count forward. Sometimes we count the two eighth notes in a quarter, and mentally the quarter gets the value of 2. We count our measure to completion: 3/4 time 1 - 2 - 3 (done) 1 - 2 - 3 (done)."

Well, the truth is I've never considered counting the beats in a measure as "having them to spend" 4 - 3 - 2 - 1. The forward counting 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 I call "accumulative counting" like a cashier at the store totaling up your purchase. The other, "I have in my pocket to spend" idea - what would be advantages be?

I'm going to try both ways as explanations of "Music Math" - and see if there is anyone who is helped by this idea. Could it reinforce the precision of counting?

Of course, I use the Note Value Counting which does not assign a location within any of the measures as being beat 1, 2, 3, or 4. Along with eye movement training, and blue dots for steady beats in problem areas, and green coordination lines, and T? R? L?, I think I offer a lot of "tricks and tools" to the student to verify his counting ability.

I'll try to incorporate this as an alternative in my teaching. Would it be true that someone who values the use of money (equated here in the example to counting note values) would be more careful, maybe even exacting, compared to the impulsive shopper who doesn't think of it as spending money when using plastic. (No offense intended, people!)

Keystring, you have one very active and questioning mind - look at those neurons regrow from the use you place on them. Good thing according to neuropsychiatrist Dr. Daniel Amen, whom I heard on PBS last night, and immediately ordered his book "Change Your Brain, Change Your Life".

Regards!

Betty

I think, Betty, that my insight was more along the lines of ben ritmo which you offered in another thread. It is the same concept but perceived different - two perceptions co-existing and we are free to shuttle back and froth as the need arises. The measure is 4/4, there are four beats in it, and that means the whole measure is a package of four things, each of the four being a quarter of the whole. Well, in fact, counting while being aware of the rhythms of meter puts a new spin and adds extra life as well.

Oh, OK!

Yes, the shuttling back and forth happens in how I teach too, which ever makes the most sense at the time can be used.

I really "reinvented" it there then. But, I was excited to see it that way - amusing in a way - but also perhaps insightful - (btw, I do not mean inciteful). It certainly does not meet the standards of counting in the music world, but perhaps there is a golden nugget coming from it as the first beat being the 4 that is being subtracted from. Then, again, it may be totally without merit. For instance, would it work better for left hander-s as a declining balance?

Remember that headache and tiredness I mentioned, yawning? There is probably a good reason for it! Trying to understand paradigms and anomalies.

Betty

You teach them every day. Who used the word "ben ritmo" in the first place in the pursuit of a fast scale in the other thread, as well as in guiding me to approaching a piece a while back? That is a paradigm shift. In the scales thread you were saying: think ben ritmo. Do not think of the beats in the measure, but count each measure as one beat. Between the "do not" and the "but" there is a shift in perspective.

Cooke, with his pillars, is shifting perspectives.

If the thumb pivots under the hand, instead of the hand pivoting on the thumb, there's another. Yet it's the same thing. Does it make a difference?

Keystring is much happier scraping cat gut with a horse-hair bow ... adapting to the rhythms of the multi-noted piano are proving a taxing new field of endeavour ... thus the high-flying talk of paradigms ... but might as well try to catch a firefly.

It must be very difficult to belatedly barge into the world of the piano ... as a trained musician who understands all the niceties of non-keyboard
orchestral roles ... and, with a sharp analytical adult mind, bravely confronts the complicated lore of the old Johanna.

Hang in there keystring ... you’re in for a bumpy ride ... thank goodness we’ve got some patient folk like Betty around to help with "the beat".

For what it’s worth I’ve included a linear diagram showing the number of beats in a measure ... and indicating US and UK duration names.

web page

Thank you for the compliment, btb, but I am hardly a musician. Piano is my first, not second, instrument, which I learned self taught half a century ago along with an intriguing way of reading piano scores, since I could not read notes. I knew where to find the tonic, and radio music floating around the house provided the patterns the the child's ear.

I am returning to the piano after a 30 year absence, this time to play it properly. The instrument that hangs from one's chin is daunting. The piano can be played by anyone, but played well by only a few. Recently we have even see a cat play the piano.

Paradigm, dear btb, is nothing more than a shift in perspective. Instead of changing the notation you change the perspective and all becomes well. I h ave not yet found difficulty with any of the "difficult" music you have presented, because my childhood way of "reading" music almost pictorally along with a strong sense of sound kicks in. The modern digital mind has barely permeted my being, so I am not perplexed by what perplexes that mind. If I could glean the sense of a score at age 12 by seeing the patterns, and not knowing note names, should I not be able to do so now, when I do know the note names?

I appreciate your diagramatic representation of note values. It makes the fractional nature of the note apparent, which was the discovery of the day. As such, your digram, which looks different from the usual note tree representation, is, erm, a paradigm of a different order, nicely shifted.