Iversen wrote:I do (or did) use key signatures with the clefs at the beginning of each line - there is in fact a sharp in the first piece, indicating that its basic tonality is e minor. But most composers would not write a sharp or flat again if a note was tied to the same note in the previous measure by a slur - I would write it as a help to the performer.
That's very helpful that you did this. if I read a slur over the measure, and the first measure it was a sharp (or flat), then I wouldn't know if the note in the second measure should be the sharp (or flat) or natural, so if the slur meant to continue the sharp, or meant legato.
Iversen wrote:Violas (Bratsch auf Deutsch) are normally notated with a C clef that points to the third line (but with a G clef for very high parts - like the violins). You can see the same clef in music for cellos and bassoons, but pointing at the second line from the top. If your were in the philosophical mood you could say that using different clefs also changes where you see a note with a certain pitch. The difference is that transposing parts also seemingly change the tonality of a piece (like when a piece in C major gets two sharps in the clarinet part).
This is interesting, I didn't think of the philosophical idea that using different clefs changes where you see a note with a certain pitch. The different keys have a different feeling for me, so some are freidnly, unfriednly, or some are rich, cold etc. I really like D major, and A flat major although I prefer to listen to sad or melancholic music, so the minor ones. I love the modulations major to minor as well, especially on the piano.
Iversen wrote: The reason that some instruments transpose is that they occurred in several sizes (clarinets today mostly are B flat, but sometimes A, and there are smaller clarinets in E flat). By using transposition the players could lull themselves into the illusion that they played instruments that all had the basic pitch C, and that meant that they only had to learn one set of fingerings, namely the one for an instrument in C. And who payed the price for this? The composers, conductors and those musicians who didn't have exactly the instrument which a composer had demanded.
Thanks for this explanation. I had thougth about this and didn't know why becasue transposing seems such a stressful and annoying thing.
Iversen wrote: The most silly transposition system is that used by hornists: when their parts are written with the G clef a standard horn in F transposes a quint downwards, but with an f clef it transposes a quart upwards. That''s bad enough, but add to that calamity that the valves only were invented in the 18. century so before that composers demanded a wealth of differently tuned instruments (or one instrument with a set of auxiliary tubes), but nowadays hornist almost always use a standard instrument in F - except for certain very high parts which they play on an in instrument i B flat -or an double instrument with a valve that changes the tuning from a low F to high B flat). So they have to transpose all the old parts with weird tunings in they heads while playing on a horn with the wrong tuning. The only sensible people in all this hoolabaloo are the tubaists - they also have tuned instruments, but their parts are always written at pitch. Hurray for the tuba! And of course for the trombonists too who have had smaller instruments (there are concerts by for instance Albrechtsberger for a cute little alto trombone), but they have never been tempted to claim they were transposing. They used the alto clef instead for this instrument (the one normally reserved for the viola parts).
Wow!! I've never seen the alto trombone before, it's very cute. It sounds sweet, if I didn't see it in the video, I woudl think that it's a different instrument, not a trombone. Maybe a cornet, but it's very soft. I mean if I listened without the picture. So there is another instrument than the viola with the alto clef, I didn't know that.
What I don't know about but think about is the quarter tones, and also music that isn't on the major / minor foundation, like mayeb the arabic music, which doesn't seem to have measures or keys or tones like the western music. Of course I know that wetsern musicians use quarter tones, like Schönberg etc and anyway, vibrato on the string instruments means that the note isn't exaclty the same pitch all the time, but tiny little bit lower and higher.
I am Jar-ptitsa and my Hawaiian name is ʻā ʻaia. Please correct my mistakes in all the languages. Thank you very much.
