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Comment by robotmay | Hacker News Reader

I've actually just spent my afternoon writing out some music for the first time in about 15 years, so this is quite interesting.

However I must say that I just don't get it. Every example I look at appears significantly more complex than the standard notation, and harder to discern at a smaller size. One place I can see it really struggling is on copies. Music tutors spend a lot of their time copying music sheets, and I suspect this would be quite difficult to read on a low quality reproduction.

Standard notation has survived for hundreds of years. I'll be the first to admit it's not exactly easy to get your head around to begin with, but once you understand the rules it becomes apparent as to why it is the way it is.

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The embedded visual cue to the name of the note, plus the proportional sizing, seem really nice to me. The sharping, flatting, and lack of ascenders and descenders I'm not so sure about.

You also lose the "wall of black notes" warning you of deadly fast notes up ahead. ;)

To me, the visual cue of the name of the note is idiotic. VERY idiotic.

He choose to use the C, D, E... system that is not the norm (the norm, maybe not in US I guess, is Do, Re, Mi...)

And then create graphical representation of words starting with those letters.

Except this works only in english.

How a portuguese speaker for example would associate the dot thing with D or Re? It looks like neither, at most it looks like a dot (that in portuguese is "ponto", thus starts with a P)

Or the above and below? Below in portuguese is "abaixo", thus starting with a A, so you have to teach someone that A actually means B.

To me this new notation might make sense in english (maybe), but in other languages is even more arbitrary and silly (and tedious to hand-write)

>He choose to use the C, D, E... system that is not the norm (the norm, maybe not in US I guess, is Do, Re, Mi...)

A musician is usually able to use both. The A/B/C/D/E/F/G is used even in European notation, for chords and stuff.

>How a portuguese speaker for example would associate the dot thing with D or Re? It looks like neither, at most it looks like a dot (that in portuguese is "ponto", thus starts with a P)

He would either have to learn 7 words in English, that almost everybody in the planet under 30 already knows, or just learn the visual shapes, which are distinct and take about 10 minutes to memorize. It's not as if "Do, Re, Mi" means anything in Portuguese either.

The average US musician knows the C/D/E, and possibly moveable Do/Re/Mi (where Do is the tonic of whatever major key you're singing in).

The fixed Do system isn't even much covered in basic college-level music theory in the US (to my recollection); I doubt most performers will know much about it.

About asking the Portuguese musician to learn 7 English words, and switch from fixed Do to the C/D/E system... well, the problem is not that it's hugely difficult, but that it will seem like a foolish choice to music teachers. Who would teach this new system?

The benefits of the new system have to be huge and obvious if it's going to gain any ground, because the existing system is everywhere.

Tell a teacher that "here's a new system! Only a miniscule fraction of extant sheet music is available for you and your students, you'll have to re-write all of your teaching materials, and you'll have to force your students to learn the American C/D/E system with English-language-only mneumonics!"

It doesn't sound like a winning argument to me.

i took undergrad music theory classes at two american universities. they both used fixed-do solfege.

or just learn the visual shapes

Which is different from learning position on the staff, how?

Did you read TFA?

It's different in that the visual shapes stay constant in all "clefs" as well as up and down the pentagram.

So a D below middle C looks exactly the same like the D above middle C -- something which is not true for the regular notation, where you have to count the pentagram lines the note is in, or how many lines below or inside the pentagram.

So the new system retains the position-on-stuff and ADDS another visual cue for the same information (the shape of the note).

I did read TFA and... pentagram? Do you mean the staff/lines?

Adding more visual cues isn't necessarily a good thing. 'Counting lines' is what you get when you're a neophyte at reading music, and is chaff for the more experienced. And when you're playing a complex piece of music, you want to minimise visual clutter.

>I did read TFA and... pentagram? Do you mean the staff/lines?

Hah, yes, sorry. In my language it's called "pentagram" (which means "five lines" literally). For some reason I had the idea it was the same in english. Well, after all, other words like "harmony" and even "music" were borrowed in English as is ;-)

> C, D, E... system that is not the norm

For those studying music theory in the English-speaking world, A-G is the norm. (German has H as well.) That being said, I've only ever met musicians from the commonwealth... I will not comment on other languages and whether or not they use solfège since I've no experience in that area.

This was my thought as well. If you're going to create a symbol association language, why not just use the original symbols? You're just adding an extra layer of learning otherwise.

If it's because the symbols (ABCDEFG) aren't universally recognized, then you shouldn't be basing your language off of them in the first place.

These symbols are fussier than necessary, because they are trying to be cute about both the mapping to the alphabetic scale and slavishly sticking with circles.

What is required is a sequence of length seven (for convenience) that allows sharp/flat prefixes and time length suffixes. Circles are merely one option.

If written by hand, there will be ambiguities between C, Dot, Empty, and Full. I think a graphic design artist had too much fun with this project...

So, that's just the mnemonic for remembering the names, which is only marginally interesting, and which I already called out for being anglo-centric in another comment. What I like is how easy it makes to spot, say, an octave, at a glance.

The embedded name of the note seems to be the only thing this has going for it, and only in high-quality prints. I feel like the stems help me to distinguish where notes start and end, and the sharps and flats seem a little... small.

Also, properly typeset standard notation is proportional anyway.

Additionally beam groups convey a huge amount of information-- there's a reason, for example, that 6/8 is typically beamed in 2 groups of 3, whereas 3/4 is grouped in 3 groups of 2. Understanding the micro- and macro-pulse relationship make sight-reading much easier, in addition to subtly informing performance.

I've often thought that if there's space for something to be reformed in musical notation, it's the fact that different wind instruments are notated in different keys[1]. I realize there are historical reasons, but it just seems like such an artificial barrier between musicians in a modern band or orchestra.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transposing_instrument

It's a standard part of musical training to be able to read a part written in either concert pitch or in your instrument's pitch, or even to be able to transpose on sight into any key. It's not easy but learning to do so pays off when you're on a gig and the singer insists on playing Lush Life in B natural.

We can debate how large an obstacle it is, or whether learning to overcome it is valuable, but clearly it is there, even if it's just an annoyance. I just think it would be really nice for (e.g.) a clarinetist to be able to sub in on an alto sax part on sight without having to go the extra mental work of "Ah, right, up a perfect fourth --"

This is mildly annoying for composers, but it doesn't really matter for the players. They play the notes they see on the page. I suppose if they have perfect pitch it might be a bit jarring.

I play mainly clarinet (which is written Bb transposed), and the transposition thing is not a problem at all. It's the relative intervals that matter anyways. I don't feel it creates a barrier when communicating with others in the orchestra (we talk about concert pitch anyways), and not having to count five extra staff lines makes up for the small inconvenience.

This makes it much it much easier when switching between different instruments of the same family - a clarinetist (when playing any clarinet part) associates one note on the staff with one fingering. If all instruments were in C, the player would need to associate the same dot with multiple different fingerings, depending on the family member being played.

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