Re: Add option to indicate frets by letters in tablature (issue164063)

[Ian Hulin]

Hi Carl,

Carl Sorensen wrote:

On Dec 6, 2009, at 7:18 PM, "Ian Hulin" <address@hidden> wrote:

  

Carl, Trevor,

You've discussed the overloading of 'string' in Scheme and what  
variable
name to use, and looked at Dana's suggestion of using 'course' but did
you consider the other important point Dana made?
    

I think so. That's why I suggested a list of (string or markup), which  
I think is completely general. At that point the user can select any  
glyph from any font available.

The possibility of adding the afm-type info that Dana talked about is  
a separate patch, because it applies to all markups.

Is there something else you were thinking of?
  

Well, yes, maybe Dana can explain this better, but it seems to me we may be in danger of perpetuating a sort of urban myth with regard to lettered tablatures.  

Fret 3 was lettered as ɣ, which was rendered in some contemporary engravings to look a bit like a fancy r, so some modern transcriptions of the tablature turn it into an r.  If we're going to re-render ɣ, why not do it as c, and keep the logical letter sequence. 

I know we want Lily to be flexible and render contemporary engraving as authentically as possible, but using the 'r' for fret 3 is as bogus as this example.  Titles like "Ye Olde Forge", is a misreading of the "Þe Olde Forge": Þ being a letter thorn standing in for Th.  The ornate blackface font letter Y looked a bit like Þ so it got substituted in some texts where early printers didn't have the Þ in their type-cases.

Cheers,

Ian

Thanks,

Carl

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