Re: Autobeaming

[Hans Aberg]

On 30 Dec 2009, at 12:53, Reinhold Kainhofer wrote:

> Am Mittwoch, 30. Dezember 2009 12:27:25 schrieb David Kastrup:
> > Hans Aberg <address@hidden> writes:
> > > Take tuplets. If there are quintuplets, then it should be a 5'  
> > > unless
> > > specified as typically 2'+3' or 3'+2'.
> > >
> > > For sextuplets, there is a convention that the should be in 3, so
> > > there is an implicit rule 3'+3' - there should be no subbeaming of  
> > > the
> > > 3'. But a compose might want to change that.
> >
> > I am not sure I understand that.  Why use sextuplets when you could  
> > just
> > use triplets as 3'+3'?  I should think that sextuplets make most  
> > sense
> > when you need 2'+2'+2' as a rhythmic pattern.
>
> In several violin parts, sextuplets are real sextuplets without any
> subdividing. The beaming should also span all six notes in that case.

What I mentioned is from Hindemith, "Elementary training", p. 116 f,  
which I think is a CPP convention. He does not subbeam it as 3'+3'.

So I think it just reflects different way to notate. One may not use  
subbeaming to indicate subaccents. The notation is simply ambiguous,  
and it is left to the musician to interpret.

One may want to specify the subaccents by subbeaming. If that is the  
case, the not subbeamed sextuplet will be unambiguous, meaning no  
subaccents. But somehow it must be communicated that you are using  
this convention.

In order to capture this ambiguity, I want "+" to indicate subaccents,  
but it does not imply any specify relation between these subaccents,  
or say that there should be no other accents.

Take 9 = 4+2+3 as example (Bela Bartok use it). It means there should  
be two subaccents. This meter is BUlgarian, where it is often grouped  
as 9 = (2'+2')+(2'+3'). The way I describe it, this for is also a  
9=4+2+3 meter - it just has a refined specification or more accents.  
One can also write 9 = 2+2+2+3.

So strictly speaking, one deals with three types of numbers: those  
that do not specify subaccents, those that are "in one", and those  
that imply a subaccents.

  Hans