On Jun 15, 2009, at 2:00 PM, Kieren MacMillan wrote:
Wol et al:
Let's take the notes C, Eb, F, Ab. Which chord is that? What's the
root?
You can easily go from the name to the notes, but not the other way
round.
We *could* parse it from the first note, i.e. in relative mode
<F C Eb Ab>
and
<Ab C, Eb F>
would display as the same chord (close harmony), but generate two
different chord names (e.g., Fmin7 and Ab6, respectively) based on
the first-chord-pitch-is-"root" system.
Not sure if it's enforceable, but it's one way of getting the cake
and eating it too. =)
Unless you want Ab6/Eb from < Eb Ab C F >. The problem here, of
course, is that human interpretation is much more flexible and is able
to take intent into account, whereas machine algorithms are challenged
by this sort of thing and typically fall short. Also, if the voicing
leaves out the 5th (common in jazz) then what does that do to the
ability to parse the chord into chord names?
How many users are wanting to write out chord entries by note ( <c e g
b>2 <b d fis a>2 <d fis a c>2 etc. ) into .ly files and have LilyPond
parse them into chord names above the staff? I don't do that- I am
just writing out Real Book-stye lead sheets and use the chord naming
method ( c2:maj7 b2:m7 d2:7 )- so I have no idea how usual this is.