RE: why Kieren is a \relative evangelist [was “Re: Nested transposition"]

[Mogens Lemvig Hansen]

I would like to forward another argument for the use of \relative.

I have used Lilypond for several years, but I am certainly not a professional musician or music typesetter.  The music I set is not overly complicated - usually up to five of six (vocal) voices on up to maybe six pages.  I seem unable to remember which octave is c' through c''.  Memorizing this is likely simpler than memorizing that the derivative of arctan(x) is 1/(1+x²), but while the latter to me is rock solid, the former is a fleeting breath.  Therefore I always end up taking a wild guess for the first note of my \relative; once that note has been corrected, the rest is mostly right.  Using \absolute would, for me, be a nightmare of wrong octaves.

 

Regards,

Mogens

 

From: Paul Scott
Sent: March 16, 2021 15:56
To: Kieren MacMillan
Cc: David Kastrup; lilypond-user@gnu.org
Subject: Re: why Kieren is a \relative evangelist [was “Re: Nested transposition"]

 

 

 

> 3. The *single* serious argument against absolute music — that it requires extra typing [of apostrophes and commas] — is essentially eliminated by using an IDE like Frescobaldi: using MIDI input means I avoid typing note code (including octavation symbols) almost entirely, and the transposition functions let me instantaneously re-octavate large sections of code if that’s ever required (which it basically never is). I believe we should be encouraging users to use tools like Frescobaldi — because I believe their coding lives would be made easier in *so* many ways — and the “crutch” of \relative means there’s less incentive to do so in the early stages of the learning curve (which is exactly when habits, good or bad, tend to be formed).

 

I am a copyist, not a composer.  I currently don’t have a MIDI keyboard. I enter everything through Emacs without a mouse for pitch, therefore haven’t considered tools like Frescobaldi so far.

I have been using \relative for many years and am aware of the problems.

 

Because of this discussion I have just started using \absolute for bass clef parts and I just noticed \fixed which I will start experimenting with.  Any other suggestions for my situation as described above? 

 

I will consider getting a small MIDI keyboard which would probably lead to experimenting with Frescobaldi.

 

Thanks for any other thoughts.

 

>

> Making other people’s (especially newbies’) lives easier *is* ultimately what I’m trying to do.

 

Agreed!

 

Paul