How to Write Music Part 4

41.--In transcribing from open score to short score, a single sound sung by two voices simultaneously beginning _and ending_ at the same time, should, if a whole note, be represented by two note-heads linked; if a half note or shorter note, by having two stems, one up and the other down:

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 29.]

42.--_Black_ notes, though of _different_ lengths, may have the same note-head if they _begin_ at the same time, the difference being shown in the hook or hooks:

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 30.]

But a whole note and a half note must have separate note-heads, since a stem would turn a whole note into a half note; and a whole note or half note and a quarter note must have separate note-heads, since a note cannot be white and black at the same time. In this case _the note-head of shorter duration must be written first_:

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 31.]

The rule is sometimes relaxed, and the longer note written first, when the shorter note is the first of a group.

Albeit a half note and an eighth, or other hooked note, may have the same note-head, _provided this be that of the half note_, because the hook shows that in one part the note is intended to be read as an eighth note. They cannot have an eighth note-head because there is nothing to distinguish the stem of a half note from that of a quarter:

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 32. S. h.e.l.ler.]

43.--Notes cannot have the same note-head which _begin_ at different times, even though they _end_ at the same time. This would involve writing one of them in the wrong part of the measure (see "Placing of Notes," par. 14).

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 33.]

Hence, as a dotted quarter is a sixteenth shorter than two dotted eighths and a sixteenth, and therefore the final note does not _begin_ at the same time (though it _ends_ at the same time) in the treble and alto parts of the last group of Fig. 16 (par. 35), the example is inaccurate. It should have been written thus:

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 34.]

and would be so played were the pa.s.sage given, say, to two violins.

[The tyro must not mistake the above two final note-heads, the _longer_ of which comes first, for a breach of the rule exemplified in Fig. 31 (par. 42), and which applies to two notes which _begin_ at the same time. Here the longer note begins _before_ the shorter one.]

44.--In part-music all the accidentals in an open score will have to be reproduced in short score. Each performer is only supposed to read his own part, and cannot be a.s.sumed to have seen an accidental in another part which, had it been seen, would have rendered one in his own unnecessary. Thus the sharps in Fig. 35

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 35.]

will remain in a transcription to short score,

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 36.]

if intended for part-singers or players. (A pianist or organist would not need the second sharp in each stave, while probably _preferring_ it as a recognition of the part-writing character of the music.)

45.--In music which is _not_ part-writing, the transcriber will have to use his discretion as to the repet.i.tion of accidentals which have already appeared in another "part" in the same measure. The guiding principle will be to avoid the likelihood of error on the part of a competent reader.

46.--Care must be taken to turn the stems of half notes and shorter notes according to the principles of short score, and not necessarily as they are in the open score.

Short Score to Open Score.

47.--Co-relatively, in transcribing from short score to open, it will occasionally be necessary to put accidentals in the latter which are not in the former. The commonest form of this is probably in extracting a single part, soprano, alto, tenor, or ba.s.s, from an ordinary short score hymn or chant book, and writing it in a part-book for the particular voice. Thus, in transcribing the tenor of the following extract from the hymn-tune "Heathlands" into a part-book, it would be necessary to insert a natural before the A.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 37.]

48.--Far more often, however, it is necessary to _omit_ naturals used to contradict an accidental occurring in a part which is not being copied.

Thus, in the following extract from the tune "Endless Alleluia," the natural in both the tenor and ba.s.s would be unnecessary were these parts written out separately from the other parts and each other.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 38.]

(The A sharp in the tenor of this extract suggests C sharp so strongly apart from the rest of the harmony, that the natural is almost a necessity even had the previous treble C sharp not been included. Not being required according to rule, however, it should be enclosed in brackets--a not infrequent, and very commendable, device with careful writers, when an accidental is desirable but not necessary according to rule.)

49.--The stems, of course, must be turned up or down according to their position above or below the middle line, and not as in the short score.

Extracting a Single Part.

50.--In copying out a single part from a score, full or short, care must be taken in abbreviating a number of measures' rest. The usual way of doing this is to write the number of measures over a single measure, thus:

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 39.]

But if a pause occurs in any of the other parts of the score this will not do. The number of bars before the pause must be counted, and the pause--or pauses--shown in the abbreviation as follows, a.s.suming it to occur in the thirteenth bar:

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 40.]

Accidentals.

51.--The necessity for inserting accidentals in a part-copy which may not appear in a short-score, has just been pointed out. Yet the musical Hercules is beset with a Charybdis as well as a Scylla. He may be drawn into the bad and very irritating modern habit of using accidentals which are not really called for. Accidentals where unnecessary are doubtless used with the object of making a.s.surance doubly sure. They have _precisely the reverse effect_, besides being uncomplimentary--to put it mildly--to the intelligence of the performer. Sharps, flats, and naturals which sometimes are _foreign_ to the signature, and sometimes _duplicate_ it, cause confusion where there was previously a.s.surance.

Bad enough at all times, they are, when one is transposing at sight, exasperating to the last degree.

An accidental is operative during the bar in which it occurs, and no further, unless it inflects the last note of a bar, and the next bar begins with the same note. It is so usual, however, to contradict an accidental in the bar _next_ to that in which it occurs, that this practice may almost be said to have become a rule, breach of which might cause uncertainty in all but the clearest cases. This is no justification for the absurd practice of some writers, of contradicting an inflection the next time the same note _un_-inflected occurs, _however far off this may be_!

As a rule, a natural should only be used where the sharp or flat to be cancelled would _not_ have to be repeated were the inflection intended to continue.