Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Clairnote: An alternative music notation system

clairnote.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 176 posts

Re: Clairnote: An alternative music notation system

#31

Post by InitialLastName »

Jeff_Brown wrote: post #16
InitialLastName wrote: post #7

At a glance, this is a neat concept, but doesn't seem to come at the problem from the perspective of the most common users of music notation (experienced musicians); rather, it appears to have been written by somebody who was frustrated by trying to learn to read music. For experienced musicians, the priorities are a) legibility for sight-reading and transcription (which this system, with indistinguishable sitting/ha…

That does appear to be its origin. And if you take 12 equal divisions of the octave as a given, Clairnote seems more natural. OTOH once you're thinking in terms of a 7-tone subset, maybe traditional notation is more natural. (It certainly is to me, but I haven't given Clairnote a try.) Traditional notation uses the scale degree as the fundamental unit, whereas this uses the 12-edo chromatic tone as the fundamental un…

> I don't think the sitting/hanging notes are indistinguishable.

They aren't indistinguishable when rendered by a computer. When rendered by hand (where space notes have a tendency to float from the line to avoid being interpreted as line notes), the F and G especially would be indistinguishable.

Re: Clairnote: An alternative music notation system

#32

Post by chrismorgan »

InitialLastName wrote: post #7

At a glance, this is a neat concept, but doesn't seem to come at the problem from the perspective of the most common users of music notation (experienced musicians); rather, it appears to have been written by somebody who was frustrated by trying to learn to read music. For experienced musicians, the priorities are a) legibility for sight-reading and transcription (which this system, with indistinguishable sitting/ha…

I’ve gained that impression from every single alternative notation system that’s come up here (a new one comes up every year or two). They have a habit of solving problems that just aren’t problems for experienced readers, while causing problems for experienced readers. (They may also solve some real problems, but when they do, they always involve compromises. Inconsistent octave positioning on the staff is a problem, even if it becomes comparatively minor for fairly experienced readers, but the solution offered for that particular issue here looks lousy to me, the compromises made being considerably worse than the original problem.)

In this instance, I look at the subtle vertical placements alone and first guessed rendering imprecision, because I’ve seen that bad and worse from some digital scores, to say nothing of older scores especially with inconsistent ledger line spacing, especially when they’ve been scanned or reprinted or are otherwise aged. I also see something that my dad would struggle to distinguish visually except under fairly strong lighting. This notation looks terribly unsuitable if you don’t have (a) a high-precision, high-resolution display, (b) good lighting, and (c) good eyesight. And it certainly won’t scale down as well, nor is it in any way suitable for hand notation.

Re: Clairnote: An alternative music notation system

#34

Post by jef_leppard »

I’m a musician who can’t read music notation and found it hard to pick up when I’ve tried. I assume I’m the target demographic for this system. At first glance I can’t for the life of me understand why I’d put the time into learning this. For one, it doesn’t appear to make anything that I personally struggle with any simpler. For two, the entire point of learning to read music is to communicate with other musicians. If I am writing my ideas in some bespoke system that no one else knows, what’s the point?

Re: Clairnote: An alternative music notation system

#36

Post by Jeff_Brown »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #17
scrozier wrote: post #15

Interesting, well thought out, and well-presented. Just not sure that it solves a problem. It certainly isn't radically easier to learn than traditional notation. And despite other comments here, huge numbers of young people learn traditional notation all the time, with little stress. Maybe, as is true with spoken languages, it becomes harder to learn musical notation as we get older? All the "problems" that this not…

I mean, English isn't hard to learn if you grew up with it either, but it's still three languages in a trenchcoat with a ton of weird things. I mean, pronounce all of these words that have the same combinations of the letters "ough": though, through, rough, cough, thought, bough, plough, ought and borough. The notation is the same, but it's clearly not adequate to express the difference between pronunciation. If you…

> English [is] three languages in a trenchcoat

I love it.

Re: Clairnote: An alternative music notation system

#38

Post by Jeff_Brown »

dwringer wrote: post #30
Jeff_Brown wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That does appear to be its origin. And if you take 12 equal divisions of the octave as a given, Clairnote seems more natural. OTOH once you're thinking in terms of a 7-tone subset, maybe traditional notation is more natural. (It certainly is to me, but I haven't given Clairnote a try.) Traditional notation uses the scale degree as the fundamental unit, whereas this uses the 12-edo chromatic tone as the fundamental un…

I always thought one of the main benefits of a 7-tone subset is that it fits inside working memory. It's also what anyone who grew up with commercial pop music or western classical music has a natural ear for. Not to mention that even just looking at it harmonically, all 12 tones are most certainly not equal from a given root. AFAIU, historically 12-TET is really a compromise, sacrificing some harmonicity to simplify…

> AFAIU, historically 12-TET is really a compromise, sacrificing some harmonicity to simplify and enable having symmetrical 7-note tonality in any traditional mode starting from any point in any scale

It is. And it's a surprisingly lucky compromise. By some metrics 19-EDO, 22-EDO and 31-EDO dominate 12-EDO for traditional (5-limit) music theory. (And of course every multiple of 12 does.) But if you want strictly better thirds and fifths, the smallest EDO that qualifies is 41.

For anyone interested in big microtonal scales, there's a great website[1] that will render a touchscreen-friendly virtual keyboard with whatever scale and layout (provided it's hexagonal) you want. Don't worry about all the menus to start, just pick something from the first menu, "Tuning\Layout Quick Links".

[1] http://terpstrakeyboard.com/web-app/keys.htm

Re: Clairnote: An alternative music notation system

#39

Post by abecedarius »

> In traditional music notation notes an octave apart do not resemble each other.

This is what I'd emphasize. To sight read, the mapping from sign to note has to be so automatic it's unconscious. In standard notation this mapping looks different at every one of the middle four octaves, which nearly quadruples the size of the "multiplication table" you're installing in memory. Since your exposure in practice to the further ends of that range is less frequent, you're still slowed down by some notes even once the middle ones are automatic to you. (And there's probably some "cross talk" for a long time -- at least, that's how it felt to me.)

It's strange to me when people are like "eh, what's the big deal" about a UX failure that seems this big.

Re: Clairnote: An alternative music notation system

#40

Post by Toutouxc »

harry-wood wrote: post #35

Top search result for "alternative music notation" is https://www.dodekamusic.com which looks like it has the same ideas, plus a rectangular rhythm design which makes it all _look_ different at a glance (for better or worse)

What I like about Dodeka is not their notation, but the Dodeka keyboard.

I'm learning to play the piano now and the amount of stupid unnecessary complexity stemming from the fact that we've designed the keyboard to make playing in a single specific key easier and fuck everything else, is hurting my programmer brain.

That, and the fact that small-handed male players like me (and like 80 % of women) are gate-kept forever from a significant portion of music, just because.

It's a shame that our most versatile instrument is actually not that versatile. We could do better as a humanity.

Post reply on HN