Hear, hear! I've sung in a specialized Renaissance choir for several years and I can testify that *not* reducing note values makes all of the difference! We need to see the original notation.
David W. Fenton wrote:
So, this all depends on your repertory and the audience for your edition. I would say that performers are better served by learning to cope than they are by having their modern expectations accomodated in older music. The difference in notation is a constant reminder that they aren't playing Brahms, and I think that's a good thing.
I comment:
There are two different audiences involved here, which both Barbara and David certainly recognize. One is early music specialists, for whom original notation carries information that is obscured in even the best modern editions. For these specialists, a facsimile may be better than a semi-modern edition, a suggestion that regularly turns up on the HarpsichordList.
The other audience is singers, players, and conductors who are NOT early music specialists, who do NOT read movable clefs, and who would panic at seeing individual vocal parts, especially without barlines. It is for them that modern editions, embodying all the knowledge the editor has but presenting it in a familiar form, are needed.
I have found that the most destructive change in modern editions is not the note values, but the imposition of barlines on music that was never meant to have them. In my practical editions for my college group, who are NOT early music specialists, I often take a compromise path. I lay out the individual parts in score, as they are used to seeing it, and I may or may not reduce the note values to help them. However, I delete the bar lines except for places that are logical starting places in rehearsal, leaving the bar numbering in place for ease of rehearsal. All notes that would be tied over barlines in a modern edition are shown at their true value, so as my singers get more experience they can start thinking horizontally instead of vertically. And of course I use modern clefs.
It works, and I do think that it gives a better picture of what the music is supposed to do and a better performance.
John
-- John & Susie Howell Virginia Tech Department of Music Blacksburg, Virginia, U.S.A. 24061-0240 Vox (540) 231-8411 Fax (540) 231-5034 Mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.music.vt.edu/faculty/howell/howell.html _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
