At 2:30 PM -0700 6/21/04, Mark D Lew wrote:
Beaming is a tricky question. There is a strong tradition in the classical genre to use beaming to indicate syllabification. That is, two notes which are not sung on the same syllable must never be connected by a beam. This originates from the days when long melismas were common, and thus syllabic beaming made the music easier to read.
Actually it originates from the early 16th century printing of music from individual pieces of metal type, each of which had a section of the 5-line staff and a single note or rest. (This single-impression method was worked out by Pierre Attaignant and probably other Parisian printers, and was more efficient than the triple- and double-impression methods used earlier by Ottaviano Petrucci.) There was no way to beam notes together until the practice of engraving on copper plates came into use in, I believe, the 17th century.
Vocal music with no beaming is difficult to read at best, and almost impossible to sightread accurately. I have always used modern (i.e. instrumental) beaming for vocal scores, and I've never had a complaint about it.
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
