[Quoting Jan Nieuwenhuizen, on December 3 1998, 17:28, in "Re: Chord Transposit"]
> Would this be acceptable/good enough/convenient for entry?
>
> Convention/Standard Logical/Lily(?)
>
> C# cis
> Cb ces
> Cm/Cmin c3-
> Caug c5+
> Cdim c5-
> Cmaj7 c7
> C7 c7-
> Csus/Csus4 c4^3
Depends. If the goal is "I want to have a way to enter a chord to
Lily", the answer is yes. But when adding the (reasonable!)
requirement that it must bear some logic relation to current
conventions, this will not do.
For example: since durations of notes are always powers of two, Lily
could use c-2 for a 1/4, c-3 for a 1/8, etc. But instead it is
much better to use the more intuitive c4 and c8.
I think the same should be true for chord names. It should stick as
close as possible to current conventions. It is, however, perfectly
okay to support only one (or just very few) of the possible formats.
> C# cis
> Cb ces
No problem.
> Cm/Cmin c3-
If Cm is problematic, C- would be a good alternative.
> Caug c5+
If Caug is a problem, C+ would be a good alternative.
> Cdim c5-
If Cdim is a problem, C0 (zero) would be a good alternative.
> Cmaj7 c7
No way. Can we use C^ (since ^ looks a little like a delta)?
> C7 c7-
Only C7 is acceptable, I think.
> Csus/Csus4 c4^3
Not sure. I could live with c4 denoting a Csus4 and c2 denoting a
Csus2.
For additions: just use the number, and prepend a `+' or `-' if it
must be raised/lowered. Sometimes you see a `.' as a separator, e.g.
C6.9 (actually, it is a raised dot).
For exclusions: Can we use `!'? E.g. c11+7!5 c++9!1 (all hypothetical).
> > > Ah, i thought you had (example-) code that would produce the
> > > non-asciified chord name, as in things like "C\delta$^7$".
> >
> > It does produce things like "C\delta$^7$", but in PostScript, not
> > (La)TeX.
>
> That'll do, translating perl->c++ will be harder than PS->TeX, i guess.
I can isolate the code to parse the chord notations and decompose them
into a vector of notes, and the code to turn the vector into a
notation. Would that be useful?
> On my way home i bought:
>
> Harald Banter
> Akkord Lexikon
> Schott's S"ohne, Mainz 1982.
> ISBN 3-7957-2095-8
>
> [At first glance it seems a] Comprehensive overview of commonly used
> chords. Suggests (and uses) a unification for all different kinds
> of chord names.
Interesting. I seem to have lost my chords book, so I must reproduce
everything from memory. Fortunately, I have implemented quite a few
things in programs...
-- Johan
