Swing Feel

[rrayner]

For those of you who are interested in this thread, I have added another example of the usage of the variations outlined in my first post on Swing Feel. See/hear the full version at: Yesterdays

My septet version of “Yesterdays” contains more of the attack/duration manipulation detailed in my initial post. I have added a sample with this post to illustrate the differences in the traditional ways of notating swing music, with my special swing manipulation last for you to hear the difference between the three examples. I have only included the horns and the bass for the examples. The first sample (A) is the “old” standard way of notating swing, i.e., the dotted eighth/sixteenth note pattern. The second example (B) is (to my ear) the closest you can get to notating swing feel, i.e., quarter/eighth note triplets. To my mind, this notation is a little harder to read as there is a little bit more ink on the paper (the bracketed 3). Notation Composer has the very nice feature that allows you to write this style of swing notation (called Standard Rhythm) and convert it to Swing Rhythm. This looks cleaner to the player, because the quarter/eighth note pairs are replaced with eighth notes, i.e., the conversion to Swing Rhythm for B would make it look like C -- a lot less cluttered. The score and the individual parts would have to instruct the players to perform the piece with a “swing feel”. This is the best of all possible worlds for writing and reading swing music, however, as discussed in my original post, the feel when Notation is playing the piece is not the way it would sound if a human swing band were playing it -- the dotted eighth/sixteenth notation is too herky-jerky and the quarter/eighth triplet notation is close, but not close enough to my ear. My goal in writing these swing pieces is to be able to play along with my Clavinova, which is “my band”, as I don’t have a local group of part-time musicians to play with. Therefore, I want “my band” to play as close to what this human will play. The best I can approximate this is heard in example C -- notated as described in my original post.

Admittedly, the differences are subtle -- the difference between A and B being the most noticeable, as A is a little bit choppier. The difference between B is C is a harder to hear, but I can feel it when I play along with the Clavinova. The bottom line is that it is personal taste.

Ralph Rayner

[dj]

And, it don't mean a thing if ain't got that . . . you know . . . what's that called?

[rrayner]

In the aftermath of my cleanup after completing Yesterdays, I thought I would try to extrapolate some of the new tricks Sherry taught me.

Specifically, Sherry and David showed me how to notate glissandi by having two staves for each instrument, one hidden which contains the written-out (and hard to read) glissando, and the other visible staff showing the clean, easy to read notation for printing (see the visible and hidden staves for the baritone sax in measures 1 through 4). I thought I would try to do the same thing with the turns in measures 56 and 57. It turns out (no pun intended) that the way we were taught to play turns at Berklee is not what Mark implemented in the Notation Software, and I assume Mark's implementation is the strict classical form.

The turns we were taught at Berklee sound like the way I notated them in measures 56 and 57. When I tried to implement the Notation turns (tu) in their stead, the resulting sound is not at all what I wanted to hear the horns playing, so I will stick with the way I had originally notated the turns.

See/listen to the attached sample of those two measures: the first two measures are the way I notated the turns; the second two measures have Notation performing the turns. I'm certain that the Notation implementation of turns is legitimate -- it just doesn't fit in a jazz/swing score. You can see the way Notation has handled the turns by using the qsor command. For some reason, Notation hides the eighth notes in measure 4 for the trumpet and tenor.

There may be some refinements that I can make to the Notation turns that could capture the sound I want, but that research will have to come at a later date. Of course, I can still use the visible/hidden staves to clean up the printed parts.

Ralph

[Sherry C]

Hi Ralph,

I'm no expert, but in referring to my little "Essential Dictionary of Music" by Alfred publishing, the Notation rendering of the Turn is "correct" (according to the Dictionary, anyway) while your notation is referred to as an "Inverted Mordent".

I know that even though we think of "standardized notation", sometimes there are still differences in definition of terms due to historical or genre differences. I think this is probably one of those instances

Thanks for pointing out the difference in this instance, and for the opportunity for me to learn a bit more in the process.

ttfn,
Sherry

[rrayner]

Hi Sherry,

I was dead certain that Mark's implementation of a turn would be "spot on".

Thanks for the revisit to my school days. The term "inverted mordent" does sound familiar, although I never could have identified it as such.

Maybe you could add it to the palette??

Ralph

[Sherry C]

Hi Ralph,

Actually mordents - both upward and downward - are already on the Ornaments palette (right after Turn and Delayed Turn).

ttfn,
Sherry

[dj]

Hi, guys:

An inverted mordent would, roughly translated, be an "upside down dying".

Jargon is weird, sometimes.

(It's so freaking cold here that I'm in a joking frame of mind, to try to generate warmth. Spent most of the day yesterday down in my well, trying to unfreeze things. We have water again.)

David