Re: why recommend \relative to take a "c"?

[James Bailey]

On 15.12.2009, at 10:00, Mark Polesky wrote:

> In NR 1.1.1 "Writing pitches" -- Relative octave entry,
> "it is recommended that [startpitch] be an octave of c."
>
> Why?  Most of the time it won't even be the "startpitch".
> Perhaps "referencepitch" is more accurate, but what's wrong
> with "\relative fis"?  Doing "\relative c" when the first
> note is F-sharp is weird to me.  It's like when the
> orchestra tunes to A440 and then plays a symphony in E-flat.
>
> Is there some advantage that I'm overlooking?
>
> - Mark

That's really interesting. I always use the first pitch as my  
\relative pitch. It never even ocurred to me to not use it.