Re: Figured Bass Improvements Potential Sponsorship of Improving this Feature.

[Mats Bengtsson]

Trent J wrote:
> Dear All,
>
> Currently I am thinking about sponsoring the improvement of the figured 
> bass system within LilyPond.
>
> The Main features that I am proposing are:
>
> 1: The alignment of the figures are calcuated from the top of the 
> figured group and spaced appropriately from the bottom of the note they 
> appear under. i.e. the figures will be placed dynamically from the bass 
> note rather than the current method of aligning along a baseline based 
> on the number of figures. Also the same facility to place the figures 
> above the continuo part and again dynamically spaced from the note to 
> avoid collisions.

If I understand you correctly, you could get exactly this using text
scripts. One of the main feature requests that initiated the current
support for figured bass was that the figures should be vertically
aligned.

I just looked at a number of scores I have at home and in modern
editions, I found examples of both schemes. In a Bärenreiter edition,
for example, they mostly used vertically aligned figures but with a
few exceptions. Same with Doblinger. Universal Edition and some others,
on the other hand, follow your proposal.

In my copies of original prints from 17th and 18th century, the figured
bass is always printed above the base line (but in contrast to modern
editions, they never included a realisation of the figured bass, which
can motivate the choice in modern editions to put the figures below the
base line). However, the main thing is that I didn't find any example
of original prints where the figures where vertically aligned. Just as
you propose, the vertical position is determined by the corresponding
note.

> 2: The introduction of spanner lines. These are used mainly in french 
> baroque music as well as some sacred music scores. They indicate the 
> prolongation of a figure or group of figures. e.g
>
> 6   --------------
>
> 4   --------------
>
> 2  ---------------
>
> or
>
> 6
>
> 4 -----------------
>
> 2
>
> indicating the entire group to be prolonged.
>
> or
>
> 6 ---------------
>
> 5 --------------3
>
> 2 -----------------
>
> indicating that the 6th and 2nd stay the same but the 5th moved to a 3rd.
>
> 3. Lastly that the figures are centred on the number with modifying 
> accidentals placed on either side. Also accidentals by themselves can be 
> used eg.
>
> #
>
> 5
>
> indicating a sharpened 3rd.
>
> If anyone else has ideas or wishes to contribute to the funding of this 
> feature please contact me at address@hidden 
> <mailto:address@hidden>.

One major deficiency, of course, is that we currently don't have font
support for slashed figures that were commonly used at least in late
17th and 18th century instead of the explicit sharps and flats.

    /Mats