Re: subdivideBeams broken?

[Hans Aberg]

On 22 Jun 2009, at 00:25, Mark Polesky wrote:

> > By default, beatLength is the numerator of the time signature.
>
> Don't you mean denominator? I would call the numerator beatCount
> or something. Haven't followed this thread, just wanted to make
> sure a misunderstanding wasn't being propagated.

This is a typo he made. But strictly speaking, the are not numerators  
and denominators of a ratio. The time signature
  p
  q
is a shorthand for the time duration 1/q taken p times. In Hindemith's  
book, he does not seem to write these as ratios, not even inline. Carl  
Orff therefore introduced that notation of a number and a note for the  
duration, though with a slash between them, written above the staff  
lines (in his handwritten scores). This is a bit logical, since the  
time signature 6 over 8 does reduce to 3 over 4, as they imply  
different metric accentuation. But in the past, there are examples  
where this has not been adhered to strictly.

  Hans