Re: Accidentals: Unwanted naturals

[Graham Percival]

On Fri, Aug 28, 2009 at 11:40:41PM -0700, Jonathan Wilkes wrote:
> 
> > Yes, but most novices with no knowledge of lilypond or music
> > theory won't be writing in 5 sharps or flats, double-sharps
> > or flats, or b/c e/f sharp/flats.
>
> These accidentals are common.  B-sharp crops up in jazz tunes, even in c 
> major, as a lower chromatic neighbor to c-sharp in a little tinkling 
> over an A7 chord.  If it's repeated within a measure, you don't have to 
> know any music theory at all to realize that b-sharp to c-sharp 
> is a lot easier to read than alternating natural- and sharp-signs in 
> front of what looks like a stationary note.
> 
> Using the black key/white key dichotomy makes other sharps/flats seem 
> more exotic than they are, which leads to poor notation when 
> unnecessarily avoiding them.

Actually, I thought that black keys would seem less exotic.  I
mean, even non-musicians can see that there's difference between
white notes and black notes, but fundamentally they're all
"notes".

-snip-

> Yes, I agree with the points you make.

I'm fine with changing the piano example, as long as the
replacement is almost as short and clear.  I think that the slight
blurring of "accidentals" and "black notes" is an allowable
falsehood, but if anybody can find a more accurate analogy,
without making it much longer, great!


> But after re-reading the LM I think it's pretty 
> clear on these issues, so that someone "making the switch" need only read 
> and reflect.

Sadly, that's the hardest thing to get people to do.  :(   The
best answer I've come up with is "make the docs as short and clear
as possible", so that people can immediately see how it affects
them, without them getting discouraged by the length.

Cheers,
- Graham