Re: Customised key signature for mensural music

[Brian Barker]

At 17:16 10/08/2014 +0100, Phil Holmes wrote:
> From: "Brian Barker"
> Sent: Sunday, August 10, 2014 4:46 PM
> > At 12:20 10/08/2014 +0000, Phil Holmes wrote:
> > > A piece of music in the Musica Transalpina from 1597 in the F clef 
> > > in the key of F major has a key signature that has two B flats: 
> > > one in the normal position and one above the stave lines.  I know 
> > > how to do that, but it is also offset to the right, and with a 
> > > smaller flat sign.  Does anyone know how this could be done?
> >
> > Are those two facets significant and by design, or are they - as 
> > perhaps appears - simply unfortunate consequences of the way the 
> > original was printed? Do you need to reproduce them, that is? After 
> > all, you are not going to reproduce those disconnected and 
> > misaligned staff lines.
>
> I don't believe it's accidental: every "upper" flat is approximately 
> the same size and in the same place: eight of them on this song and 
> the same thing on quite a number of others.

I don't suggest any accident. All that would be true if it were 
simply a consequence of the printing technique: the two flats are 
surely on separate printing blocks and identical blocks would be used 
for each instance. I imagine the printer thinking each time "Wouldn't 
it be nice if I had a single block available with both flats the same 
size and vertically aligned? I wonder if at some point in the future 
that will become possible."

Brian Barker