[tablatures] Baroque lute tablature

["Trevor Daniels" <t.daniels@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Carl et al

I was inspired by the appearance of the Baroque lute tablature
produced by Fronimo and the interest shown in adding this capability
to LilyPond by several users, including Dana Emery, Laura Conrad,
Marc Hohl and others recently.  I've been considering how this
functionality might be added to LilyPond.  As a reminder, examples
of this tablature can be seen at 
http://www.mateus-lutes.com/tablature/.

I've attached a pdf showing what can be achieved by modifying the
input stream to insert markups to render the durations above the
tab context and the bass courses below the tab context, but 
otherwise
using just standard LilyPond input syntax, as shown below.  This is
the first two systems from the mateus-lutes site referenced above.

The Scheme for doing this is rather messy - it was just a lash-up
to see what was possible by applying a function to the input 
stream -
but as this is not the way it should be implemented I'm not 
attaching
it.

Here's what I've learned:

a) Most of the glyphs needed to output Baroque lute tablature
would need to be designed.  The glyphs used for the fret indications
and bass courses I 'borrowed' from the Fronimo site - these would 
need
to be redesigned for LilyPond as the Fronimmo licence does not 
permit
commercial use.  The glyphs used for the durations are taken from 
the
standard LilyPond font set, but are not so beautiful as the Fronimo
durations; they could with advantage be redesigned but are OK for a
starter.  There are also a few more glyphs like the section 
separator
and end-of-piece indicator that would need to be designed.

b) Markups above and below a standard tab seems quite satisfactory
to indicate durations and bass courses, and are easy to implement.

c) Right hand fingerings and string indications can be easily 
rendered
in Baroque style, although the precise placement of the right hand
fingerings will need more control.

d) I haven't yet looked into adding the decorations (the comma, the
small curve and line under notes) mainly because I'm not sure what
they represent musically.

e) But the big lesson is that transcribing from tab to tab via
notemode is totally impractical.  I and many lutenists do not
know what pitch a particular fingering generates.  A tabmode entry
form will be essential.  This has some obvious difficulties,
the main one being the lack of information about how accidentals
should be represented when outputted in a standard staff.  Not
sure what to do about this.

OK, I've rambled on long enough.  What I want to know is whether
I should continue with this.  I'm confident we can produce 
acceptable
output from standard notemode input, but I'm equally confident
this would be of little use to lutenists without tabmode input.
I'm also confident tabmode input can be provided without too much
difficulty for Baroque lute, using letters to represent frets, but
how should accidental indications be made, and would this be of any
use to other forms of fretted instruments?

So a few thoughts and comments from others would be very helpful.

Trevor

ps, here's the input I used for the attached file

notes = {
 % Usual string tuning for 13-course Baroque lute
 \set stringTunings = #'(17 14 9 5 2 -3 -5 -7 -8 -10 -12 -13 -15)
 \relative c'' {
   \time 3/4
   \key d \minor
   \partial 4.
   <a-\RF #1 >8 <g-1-\RF #5 > a |
   <f d-\RF #5 >4. <f-\RF #1 >8 < g-2 e-1 >4 |
   <a f f-3\5-\RF #5 >4_( <a f-\RF #1 > d8) <g,-1-\RF #5 > |
   <cis-4 a-3\4-\RF #5 >4 <a,\6>8 <g'-1-\RF #1 > <f> <e-1-\RF #1 > 
|
   <d' a d,,>4 <e-2-\RF #2 >8
   \once \override Glissando #'(bound-details left Y) = #2.3
   \once \override Glissando #'(bound-details right Y) = #1.3
   \once \override Glissando #'extra-offset = #'(-0.5 . 0)
   <f-\RF #1 >16
   \glissando <e-2-\RF #1 > <f-\RF #2 >8 <d,-\RF #5 > |
   \break
   <a-\RF #5 >4 <c'-4-\RF #1 >8 <e,-2-\RF #5 > <f-3\5-\RF #5 >_( 
<c'-4-\RF #1 >) |
   <bes-1 d, g,>4. <e,-2-\RF #1 >8 <a f f,>4 |
   <g-2-\RF #1 c,,>4 <f-2-\RF #2 >8 <e-1-\RF #1 >16 <f-\RF #2 > 
<e-1-\RF #1 >8 <c-3> |
   <f d-\RF #5 >8 <g-2-\RF #1 > <a-\RF #2 > <c,-3> <bes-1>_( 
<g'-2-\RF #1 >) |
   <a a,>8 <bes-1-\RF #1 > <c-4-\RF #2 > <f,-\RF #1 > <bes-1 g,> 
<e,-2-\RF #1 > |
 }

Attachment: lutetab-as-markup-16.pdf
Description: Adobe PDF document