Re: Figured bass

[Mats Bengtsson]

> Hi Mats,
> 
>       The  way  I  feel  is  the  most  efficient  is to use
>       fingerings.  You  can  easily stack any number ranging
>       from 1 to 8, and the symbols will appear aligned.
>         ex: g,_6_4_3
> 
>       Where  this  becomes  inconvenient is when you want to
>       put  accidentals.  Or when you want to do figured-bass
>       specific things (crossing numbers, adding movement...)
>       To  put  accidentals,  the  definitions  is sufficient
>       (thought  it  aught to all be groupped afterwards in a
>       file  the  user  doesn't have to load himself (default
>       lilypond).
> 
>       The  most  flexible  way  I've  found  for typesetting
>       figured bass is your way : text markups. Though it's a
>       lot of code for three numbers.
>         ex:   7
>               2
>               3
>             becomes : a_#'(finger (lines "7", "2", "3"))

Why make it so complicated? You should get exactly the same
result from a_7_2_3

>              #5
>               2
>             becomes : d_#'(columns (lines ((font-relative-size . -2) ((raise 
> . 0.35) (music "accidentals-1"))), " ") (finger (lines "5", "2")))

Using the definitions of my previous mail, you could reduce it to
d_#`(rows ,text-sharp " 5") _"  2"

However, the horizontal alignment brings up an interesting problem.
In many cases, you want to align the chord changes to a certain beat
which is easier using a lyrics line where you can assign the duration
of each "syllable". If you use text scripts, you may have to insert
spacing notes parallel to the base note to get something to align
the new chord to. In many handwritten manuscripts, the horizontal
alignment of the chord changes isn't specified, so below a whole note
you could find
7 6 5
4 5 3
and as an editor you have to decide either to typeset them as in the
manuscript with just a single space between the numbers or to specify
at which beat to typeset the change. Personally, I don't want to make
that decision as an editor and stick to the former alternative. 


>       The   symbols  are lacking, but it's a good base. What
>       could   help  is  to  have  this  'thing'  calculated
>       automatically.
>         ex: a_bass(7,2,3)
>             d_bass(5is, 2)

I've seen at least three different ways of typesetting a 5is:
#
5, #5 or 5 with a dash, but you could have a property to determine
the desired style.

>       Though the fingering font look the best to me for this
>       kind  of  stuff  (small and bold), I can conceive that
>       may not be suitable for two reasons :
>          -  for  the reasons you specified (is that the font
>          that have an ill suited layout?).

Yes, I find it has a bit too elaborate curves, especially if you 
want to, for example, prolong the top straight line of the 5 to
put a dash through. I'd prefer a more plain sans serif font, it
could still be small and bold. 

>          - because it would be ugly to use the same font for
>          fingering  and  figured  bass (though baroque music
>          never  originally  have  the  fingerings,  so  this
>          shouldn't be too much a problem).

No problem for me.

  /Mats