interesting "readme" file for Sibelius plug in

I thought I'd post a bit from Peter Walton's "readme" file for his
microtonal Sibelius plug-in, since it involves notation and is quite
interesting.

Basically, he takes the 7 "white notes" (do we call those "nominals"
I can't remember??) and uses the 9 possible alterations of each of
these to create, at maximum, a 63 note scale.

The problem for *my* particular interest is the fact that this
doesn't quite make it to 72!

*Blackjack* at 21 notes could easily be "translated" by this plug-
in. In fact, I would only have to use "sharps and flats" and nothing
more, since just one sharp and flat would give me 3x7 = 21!

However, part of the facility of Blackjack is the fact that it is
*notated* of course, in 72-tET, and Pete's system wouldn't give me
the consistency, since I would have "sharps and flats" in this system
that would vary in cents value from note to note. I suppose I could
*delete* these symbols and just leave in the "pitch bend" but it's
just as easy, quite frankly, to put in the *correct* Sims symbols and
add the pitch bends manually... or so it seems at the moment.

Anyway, here is the readme file. Anybody who has Sibelius and who
wants to try his plug-in, which also comes with a nice example in a
Sibelius file, should write to Pete:

pete-at-pswalton.freeserve.co.uk

Graham Breed: here is another English microtonalist that you might
want to know about!

Anyway, here is and extract from the "readme." It's interesting or I
wouldn't be posting it. (Readme files, as a general rule, don't
strike me as novelistic entertainment...):

TEMPERAMENTS PLUG-IN
by Peter Walton
Copyright PeterWalton 2002.

INSTALLATION
--------------------

1. Exit from Sibelius.

2. Copy the file "Temperaments.plg" to the relevant Plugins
folder.

3. Restart Sibelius.

GENERAL NOTES
----------------------

My motivation for writing the plugin was:
a) to use in my own compositions
b) to use for the playback of folk music from around the world.
I find this often sounds
dull in 12noteET, but comes to life once you alter the tuning.

1. Temperaments

The scales and temperaments are stored as tables of pitchclasses
along with deviations in cents from 12noteET. The plugin compares the
notenames in the selection with those in the table, and, where they
match, adds the relevant Midi pitchbend command.

2. Monody

If you have any simultaneous notes in any staff in the selected
passage, the plugin will mark them [X] NB the plugin does not
recognise where there are two or more voices on a staff.
You should separate voices and chords before you run the plugin.

3. Channels

Since pitchbend commands apply to a Midi channel, you should make
sure that all parts that you apply temperaments to are on separate
channels.

4. Non Scale notes

The plugin will mark any notes that are not defined in the table for
the scale as [NS]

5. restoring 12note Equal Temperament

At the beginning of the bar after the end of the selection, the
plugin adds a midi command ~B 0,64
This should restore 'normal' tuning.

6. multiple temperaments

If you really want to, you could have different instruments playing
in different temperaments, or even have the same instrument changing
temperament during the course of your piece.

[HERE'S THE MOST INTERESTING PART -- ED. OR RATHER JOE]:

NOTATIONAL CONVENTIONS FOR MICROTONAL MUSIC

----------------------------------------------------------------------

This is probably the most contentious issue re this plugin.
I welcome your comments on this issue.

The books and articles I have read use many different forms of
notation for microtonal music including a variety of signs, arrows,
symbols, ratios etc.. As far as I am aware, there is no single
convention for the notation of microtonal music, or to
be more accurate, there are several conventions in existence.

The notation I have used is a compromise which is necessary due to
the current limitations of the Manuscript language. The range of
accidentals consists therefore of those accidentals which are easily
recognisable by Manuscript: double-flat, 3/4tone-flat, flat, 1/4tone-
flat, natural,1/4tone-sharp, sharp,3/4tone-sharp,double-sharp.

The practice I have followed has generally been as follows (though
there are probably a few exceptions):

no of notes in scale

signs comments

1-12
natural # b only enharmonic equivalents have same tuning

13 - 21 natural # b only enharmonic equivalents may
be tuned differently

21+ all

Where enharmonic equivalents are tuned differently, sharps are
treated as higher than flats ie:
D# is higher that Eb
Dx is higher than E
Ebb is lower than D

However, when I got to very large scales (eg the 63note scale) I
abandoned the last point, and used the order Cbb, C3/4flat, Cb,
C1/4flat, C, C1/4sharp, C#, C3/4sharp, Cx then the same for D,E...etc

So far, I have started all scales on C. Making the scales
transposable is on the list (below) of possible future developments.

For now, if you want them to start on another pitch, you will have to
edit the Method for the particular scale you want to change.

If you want to create your own convention, read the section on
editing your own scales (below).

POSSIBLE FURTHER DEVELOPMENTS
-------------------------------------------------

a) Addition of more scales and temperaments;

In Sibelius 2 it is easy.
If you do create more scales, please send me a copy.

In Sib 1.4, make a copy of the whole plugin and change the Scale...
method.

b) Making the scales transposable

I wrote the plugin on Sib 1.4 which did not provide support for
arrays.(OK they were theoretically possible but it was very awkward)
Since Sib 2 now makes arrays possible it should be possible to make
themost of the scales transposable.

c) Recognition of Symbols

At the moment the Manuscript language can not recognise and interpret
symbols attached to notes. Hopefully a later version of Manuscript
will be able to do this.

d) Parsing text files

On a couple of occasions I have asked Sib to add to the Manuscript
language the ability to parse text files. Their response was that it
is something they intend to add in a future version of Manuscript
(though they didn't give any clue as to when that would be).

This will have lots of advantages eg I occasionally do algorithmic
composition in java, but to get the results into Sib I have to save
them as a Midi file (Yuk), then read it into Sib. With a text file I
could pass lots more note information - dynamics, accentuation etc...

Similarly for microtonal usage it should be possible to adapt or
rewrite the plugin to read and interpret Scala files, which would
increase its capacity very greatly !

MICROTONAL PLUG-INS
by Peter Walton

MICROTONAL PLUGINS
---------------------------------

I have several microtonal plugins. At the time of writing (March
2002) they include:

Temperaments
TempAbsolute
TempArabic
TempAsia
TempDetune
TempEqual
TempGamelan
TempNon8ve
TempRatio
RandomDetune
AdhocTemperament
MicroOrnament

Temperaments
-----------------

a sampler plugin containing 3 scales

TempAbsolute
-----------------

This plugin basically allows you to set up temperaments which are
defined by pitchclass and 8ve
rather than just pitchclass. Thus you can set up eg a different cents-
deviation for C4 and C5 .

TempArabic

--------------

several scales taken from an article by AJ Ellis and from Scala

TempAsia
------------
a few tunings from Burma, China, Japan, Thailand and India

TempDetune
---------------

Detune uses the standard chromatic scale but sets all notes slightly
out of tune.

Folk1-5 : you should edit these to play eg folk or blues where you
only want to
alter the tuning of a couple of pitches. For example you may want to
slightly alter Eb and Bb
to get a neutral 3rd or natural 7th.

Since for the 'Folk' scales only a couple of notes are being retuned,
they do not mark non-scales notes as [NS]

TempEqual
-------------

19noteET
63noteET

TempGamelan
-----------------

Two pelog and two slendro tunings

TempNon8ve

-----------------
25th root of 5/1

15th root of 3/1

16th root of 3/1
9th root of 3/2

TempRatio
-------------

Partch 43-note
Just
Werckmeister 3
Pythagorean
Fibonacci

RandomDetune
-----------------

You are prompted to enter a maximum deviation in cents (up to 100).
The plugin will detune each note separately in the selection by a
random number of cents.
The detune will be different for each note and will be between 0
cents and +/- the maximum deviation you entered.
This differs from theTempDetune inasmuch as, in this plugin repeated
notes will be tuned differently from each other,
whereas in TempDetune all notes of a given pitchclass will have the
same pitchbend.

It is useful for where you have the same melody played by two
instruments and want one of them
to play slightly out of tune with the other. For this use a max
deviation of ca 10 cents.

If you want your piece to sound like it is being played by someone
with absolutely no sense of intonation
you could set the deviation high (eg to about 50). I tried that
once with a Bach fugue....

AdhocTemperament

------------------------

Use this if you want to try out a one-off temperament.

You are prompted to enter a deviation for each pitch-class.

MicroOrnament

--------------------

This one is still in development.
It creates multiple pitchbend commands for a single note, in order to
produce microtonal fluctuations
of various kinds.

Please unsubscribe me from the tuning list!

---------------------------------
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