[smufl-discuss] Re: plainchant and mensural notation

[Emil B. Wojtacki]

On 15-03-2014 22.13, Daniel Spreadbury wrote::

> Emil wrote:
>> ... strophices liquescentes. Recently, I
>> have came across one of them in the offertory Ascendit Deus
>> (http://www.gregor-und-taube.de/D.6.d_Christi_Himmelfahrt.pdf ...).
>> They are rare, but I suggest these four glyphs to be added.
> ... it would be helpful if you could respond to Grzegorz's point
> concerning how we should separate them into components for the
> multi-note form range; ideally they should be separated into
> lower and upper components to be joined with a connecting
> line. Thanks.

My recommendation is to encode four ligatures without decomposition,
similarly to chantLigaturaDesc2nd
-- chantLigaturaDesc5th.

Grzegorz Rolek wrote:
> That's a nice finding, Emil. Have you seen more of these liquescent
> strophicae in those editions? I wonder if a more 'standard' one would make the ligatures
> decomposable in any sensible way. That is, if my assumption is correct
> that the strophicae in question are ligatures of a strophicus auctus and
> punctum deminutum.
That’s right, they are ligatures of strophicus (auctus) and punctum
deminutum (inclinatum?). I have not seen more liquescent strophici; my
experience with plainchant is rather small. Anyway, Anton Stingl, the
editor of those scores, says this neum is very rare (other editions of
this particular offertory put clivis or cephalicus instead, but they
render all strophici as simple puncta).

> Intervalic variants of such stropha aucta plus a
> single deminutum would at least put it in line with the rest of the
> mutli-note section.
In this case you would have to encode five rare symbols (4 intervalic
variants of stropha and one graphical alternate of punctum deminutum
just to join with those strophae).
Now, "decomposition" of podatus makes sense, because chantPodatusUpper
may be used for porrectus; chantDeminutumUpper is used not only for
cephalicus, but for liquescent porrcectus, too; and chantDeminutumLower
serves as initio debilis of torculus. And there is nothing to win by
decomposing liquescent strophices.

>> My second suggestion is to add glyphs of ligatures for breves and
>> semibreves in mensural notation, similar to plainchant
>> "porrectus"-glyphs which have been recently renamed. As to my
>> understanding, four noteheads (mensuralNoteheadMaximaBlack,
>> mensuralNoteheadMaximaVoid, mensuralNoteheadMaximaBlackVoid,
>> mensuralNoteheadMaximaWhite) may appear in slanted version of different
>> span (2nd-5th), both upwards and downwards.
> We had these as separate glyphs at some point (between 0.6 and 0.7, when I
> was working in collaboration with Myke Cuthbert on the expansion of the
> Medieval and Renaissance ranges) but in the end it was determined that
> they were redundant, and the glyphs in the 'Medieval and Renaissance
> plainchant multi-form notes' range could be used in their stead. Is there
> now consensus that this is incorrect?

In some circumstances (for instance, when certain
conjectures/emendations must be discussed in details), there is a really
strong need of these symbols.

Best,

Emil

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