Melodeon.net Forums
Discussions => Tune of the Month => Topic started by: Clive Williams on January 01, 2013, 01:24:15 AM
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(or 8 time waltzes or 11 time waltzes or ...) You get the idea. This month, it's those assymmetric waltzes, where you count 1-2-3-1-2, or 1-2-3-1-2-3-1-2, etc. The most commonly known tune from the English tradition like this is probably Searching for Lambs, although there are many more, especially the newer compositions from the continent.
Or, of course, you can take a 4/4 (or other time signature) tune, and tweak it, er, like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6YdKCFRxJw
or this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=maHbd04sMPo
Good luck everyone - playing in 5/4 etc is quite a skill, but very enjoyable once you get your head around it.
Cheers,
Clive
Perhaps it'll be a little clearer once we get a few examples in? :-)
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Thank goodness for the explanation Clive. I would have thought you just had to play a waltz five times through ::)
I'll need to look at examples to get the gist.
HNY
Sandy
(:)
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Yipee - it's only the 1st of January and I've already got a chance to cheat! When Planxty Irwin was TOTM I gave it a go in 5/4.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26OTWPn5pT0
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A tribute to Dave Brubeck, may he rest in peace, and Take Five.
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I know some 5/4 tunes but they're hornpipes.
And I'd love to hear somebody playing Take Five on a melodeon, but I'd never have thought of it as a waltz...
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I know some 5/4 tunes but they're hornpipes.
And I'd love to hear somebody playing Take Five on a melodeon, but I'd never have thought of it as a waltz...
This does raise a number of questions about time signatures in general. How can you take a compound time signature and assign it a simple time name and expect it to make sense? i.e. 5/4 (compound time) becomes a five time (simple 3/4) waltz? I get the whole idea of counting compound time in twos and threes and I can even see the logic in making top heavy time signatures split time i.e. 5/4 = 1-2-3,1-2 or 1-2,1-2-3 but adding the name of a well defined rhythm like 'Waltz' is nonsensical to me.
Please point me to the nearest 12/8 polka and 7/8 schottiche, ta! :Ph (Oh and a 9/8 rant would be good!)
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I know some 5/4 tunes but they're hornpipes.
And I'd love to hear somebody playing Take Five on a melodeon, but I'd never have thought of it as a waltz...
Let's face it, we're not going to have a 5/4 hornpipe theme, so now seems a good time to bend the rules a bit and let us hear them!
I've been trying to get my head around Astor Piazolla's Oblivion (8 time) recently; it's a fantastic piece, but I'm nowhere near good enough to be able to arrange/play it yet, or realistically this month. A long term project I think...
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How can you take a compound time signature and assign it a simple time name and expect it to make sense?
As usual, things like this make more sense when you remember that they are dances, not just tunes.
I don't know how the steps for a 5/4 waltz go, but I would assume that it's closely related to a 3/4 waltz in feet movement and style, so if you are a dancer you'll recognise it as a type of waltz.
We've recently had a thread demolishing the notion that a 3/4 tune is a waltz. Similarly a waltz is not a 3/4 tune. It's a class of dances, of which the most common is in 3/4.
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Let's face it, we're not going to have a 5/4 hornpipe theme, so now seems a good time to bend the rules a bit and let us hear them!
Oh, all right then.
But I've just been spending about an hour trying to learn a tricky minor-key 5/4 waltz I found on the net. It took a long time to be able to play it well enough to have a clue how the flow of the tune went, but now I'm nearly there I think I've found a really pretty tune with some nice possibilities in bass and harmony and I am going to learn it.
John Kirkpatrick's The Gas Almost Works is a 5/4 hornpipe, and Greg Trice, the mad accordion player with Chelmsford Morris in the 1970s, wrote the Moulsham Street Hornpipe in 5/4 to go with it.
Not ready for videos/recordings right now, but it'll get done this month.
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I know some 5/4 tunes but they're hornpipes.
And I'd love to hear somebody playing Take Five on a melodeon, but I'd never have thought of it as a waltz...
This theme is beginning to sound like mission impossible!
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I get the whole idea of counting compound time in twos and threes and I can even see the logic in making top heavy time signatures split time i.e. 5/4 = 1-2-3,1-2 or 1-2,1-2-3 but adding the name of a well defined rhythm like 'Waltz' is nonsensical to me.
It's named that way because it is a recognised dance form in France so try searching for "valse a cinque temps and you will find plenty of examples. Here is a tutorial (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTW4X6qfz2w) on one way of doing the dance. He counts 1-2,1-2-3, ect whereas you can also think of it as 1-2-3,1-2,
And here is an example of a five time waltz at its slinky and sexy best http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fC6FWy7fr0w (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fC6FWy7fr0w)
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How are we dancers expected to cope? Grow more feet? :-*
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Not at all! In a 3/4waltz you use the feet in the following order:
Lrlrlrlrlrlrlrlrlrlrlr etc
In a 5/4waltz you use the feet in the following order:
Lrlrlrlrlrlrlrlrlrlrlr etc
Simples!
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OK, Clive, challenge accepted:
https://soundcloud.com/chrisbrimley/auld-lang-syne-5-4
I originally tried doing this tune in 3/4, 4/4, 5/4, 6/8 and then 7/8, but gave up because it: a) was too difficult; and b) just sounded silly.
Happy New Year, melnet.
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Auld Lang Syne works really well in 5! Nice!
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How can you take a compound time signature and assign it a simple time name and expect it to make sense? i.e. 5/4 (compound time) becomes a five time (simple 3/4) waltz?
You can't. Is everything in 4/4 immediately understood to be a reel (or schottisch or hornpipe)? All of these judgements happen within context. In the context that I draw from -- French with a heavy Alsatian seasoning -- the odd-time waltz is well loved. I'll post one this evening. Learned it from a Patrick Bouffard recording ... though mine is far simpler than his.
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These are very popular at Bals in France now, they are tricky to dance to, but the easiest one to start learning is the 8 time, so it goes (usually) calling for a gent, waltz step left, waltz step right then a 1-2 (left-right) which means that you start again on the left. Check out Parasol on YouTube who compose, play and teach these. The dancers have to work hard listening for the the 1-2, particularly in the 11 time where it could be at the end of the phrase or earlier. :|glug could drive you to drink ;D
John
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Here you go. Did this within minutes of getting home this evening. A very basic 5 Time waltz that allows for a lot of flexibility in arrangement.
http://accordeonaire.blogspot.com/2013/01/waltz-in-five.html
Played on my Salterelle Pastourelle, which seems to have gotten better after a month or so with a goofy reed.
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Here you go. Did this within minutes of getting home this evening. A very basic 5 Time waltz that allows for a lot of flexibility in arrangement.
Thanks Gary, that's lovely! My head absolutely will not accept what you're playing - but my soul is dancing along merrily!
Pete.
Edit: Apostrophe crime!
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Since Clive opened up the parameters, here's another one, La porcher, an Alsatian tune that's not exactly a 5 time waltze, but is a scottish/waltz/marche ... meaning it will alternate between bars of four, bars of three, and bars of two.
http://youtu.be/UaYCSgUQA5I
If that's off topic, Clive, let me know!
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Nice feel on both of those, Gary! - I see on the first it's 2+3 rather than 3+2, and it gives a quite different effect.
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Lovely! thanks Gary.
Le Porcher is known as "Saulocker" in Bayern, and is danced as a Zwiefache, a mixture of waltz and two step and four step turns.
Louise
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Since Clive opened up the parameters, here's another one, La porcher, an Alsatian tune that's not exactly a 5 time waltze, but is a scottish/waltz/marche ... meaning it will alternate between bars of four, bars of three, and bars of two.
http://youtu.be/UaYCSgUQA5I
If that's off topic, Clive, let me know!
c.f. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQbRQUMlxcI
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Another cheat, as already posted for Brighton Camp TOTM (a bit too fast)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOXP84_stCQ&feature=share&list=PLA224E5213E0AE381
Intention for later in the month: Dancing on the Sea (Wendigo) is a great 5 timer.
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Thank you! I love the nom d'anglais for these types of meters: crooked tunes. That seems to capture the whole family of them. It's always nice seeing dancers go at these with ease and grace ... peoples' heads do tend to 'splode a bit at the idea of twos not being followed by more twos, but they really do work.
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Very good so far everyone!
If you've never seen a french style 5 time waltz before, you may find this video "walkthrough" of the dance helpful:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTW4X6qfz2w
The chap who did this also has similar walkthroughs for the French schottische, waltz and 2 time bourree it seems.
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And here's a video of Au Gre des Vents, an Alsatian group who are really masters of this sort of tomfoolery. The video -- waltz in 7 -- is good because it focuses so well on the dancer's feet.
http://youtu.be/Z36iH3SoxGE
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Another scottish/valse/marche. I recorded this a while ago.
http://youtu.be/rzDBHEGj9lw
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here my contribution :
http://youtu.be/oGhhOU1trrM
not sure I made it really "danceable" as a waltz though ... I enjoyed playing it "funny" and lively !
Maybe I'll try to record another one (maybe by Stephane Delicq : he was really fond of "odd" crooked rythms, and there are plenty of things of that kind to get from him)
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Just picking up on the usage of "crooked". This term is well established for tunes which have occasional extra beats, or missing beats. I don't think it's helpful to use the same word for tunes in five where the bar length is always the same. If a word is needed a better one might be asymmetric to describe a bar which splits into two unequal parts. This is not so unusual, after all polkas and rants split into 3 beats and two half length beats per bar: one,two,three, anna,one,two,three, anna, ...
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Here's an eight time (123,123,12) waltz by the late Stephane Delicq.
'Les Amities'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sd2JDYEJmrA
Roland
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Combining TOTM and ThOTM: That Spirit will have to concentrate or she'll lose her step.
http://youtu.be/L3QeWBt5DMg (http://youtu.be/L3QeWBt5DMg)
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here my contribution :
http://youtu.be/oGhhOU1trrM
not sure I made it really "danceable" as a waltz though ... I enjoyed playing it "funny" and lively !
Maybe I'll try to record another one (maybe by Stephane Delicq : he was really fond of "odd" crooked rythms, and there are plenty of things of that kind to get from him)
Well played. :|||:
This is another Zwiefacher probably from Westrich, Rheinland Pfalz. In Bayern it is known as "A oanzig's Hendl, a oanzig's Oa" which is "Ein einziges Hühnchen, ein einziges Ei" in Hochdeutsch which means "One single chicken, one single egg"
Here the Bavarian version:-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aT_CyO8cQU&feature=player_embedded (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aT_CyO8cQU&feature=player_embedded)
Louise
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Just picking up on the usage of "crooked". This term is well established for tunes which have occasional extra beats, or missing beats. I don't think it's helpful to use the same word for tunes in five where the bar length is always the same. If a word is needed a better one might be asymmetric to describe a bar which splits into two unequal parts. This is not so unusual, after all polkas and rants split into 3 beats and two half length beats per bar: one,two,three, anna,one,two,three, anna, ...
"asymmetric" seems a right word ;) we use this word too in France for this kind of rythm, or sometimes we say "impair" (which means "uneven" or "odd" ?)
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Well played. :|||:
This is another Zwiefacher probably from Westrich, Rheinland Pfalz. In Bayern it is known as "A oanzig's Hendl, a oanzig's Oa" which is "Ein einziges Hühnchen, ein einziges Ei" in Hochdeutsch which means "One single chicken, one single egg"
Louise
thank you ... the waltz is the same as Gary's ...
As for its origin, you are certainly right ...somebody told me it looks Alsacien (from Alsace, in France) which is not very far from Westrich ;)
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Here's one, allegedly German. I didn't like the look of it at first, being in A minor, but after working on it in E minor on my D/G box, once I could play it with any kind of rhythmic continuity the tune started coming to life...
http://youtu.be/7w7KVE4Z6cU
If I reverse the accidentals on my G/C box it would work nicely in the original key and less squeaky. Some reed hacking needed...
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That's great, Anahata. The chords are very sweet, and I never once thought, "Oh, too squeeky."
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Here's one, allegedly German. .
http://youtu.be/7w7KVE4Z6cU
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I enjoyed hearing this played with gentle care and subtlety, and some lovely unexpected chords. It's a no-name that we tend to play fiercer and faster at the Bath French session, paired with Dancing on the Sea. I learned it from Daniel Wolverson (fiddle/gurdy) who told me that it had been written by Chris Shaw, but maybe CS was a conduit not the fount.
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I'm too old for fast and ferocious ;D
I have only a little experience of French dancing, and I know they like to take waltzes quite faster than most, but despite my tendency to play it faster if I wasn't careful, I couldn't make it feel very "waltzy".
A sample of the notation I used is here on abcnotation.com (http://abcnotation.com/tunePage?a=trillian.mit.edu/~jc/music/abc/mirror/tunebook.org.uk/tunebook/00100)
From Bavaria, I see it says now.
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Learned this one this week. A branle asymétrique in 5/4 by the amazing Alsatian duo Au Gre des Vent. Boy, these cock-eyed meters take some hard thinking to learn.
http://accordeonaire.blogspot.com/2013/01/branle-asymetrique.html
Thanks
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It's a wet Sunday here so I thought I'd give this theme a go.
This is an 8-time Waltz from Philippe Plard "Prendre ma peine" the harmony is from Johanna Jung.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JClQ5LNUsOw&feature=youtu.be (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JClQ5LNUsOw&feature=youtu.be)
Louise
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sounded smashing....hubert
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Getting carried away, here's Vivre by Stéphane Delicq
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsKoAEA3CVY&feature=youtu.be (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsKoAEA3CVY&feature=youtu.be)
Had to cheat a little as I kept fluffing the second time round
Louise
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http://youtu.be/R_aSGsbouKM
The first is a cross between Valse du depart by Thierry Laplaud, and a Valse a 5 temps attributed to Marc Perrone on diatonia.net, but itself a strong borrow from Laplaud. The second is the standard 'trad' that seems to pop up in 5/4 and 5/8 on every search, with A's and B's swapped in some versions (already posted by others).
Not within my comfort zone, as is probably apparent!
All the best
Bill
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It's a wet Sunday here so I thought I'd give this theme a go.
This is an 8-time Waltz from Philippe Plard "Prendre ma peine" the harmony is from Johanna Jung.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JClQ5LNUsOw&feature=youtu.be (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JClQ5LNUsOw&feature=youtu.be)
Louise
love it ... thanks ;)
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Great stuff, everyone.
I just heard from Gilles, of Au Gre des Vent, who let me know that I dropped a beat in my "Branle Asymétrique." It turns out it is supposed to be in 5/4, except for one bar which is in 6/4 ... this is some tricksy dang stuff. I'll get to work on that.
UPDATE: Here it is, fixed!
http://accordeonaire.blogspot.com/2013/01/branle-asymetrique.html
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**Off Topic**
I just found this and thought Clive might like to have a go at something in 5/16!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Q5Aadb8Cos (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Q5Aadb8Cos)
Edit, typo - what else! ::)
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Q5Aadb8Cos (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Q5Aadb8Cos)
Somewhere I have a minidisc recording of myself attempting Pajdushko Horo on a Bulgarian gaida, in Bulgaria, in front of an audience, after a certain amount of Каменица beer and Rakia had been taken (by everyone, not just me, fortunately) :|glug :|glug :|glug :|bl
It's not my best recording but it was a memorable night.
I have another Pajdushko tune that I might brush off and have a go at, on melodeon. If Clive doesn't get there first.
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Rakia
Do I assume this isn't a mis-spelling of Indian yoghurt? ;)
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Rakia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rakia)
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2 five time (ish) waltzes for you recorded last week
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jedGOwA8wQw - About Time, written by Helena Torpy (she who wrote the Attingham Waltz, and plays in a lovely duo with Steve Turner). Written for a Blowzabella tune writing competition apparently (it didn't win). Played on the Castagnari Mory in D/G.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XGrD7IOXrI - 5X, written by me mate Chris Shaw, that's 5X as in 4X as in XXXX as in beer, I believe. The opening bit certainly doesn't sound very 5 time to me, but that's how it's written - it settles down nicely after that though. Played on the Hohner Preciosa in Bb/Eb.
Enjoy,
Clive
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Rakia
Do I assume this isn't a mis-spelling of Indian yoghurt? ;)
Cretan grape-spirit, isn't it? :|glug
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I was unable to find any 5-time waltzes that I liked enough to record, so ending up writing my own.
https://soundcloud.com/olliekingbox/abunadh
The title comes from a rather nice whisky (Aberlour A'bunadh), and means 'the origin'.
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Have just finished writing a 5/4 waltz, but haven't learned to play it yet. Does anyone want to have a go?
Nigel
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Have just finished writing a 5/4 waltz, but haven't learned to play it yet. Does anyone want to have a go?
Nigel
Here's the abc for the ear players (hope you don't mind Nigel!)
X:70
T:Five Legged Ant, The
C:© Nigel Hallet 2013
M:5/4
L:18
R:5/4 Waltz
Z:Peter Dunk 18/01/2013
K:G
"G"B>c d2 BA GA B2|"D7"A>c e2 dc Bc d2|\
"G"G>AB2 "D7"AG FA c2|"D7"d>e fe "G"dA dc B2|
%
"G"G>AB2 "D7"AG FA c2|"C"A>c e2 "D7"dc Bc d2|\
"G"G>AB2 "D7"AG FE D2|"D7"D>F Ac "G"BA BA G2:|
%
|:"G"g>a gf "D"ed cB A2|"D7"D>F Ac "G7"fe dc B2|\
"G"g>a gf "D7"ed cB A2|"D7"D>F Ac "G"BA GA B2|
%
"G"G>AB2 "D7"AG FA c2|"C"A>c e2 "D7"dc Bc d2|\
"G"G>AB2 "D7"AG FE D2|"D7"D>F Ac "G"BA BA G2:|
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More asymmetric highjinks:
http://accordeonaire.blogspot.com/2013/01/lintermittent.html
Thanks
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Very good folks - now it's end of the month and time to move on! Late submissions as ever are very welcome - just stick them on the end here!
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Here's a very late submission, an attempt at playing Paul Desmond and Dave Brubeck's tune. Includes a dodgy middle improvisation bit. Sorry for being so late, it just took me ages to even half learn it, particularly working out how to play the 5-note rolls. I found it was best to play on my box in Em, though the original is in Ebm, which sounds more mournful. The choice of key was mainly determined by the need to play all the notes on the rolls on the push, against a minor LH V chord. Gm was my first key choice, but that didn't seem possible after a lot of trying, even though I could then have used a push or a pull for the Dm rolls.
https://soundcloud.com/chrisbrimley/take-five-20-2-13
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In case anyone's interested, here's my Musescore transcription of the dots for Take Five in this key.
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In case anyone's interested, here's my Musescore transcription of the dots for Take Five in this key.
Thanks Chris
I doubt I'd ever be able to play this on a melodeon, but is there any chance of you sharing your transcription as a PDF file? I don't use Musescore and I've never seen the mscz format before.
cheers, Ian
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Ian, sure, a pdf version is attached. It has some minor amendments from the previous Musescore version, for our band as they developed it.
If you haven't tried Musescore, however, it's well worth a try: http://musescore.org/
IMO it's quick to download, intuitive to use, pretty flexible, and regularly being developed and updated. If you try it, you'll quickly find you can modify the score and text for your own needs, play it back to listen and practice to, and so on.
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it's quick to download, intuitive to use, pretty flexible, and regularly being developed and updated.
And free! (in case that wasn't obvious)
I gave it a slightly more than cursory look a couple of weeks ago, and even after 10 minutes I could see it could be quite fast for inputting music. While I'll probably stick to hand-edited ABC for simple tunes, I could see myself using Musescore in the future for anything with multiple staves or other complexities.
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Here a very late submission; with magic music by Eric Thezé. Enjoy!
http://eric.theze.free.fr/scores.html (http://eric.theze.free.fr/scores.html)
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Slightly drifty, I know, but Anahata, the thing I particularly like is the ability with Musescore to stretch and compress staves - although there's still some bugs in this, it does work most of the time. I hate scores where the repeats are difficult to find, because everyone always gets lost at that point, unless you've highlighted the repeats in colour or something.
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I couldn't see any kind of score for "Prendre ma peine" on the web so I made one:
X:1
T:Prendre ma peine
C:Philippe Plard
M:8/8
L:1/8
Q:3/8=72
K:EMin %Transposed from AMIN
G>FE EFG cB|A>GA AGA FG|G>FE EFG cB|A>GA F3- F2:|
G>AB BAB dB|G>FE EFG AF|G>AB Bcd ec|B>AG GFG AF:|E8|]
I originally posted it here:
http://theocarinanetwork.com/single/?p=8428935&t=7954630
where using that forum's auto-display of ABC, it looked on screen like the first attachment below. The displayed notation looked like the second attachment.