Re: chromaticism--Rollie eats crow
Alix Baillie (abaillie@mindspring.com)
Thu, 16 Jan 1997 23:35:12 -0500
At 07:21 PM 16.1.97 -0600, you wrote:
>This is what I did find in Grout's "A History of Western Music", 1973, W.W.
>Norton & Co, p. 235. The word "chromatic", derived from "color", was used
>to describe a particular kind of notation that evolved in the mid-16th c.
>Before then, it was customary to write music in 2/2 using "open" or "white"
>notes, like our half and whole notes, where the outlines were drawn but the
>interiors were left without ink. A new custom arose of writing in 4/4 with
>notes of shorter durations, analogous to our quarter notes, eighth notes,
>etc. Such notes were filled in with ink--they were then called "colored",
>"black" or "filled-in";as opposed to "open" or "white" notes, they were
>"chromatic" (colored) and music with lots of them was called "chromatic
>music".
Better still: sometimes the colored (or colored-in) notes mean to change
from duple to triple meter! This might mean a time-signature change, or
just a few triplets in a transcription, depending on the context. How do
you know which? How do you know whether the colored notes are for triple
meter or shorter duple notes? You guess! You transcribe most of the piece
and see which works out! Yippeee!!!
Alix Baillie