Natural and Sharp

• Jun 1, 2016 - 23:57

Well, I'm rather stumped here. I'm transcribing Rachmaninov's Etude-Tableaux Op. 39 No. 5, and I came across this oddity:

NaturalandSharp.png

Now, I'm not sure if what they're doing here is the correct notation or not; I don't even know what the correct notation for this would be. The problem is simple- they have two notes in two different voices playing on the same beat. One is neutral, the other sharp, but otherwise both occupy the same ledger line (I've seen this also come up with two notes on the same voice, with even stranger notation). How would I notate this in a way that makes any sort of sense? Musescore's default way of notating this is to stick a natural between the quarter note and the sharp for the eighth, making everything cluttered and incoherent. Any advice here?


Comments

In reply to by edizioneo

That is in the end what I did. Still leaves the question, though- what is the proper way to notate such a strange occurrence? I can think of other examples that occur in the same voice, with even more bizarre notation means. Here's an example from El Puerto, one of the parts of Albéniz's Iberia:

SplitChord1.png

Now, besides the fact that this notation can't be done in Musescore as far as I know, let alone any other notation program, I'm not even sure if such notation is correct. I've seen similar in Ornstein's Suicide in an Airplane, though in that example it leaves one note lined up with the chord and the other off to the side. Any suggestions?

In reply to by LuuBluum

If you say it can't be done, you mean your example from El Puerto?
Perhaps not by default (I believe it can be done with some tweak), but you don't need blindly copy that alternative.
Entering C and C# as doubled unison with two accidentals is a perfectly valid notation.

With MuseScore it is possible to tweak maybe 99% of things. What you need to do is ascertain what the original is meant to signify. Try to obtain more than one printing of the sheet music and - if possible - track down a recording of Rachmaninoff on YouTube and listen to him playing his own piece. Then, if you can't notate it how you want, tell us how you want it to sound.

I've tried inputting into MuseScore several of Rachmaninoff's works (Opus 3 and 10 at the moment) and I have come across discrepancies in the source printed sheet music and in performances and it what I think it should sound like.

This sort of piece re-enforces the need for some musicians' requests to notate music with each accidental only applying to the note to which it is attached. Yes, this could result in a cluttered score but no-one said Rachmaninoff was easy (and you need big hands).

In reply to by underquark

Well, in the Rach case it seems quite clear that what's intended (given everything else in that measure, among other things) is that the two cords are played simultaneously. This was easy to notate; I was just uncertain as to whether there was any better way to actually notate this than the one shown here.

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