ABC notation

Abc notation is a standard for writing music using the ASCII character set. The standard was developed by Chris Walshaw in early 1991 and it has since been adopted widely for the distribution of traditional tunes, especially over the internet. Software to edit and manipulate music in abc notation are readily available on most computer systems including unix, Windows and Mac.

The following is an example of the use of abc notation

X:1
T:The Legacy Jig
M:6/8
L:1/8
R:jig
K:G
GFG BAB | gfg gab | GFG BAB | d2A AFD |
GFG BAB | gfg gab | age edB |1 dBA AFD :|2 dBA ABd |:
efe edB | dBA ABd | efe edB | gdB ABd |
efe edB | d2d def | gfe edB |1 dBA ABd :|2 dBA AFD |]

Lines in the first part of the tune notation, beginning with a letter followed by a colon, indicate various aspects of the tune such as the index, when there are more than one tune in a file (X:), the title (T:), the type of tune (R:), the time signature (M:), the default note length (L:) and the key (K:). Lines following the key designation represent the tune.

See either Chris Walshes' abc notation site or Steve Mansfield's abc tutorial pages (links below) for more complete information about the current standard.

External Links

• Chris Walshaw's abc notation site
• Steve Mansfield's tutorial on abc notation
• Concertina.net Convert-O-Matic form to produce sheet music and midi files from abc
• Online abc editor that can process multiple tunes