User talk:Jerome Kohl/Archive 15

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Pardon?

Please tell me what I should think of this, with the edit summary you chose and no apparent effort to talk to the good-faith editor you reverted nor a discussion on the talk. I recently stood up against the belief that live editing of featured articles is not a good idea. You could have left this one with the main editor, no? - Btw, I have a FAC open. - The year started well with Don Giovanni, - wish you a good and peaceful one! --Gerda Arendt (talk) 13:43, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

First of all, I only discovered it was FA when I clicked the "save" button on that edit. Otherwise, I might have left it with the main editor, yes. That article has been on my watchlist for years now, though I have only made the occasional edit to it, and I had not been keeping a very close eye on it lately. I vaguely recall that there was a flap over an infobox a year or two ago, and assumed there would be the usual long, acrimonious discussion on the Talk page from that time. I appear to have been wrong about that.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 16:58, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for your thoughts, - some of mine. I meant FA, you seem to have meant TFA. I was the one who nominated Tippett for TFA today. I didn't care that he has no infobox. - DYK that Beethoven had one for a month, and the discussion on the talk is civilized? ... that the main author of Tippett came to my talk with good wishes for identiboxes, "let's continue to help each other"? The former wars are best remembered as a farce, and we do well not to participate ;) --Gerda Arendt (talk) 18:19, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

I do my best to stay out of those "conversations", though I do have my opinions on the subject.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 19:56, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

Is it too sarcastic to ask if you think reverting is a good way to stay out of discussions? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 20:02, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

It is too sarcastic, yes, but the answer is no, that has nothing at all to do with it.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 22:00, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

Then back to serious ;) - You once remarked about edit summaries as something that can't be corrected. What will you write next time you revert a good-faith edit, - hopefully not again "correcting format error". Corrective measures having been taken against me, so I am perhaps a bit (over?-)sensitive to the wording. Or do I misunderstand? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:44, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

That was a misjudgment, admittedly. I had incorrectly assumed there was a long and vitriolic discussion on the Talk page, and this was a latter-day attempt to re-foist an infobox on the article. Ordinarily, I would put a link to the position expressed on the Composers Project page, and a request to seek consensus first before adding an infobox to a composer bio article.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 22:51, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

You mean you would point to that old project stuff (2010, I believe) while the arbitrators ruled (2013) it has to be decided on a case-by-case? (No practical ruling, but that's what you get from arbitration.) I like the conversation on the project talk about reversions (feel free to join), where the original generous premises of the projects were quoted: "Use your own judgement in applying these guidelines and all Wikipedia guidelines to composer articles and be bold." - Today Falstaff, btw ;) --Gerda Arendt (talk) 23:33, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

My recollection is that it has always been on a case-by-case basis. Since it is a volatile issue for many editors on both sides, it seems inadvisable to make such changes without first consulting the editors currently active on the article. Not every editor is aware of this situation, of course, but the ones who actually overwrite an editorial note about this (as I have seen happen on numerous occasions) seem to be deliberately provoking trouble. I'll take a look at the discussion you have linked, thanks.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 00:03, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

With a note that a project advises against an infobox, it was not case-by-case. Tippett, however, had no such notice, to my knowledge. If a user installs an infobox we can assume in good faith that the motivation is to improve the article, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 17:56, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

Maxima...

A history of the Maxima from 1200-1400 will be published soon, so I'll add a lot of new references once the article (I've seen but can't share) comes through. It discusses also the brief history of notes longer than maxima. I figure that like notes smaller than 256th notes (which appear in that article) or clarinets lower than the contrabass clarinet, it'd be better to add to this article than to make stub-length articles on them. Thanks for your help on that article! -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 17:07, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

That's great news, thanks for letting me know. I look forward to your additions. As you are aware, I was startled to learn of the term "larga" but, even if there is only a single surviving theoretical treatise documenting it, this goes a long way toward explaining where the British term "large" comes from. I agree the the article on the maxima is the best place for a discussion of such esoterica as notes longer still than the "longest". (This reminds me of Bob Marvin's satirical brochure, advertising exact copies of a Bressan alto recorder for such-and-such a price, with "even more exact" copies for a yet higher price.)—Jerome Kohl (talk) 00:07, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Ha! love the "even more exact" quote. Well, the "minima" was the smallest possible note, while the semi-minima was half of that length. The Johannes de Anglia quote I chose actually turns out to be an anomaly: it's one of the only two securely continental sources to use the term "larga". There are at least 6 English sources that do. Just to prepare, the longer notes will have names like "longissima" and "maximissima", and also "hairy long" -- you might think that when I add these references that I've suddenly gone to the dark side and started vandalizing Wikipedia, so I'll be sure to add footnotes. But before you google for "hairy long" and get the expectedly uncouth results, here's a link: [1]; search for "pilosas" (feminine plural for "hairy"). :-) you'll find larga mentioned in the same sentence. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 05:16, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

The mind boggles! Interesting to know that there are more sources for larga, and even more interesting that most of them are English (Johannes de Anglia would presumably be an English source, but I think you meant Giovanni di Roma suburbia, detta Anagnia). I wonder how Apel managed to overlook all of them. That's a good point about the minima. Jake of Cork would be horrified at all the itsy bitsy notes we have pulverized music into these days. Telemann had a better sense of humor.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 06:03, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

You're right on Anagnia. Apel overlooked most of these because he really only needed theorists when he needed a justification for what he was seeing in the musical scores. On the one hand, this freed him to make comments about pieces that had no theoretical justification, but on the other hand it meant he missed a lot of things discussed in theory that never appeared in practice. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 05:47, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

I had no idea we had a List of musical works in unusual time signatures; thanks! -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 05:48, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

I see your point about Apel. Of course his primary interest was in the literature, and bless him for it. On the other hand, I wouldn't be so quick to assume that things like note values even longer than the duplex longa were purely speculative. After all, there is no reason to suppose that we have more than just a tiny fraction of all the music that was written down in the 13th century, and it wouldn't take much more than a single discovery in a 16th-century book-binding to blow all of the statistics we have got about medieval notation right out of the water.

You may want to peruse that list of unusual time signatures for a while before deciding to thank me for pointing it out. If you examine the archives on the discussion page, you will find, buried deep in a long and bitter debate over just what should be included and what should be excluded, an astonished squeak from someone who apparently had never emerged from his rock-band's garage, protesting that 3/4 time is nearly as rare as 5/4 or 11/8. Thanks goodness we finally managed to spin off Quintuple meter and Septuple meter into their own articles. I hope one day to track down the statute in British law that requires the signature tunes for all UK television police dramas to be in quintuple or septuple meter (private-eye shows can use undecuple meter instead, presumably because their heros don't have to march to the drum of hidebound superiors).—Jerome Kohl (talk) 00:16, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

Landscape

A few of us are working on revising the article on Landscape. An overly long etymology section has been trimmed, and we are discussing the form the article should take and possible sections. Since music has been mentioned, perhaps you'd like to add your ideas to the discussion at Talk:Landscape or even add a section to the article. CorinneSD (talk) 18:54, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

I wouldn't have thought this article would ever come under my view but, since you have brought it to my attention, I will have a look at it.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 20:10, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

Counterpoint, contradictions

Hello. I removed all your contradiction tags from the article on Counterpoint. Species counterpoint is a didactic tool for studying and practicing counterpoint and is therefore rhythmically limited for that very purpose. Do let me know if you have any objections. Adagio Cantabile (talk) 14:32, 17 January 2015 (UTC)

I trust that you edited the article to make this distinction clear. Otherwise I'm afraid I shall have to restore the contradiction tags. However, as I recall, it was not solely to species counterpoint that the contradiction applied. If memory serves, the article describes several other types of counterpoint in which the rhythm between parts is not independent. Thank you for the courtesy of notifying me of your edit. I shall certainly visit the article.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 19:08, 17 January 2015 (UTC)

Hello again. I've been pondering on how to rewrite the above mentioned article on Counterpoint, as the entire subject is laid down in a rather incoherent and haphazard manner. However, the first obstacle I ran upon is the very definition. I would venture forward and say that tonal counterpoint is a compositional technique whose nature and rules have been established through study of development of polyphonic compositional techniques from Palestrina through Bach and onwards, and written down by scholars starting with Fux. However, I found it hard to find a notable reference which attempts to define it as such. Textbooks and treatises which deal with the subject tend to avoid definition and go straight into technicalities. If you could find a source which deals with definition of Counterpoint, I would be much grateful. Adagio Cantabile (talk) 23:06, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

I suspect that part of the problem is that the various definitions are contextual, with the primary division being between textbooks meant for teaching counterpoint and historians dealing with a broader view. If you adopt the definition given in a textbook on modal (Palestrina) counterpoint, you will get a definition intended cover just the style prevalent in the 16th century; if you take a definition in a text on tonal counterpoint, you will get something a little different (something like that definition given in the lede, and cited to Laitz's 2008 textbook). The real problem sets in when you try to define what counterpoint means more broadly, across all periods of history. For example, discant and organum are both generally regarded as forms of counterpoint, but the rhythmic relationship between the parts is far from independent. In fact, discant is to all intents and purposes note-against-note counterpoint, though the emphasis is on contrary motion between the parts; some types of organum, on the other hand, involve mainly parallel motion between the parts. Even in the 16th century there are types of counterpoint that do not conform to the principles governing, say, the average motet by Palestrina, and even Palestrina occasionally writes homophonic passages in a composition that otherwise follows Jeppesen's rules. I think that the definition given in the Oxford Dictionary of Music is serviceable, though at the moment the server is down on my online access. Percy Goetschius (Applied Counterpoint, New York: G. Schirmer, 1902, p. 1) gives a better definition than Laitz: "the harmonious association of individually perfect and coördinate, but independent, melodies", though even this is perhaps too restrictive to encompass parallel organum or fauxbourdon.

The Wikipedia article suffers from too many chefs, I think. Plainly, at least one editor has tried to make it into an introductory textbook (all that stuff on species counterpoint, for example), while others have attempted to give some historical context. It may be asking too much to do both of these things in a single article, while at the same time maintaining both balance and conciseness. Perhaps a separate article on species counterpoint should be made, to start with. It is, after all, primarily a didactic subject, separated from any real description of musical literature. Walter Piston (Counterpoint, New York: W. W. Norton, 1947, p. 10) puts the distinction between the didactic/practical and historical aims rather well: "Historically, there are three outstanding peaks in the art of counterpoint. ... The first of the periods mentioned [polyphony of the Gothic period and the polyphony of the Franco-Flemish school] has ceased to exert an active influence on our music, but Palestrina and Bach have become the very symbols of polyphony." Mind you, I'm not so sure that Piston would have held to this claim twenty years after writing it, since Franco-Flemish polyphony came to be of considerable interest to many composers in the post-war era.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 00:24, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

Aquarius (opera)

Please note the comments of User:Voceditenore, which I support, in regard to this article's lack if inline references via the standard system. Also, per WP:Opera's guidelines, we lay out a synopsis with no editable scenes.

If you wish to discuss this, please go to the article's "Talk" page and do so before taking any other action. Thanks you. Viva-Verdi (talk) 01:34, 27 January 2015 (UTC)

The "standard" system you refer to is, unfortunately, not "standard' at all. It is one of several "standard" citation systems used on Wikipedia. I have already pointed you to WP:CITEVAR. Have you read it? I might also point out that Wikiprojects' preferences do not override Wikipedia policies or guidelines. It is not merely common courtesy, but a stated guideline that references should not be changed from the established format without first obtaining consensus of the editors of the article. As this has not been done, I respectively request that you restore the established formatting until such consensus has been obtained. I am copying this discussion to the article's Talk page.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 05:07, 27 January 2015 (UTC)

References

Merge?

I saw your name in the list of opposers to a merge of {{infobox academic division}} and don't understand your argument, please explain. To my understanding, the organisation of a university has nothing to do with how we call an infobox internally (which a reader doesn't even see), as long as the facts are displayed well. - I engaged in the suggested merge of {{infobox hymn}} and {{infobox musical composition}}. The character (and category) of a hymn is in no way diminished if the same (!) information appears under a different internal template name (I suggested {{infobox composition}}). Compare a hymn in two version: hymn and composition. You see that "composition" even tells the reader "hymn", a fact he doesn't see in the former. - If two templates serve the same function to the reader (!), why would we want to maintain and update two? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:15, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Hi Gerda. I have no idea about any of this. I don't see my name on the discussion page for the proposed merge of {{infobox academic division}}, and indeed did not even know this existed until this very moment. Can you point me to the page where my opposition to this merge is found? I also know nothing about those other infoboxes. In general I am not much interested in infoboxes, apart from their use on composer biography pages, where I find them inappropriate.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 18:04, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Now it's my term to be mystified because I don't find it. Excuse the sidetrack from music please, I must have confused two names or two pages. - Rubbing my eyes more, I see that I confused names. (Thread doesn't need to be archived. - Rehearsing Bach's Missa in B minor for a Sunday concert, - sorry for the German link, - I don't like the title of the English, - one of few times that Bach wrote a title page, and we don't take his name ;) --Gerda Arendt (talk) 18:35, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

No problem. We are all entitled to the occasional lapse, and preparing a performance of Bach means it is certainly in a good cause ;-)—Jerome Kohl (talk) 19:18, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Berkeley Horn Trio

Greetings! In the Horn trio article I've changed the date of composition of the Berkeley trio back to read "1953?". I didn't realise there were conflicting sources on this. I've also removed the "citation needed" tag and part of your hidden comment, which now seemed irrelevant. I'm not sure of the protocol with regards editing other people's hidden comments – apologies if I've broken Wiki-etiquette in doing this! --Deskford (talk) 17:06, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

You have done exactly as I would have done. I think this is the correct protocol but, if not, then we are both tarred with the same brush! This confusion over the year of composition was an infuriating surprise when I collected together the sources for the article on Berkeley's trio. The "late 1940s" assertion is surely a wild and mistaken guess, but the other three years are all plausible. I believe that Berkeley was not an exceptionally rapid composer—certainly not a hasty one—which makes 1954 less likely than 1953, though of course he may have put the finishing touches on the score during the two months leading up to its premiere. I have been unable to come up with any convincing evidence, however, that Berkeley might not have completed it more than a year before that performance, so 1952 stands as a real possibility. Someone else had originally put in "1953?", but it seemed like the best option to me, as well, so I retained it when I reformatted and expanded the table. Thanks for the additional information on other trios in that list, by the way. I don't believe I took advantage of the "Thank" option in the edit history, as I should have done.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 19:53, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

Voice leading

I have done some recent work on the "voice leading" article. Do you have any opinions or suggestions? Hyacinth (talk) 12:28, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

I will cast an eye over this article, which has never before come to my attention. Thanks for asking.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 17:59, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

You wrote: "...an unfounded prejudice that there is little interest in Schenker on the part of British music theorists." Have a look at http://www.schenkerdocumentsonline.org/project_information/contributing_scholars.html, you'll see that there are several British theorists in this list, and at least one additional one is missing, Nicholas Cook who I think has done a lot of Schenkerian reseach. And look at http://www.schenkerdocumentsonline.org/project_information/project_team.html, you'll see that the whole project is mainly British.

Searching Schenkerdocumentsonline for "Voice-leading" gives 403 results (which I didn't further check); searching for "Part-writing" gives only two, one in a translation by Drabkin, the other a translation by Scott Witmer (no idea of who he is), both translating Stimmführung. — Hucbald.SaintAmand (talk) 11:58, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

Well, I did say my prejudice was "unfounded", but thanks all the same for the list that shows how wrong I was. Thanks also for confirming my impression that even British Schenkerians overwhelmingly prefer "voice leading" to "part-writing". At least I was right about that!—Jerome Kohl (talk) 16:11, 10 February 2015 (UTC)

Precious again

knowledge and modesty
Thank you for helping me consistently, from my second article on, and for adding your admirable knowledge to this project in almost an understatement, about Stockhausen in particular. You mentioned in Freundschaft: making joyous music together, perhaps something playful as this. In Freundschaft, - you are an awesome Wikipedian!

--Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:42, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

Three years ago, you were the 40th recipient of my PumpkinSky Prize, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 13:31, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

Music theory

I'm a little mystified by your blanking of huge sections of the Music theory article. Although I'm a little bored by the minutiae of WP policies, it seems like common sense that a summary article like this one, with bunches of "Main article" cross-references, wouldn't need to be extensively referenced, since anyone interested in verifying the information can easily go to the main articles cited.

You didn't even leave stubs for those sections, meaning that a summary article on a broad topic (music theory) now doesn't even mention large subtopics. I'm at a loss to understand how this will better serve WP readers. —Wahoofive (talk) 16:54, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

If you like, the headers can be restored, each with a banner requesting content, though some of the subjects were even dubious as areas belonging to music theory, and having separate sections on "chords" and "harmonies" seems absurd for a summary article. I noticed another editor had begun the process by removing one challenged section with no references, and I merely finished the job. Not only were they written like something copied from an undergraduate's class notes, but they had been flagged as unsourced three months ago.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 17:18, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Covered anonymous

Dear colleague, you removed a mention about anonymous works printed by Petrucci. Your action is quite typical for a modern musicology, which concentrates mostly on composers' music leaving anonymous contribution neglected. However, if you'd take the trouble to check music paleotypes (Odhecaton is just one of them), you'd definitely see that many compositions have been printed anonymous, these are not like now, not a commercial handful of famous brands. Olorulus (talk) 07:15, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

Except that the sentence in question read "some of the most famous composers of the time, including ...". It is only as a joke that one can say Anonymous is a famous composer. It is of course perfectly acceptable to mention that there are also works included in the collection that are not attributed to any composer, but "many others" should be sufficient. Or do you have reason to suppose that all the anonymous works are by the same anonymous composer?—Jerome Kohl (talk) 19:05, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

I think, you perfectly understand the point. As for my English, I always apologize for it (English is not my mother tongue), to jeer at it is too simple and mean. Olorulus (talk) 09:04, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

I apologize if I seemed to be making fun of your English. That was not my intention, but merely to point out that the context (nothing to do with your English usage here, which was fine) made the characterization of Anonymous rather strange. You have already noticed that I adjusted your new version of this observation to include manuscript as well as early print sources. I do not, however, understand your criticism of "modern musicology" neglecting anonymous works. It is of course much easier to evaluate the corpus of one known artist than to try to make sense out of a miscellaneous body of work probably involving hundreds of different composers of unknown nationality, age, or reputation. There is no surer way of increasing the profile of an anonymous work that by attributing it, however tenuously, to a known historical figure, and there can be very few pieces of music that have caught the attention of scholars, performers, or the general public and yet remain firmly of anonymous authorship. Why should this be either strange or unfair?—Jerome Kohl (talk) 18:33, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

Anton Bruckner

Hello, Jerome -- I have just finished reading the article on Anton Bruckner. I came across a sentence that doesn't seem to fit. It is toward the end of the long paragraph that is the section Anton Bruckner#Study period. Here is the sentence:

• A devout Catholic who loved to drink beer, Bruckner was out of step with his contemporaries.

I can see nothing either before or after this to support or explain the second half of this sentence. Also, the connection between the first and second halves of the sentence is not clear. Are Catholics not supposed to drink beer? Does being a Catholic and loving beer make a man out of step? CorinneSD (talk) 04:57, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

I am not myself a Catholic, but I cannot say I have ever come across a claim that beer drinking is inconsistent with Catholicism. Perhaps it is simply a non sequitur. I would suggest putting a {{clarification needed}} tag on it, together with an editorial note explaining the need (for the benefit of the less than entirely sharp).—Jerome Kohl (talk) 05:04, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

O.K., thanks. CorinneSD (talk) 06:02, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

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Category:Scales with unusual key signatures

You may or may not be interested in Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2015 March 12#Category:Scales with unusual key signatures. Hyacinth (talk) 06:34, 16 March 2015 (UTC)

List of musical symbols

Re: this edit, I assume what the author meant was that pianissimo could be changed to pianississimo (=ppp) etc. by adding iss to the middle of the word. A little clumsily written, and really more detail than necessary on a summary page, but perfectly legitimate. —Wahoofive (talk) 16:12, 23 March 2015 (UTC)

Yes, that is what I assumed as well, but it was so badly written that I could not be sure, and it did look more than a little comical when taken at face value.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 16:15, 23 March 2015 (UTC)

Josephkleen's edits

Saw your revert in trombone I don't think Josephkleen is malicious, I think he's just a (probably youngish) idiot. He has edited baritone horn as well. I tried to clean it up without being too obvious, because he seems to think he knows more about brass instruments than he actually does. JacquesDelaguerre (talk) 00:32, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. My initial assumptin was much as you describe, but when he started reverting automatically without evidently reading my edit summaries (and without leaving any of his own), I began to think otherwise. Assuming good faith is well and good, up to a point, but when they start acting like vandals, it is difficult not to assume they are vandals.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 06:14, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

Ah. Okay, thanks. I'll keep my eyes open. JacquesDelaguerre (talk) 11:50, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

Baritone horn

JK ... I'm not a super expert wiki editor ... the range diagram on the baritone horn page is wrong, showing the low 1st partial all valves depressed as F₁ but it's E₁ (obviously, no cite needed, by the mechanism of the instrument). I don't know how those range diagrams are generated. If you know how to generate a new one that's correct ... :) JacquesDelaguerre (talk) 17:46, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, but I don't know how that particular one was made. Your best option would be to go to the image file on Wikimedia Commons to see if the creator of the file is named, and if he is currently active. If so, then a message can be left on the user's Talk page (or perhaps on the article Talk page with a ping to the user). Failing that, we can always create a new diagram, since it is not a very complicated one.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 17:51, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

I tried reaching out about a year ago and the user didn't respond. JacquesDelaguerre (talk) 17:54, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

Ah, yes, I see that this user appears not to have been active since 2007. In that case, let us make a corrected replacement image but, before we do so, let us be sure we have got our facts straight, with a reliable source to back up the changes. I am not a brass player of any sort, let alone a player of the baritone horn, so this is a purely theoretical exercise as far as I am concerned.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 18:11, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

Hmm, well, all modern three-valve brass work the same way, that's why they tend to be transposing instruments: the fingering is identical. Descending from notational C you go down a tritone to F♯. Since Baritone's transpositional C is B♭, its F♯ is E. Here's a chart based on the (more playable) 2nd partials. The pedal tones (the low note in the diagram refers to the lowest pedal tone) are the seven lowest notes in that chart but an octave lower. As you can see in the chart, which treats the baritone horn as a non-transposing instrument, the lowest note is E₂ so the pedal is E₁. I'm an alto horn player, which is like the bari, only up a perfect fourth, its transposing Middle C is E♭ below Middle C (E♭₃). Its lowest 2nd partial is A₂ and its lowest pedal is A₁. JacquesDelaguerre (talk) 18:55, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

I have taken the liberty of replacing the image in the infobox. The new image goes from E one line below the bass staff (8vb) to F on the top line of the treble staff. Since there is no way for me to get a seventh-position pedal tone on a trombone, nor have I tried to do that on the euph, I will take Jacques' word for it. The old image is still used in numerous articles in other languages, but just now I do not have time to clear up that mess.

(and thanks, Prof. K, for fixing Jambe de Fer's surname in the cello article. I had meant to go back and do that, but life's distractions intervened.) Just plain Bill (talk) 20:27, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for taking care of the illustration, Bill. A little less of the "professor" bit, please. I am not one now, nor have I ever been. "Jerry" will do or, if you insist on formality, "Dr. Kohl". You are most welcome for Jambe de Fer. As a matter of fact, I was brought up short myself when I saw that query about "who is this 'de Fer' guy?" It was only your adding the link that suddenly made the penny drop!—Jerome Kohl (talk) 21:34, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

Oops, sorry. Don't know where I got that notion to start with, but as of now it ceases. Thanks again for what you do here. Just plain Bill (talk) 22:26, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

Are you feeling OK?

Im sorry, but you current behaviour over citation requests on the Pentatonic article is uncharacteristically irrational - or to put it another way - we don't expect such a person like you to be so silly. Is thre anyone you can call, if you have problems? I am sincerely concerned about you. --Soundofmusicals (talk) 01:53, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

I dealt with the ancient Greece claim about two years ago, and left the rest stand, apart from the tag on Debussy (which ought to be covered by Benward and Saker, as it is in the musical example). I thought it would look so odd to have M. L. West in a book on ancient Greece as the only confirming source for everythingfrom the Tatras to Stephen Foster that someone would get embarrassed enough to at least find a source for the Impressionists. All that ethnomusicological stuff looks very impressive until you realize there is nothing to back it up. It has been long enough. When sources are found, any or all of it can be restored.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 01:58, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

OK, I'm relieved that you're not having a "spell" like the co-pilot of that Lufthansa jet! Really not my direct sphere (I'm certainly not a musicologist) so I'll leave you to it - I'm definitely not trying to get at you or anything. Just that the placing of the citation request seemed to refer to the Chopin, where I didn't see that as really needing it - rather than a load of other stuff in an earlier sentence - cites (and cite requests) are usually context specific. --Soundofmusicals (talk) 02:10, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

I take your point, though I imagine you can also see how tricky this can get when there is a rapid succession of specific claims, as in the present case. On the whole, I prefer not to carpet bomb an article, but when nobody will take the hint, there may be no alternative. The underlying problem in the present case is that the pentatonic scale is so ubiquitous. It is one thing to point to one Chopin étude as an example, but on reflection it must be admitted that this is an exception rather than the rule for Chopin. If this is so, then is it equally the case for Debussy, for American folk music, and so on. I mean, for heaven's sake, the opening phrase of Jerusalem is pentatonic, and probably for programmatic reasons, but this doesn't make the scale characteristic for Hubert Parry's music generally.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 02:39, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

Fair enough. It was the apparent "tone" of what you were saying and doing more than the content that was starting to concern me. It felt as if I was being yelled at (or am I a bit sensitive this morning? and you're obviously not the type of person one expects that kind of thing from. --Soundofmusicals (talk) 03:20, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

I suppose I was "yelling", though not at you. As I said , I probably dropped a way-too-subtle hint, and nobody noticed. So I got peeved. Sorry if you got caught in the cross-fire between me and my invisible (nonexistent?) opponents.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 06:11, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

As I've already said - good to have that sorted. Nothing to apologise for really - we all have "those days" (sez he!). -Soundofmusicals (talk) 23:59, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

Neume

Thanks for a quick delivery, and exceeding expectations on Neume. Now there's so much on etymology that I'm wondering if it would be better to put it in its own section, or in the history section. (To be exact, I think the perfect place would be Wiktionary, and I tried to enter it there, but was not very successful.) What do you think? — Sebastian 07:31, 30 March 2015 (UTC)

You are welcome. I agree that the etymology is now a little excessive, and really does not belong in the article's lead section. I see no reason why it should not remain in the article, but moved to a more appropriate location (perhaps its own section, as you suggest, or perhaps folded into a lengthened "Early history" section). This would not preclude adding it to Wiktionary, of course.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 15:37, 30 March 2015 (UTC)

Jules Massenet 2

Even if you agree with the edit, you'll enjoy the edit summary at Jules Massenet. [2] CorinneSD (talk) 00:49, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

Yes, that is very entertaining, thanks for alerting me to it. I liked Tim Riley's summary even better, when he reverted that edit.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 16:06, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

Maurice Ravel

Speak of the devil and he will come to you. Quite by chance, as it happens. I was looking in to see if you might be interested in a peer review I have put up for the Ravel article. I keep running across shrewd and authoritative edits by you in music articles (and now I look at your user page I can see why the edits are s. and a.), and I wonder if you might care to look in chez Ravel. Quite understand if not, naturally. Kind regards, Tim riley talk 15:41, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

I have noticed a flurry of activity on the Ravel article over the last few days, and wondered if something like this might be in the works. I shall have to check the rules to see whether I am allowed to do such a review (after all, I have edited the Ravel article myself in the past, though not extensively). If I am not disqualified, I shall be happy to do a peer review.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 22:45, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

Anyone is allowed to pitch in at peer review. You might possibly feel more inhibited about supporting/opposing at such time as the article is submitted for Featured Article candidacy, but at this stage you can pitch in with a will, and I hope you'll do so. Tim riley talk 09:56, 5 April 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. I had been confusing peer review with the GA and FA processes. I have already checked the peer-review page for the Ravel article, and see that many hands have already pitched in. I will try to get to this myself, though I have been occupied the last few days with a new article on Votre Faust, which still needs a lot of work.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 18:50, 5 April 2015 (UTC)

Well, absolutely no pressure on you from me. If you can look in I'll be delighted, but please don't think twice about it if other considerations make it inconvenient. Best wishes, Tim riley talk 21:00, 5 April 2015 (UTC)

Roman numeral analysis

The roman numerals for the natural minor are i-iio-III-iv-v-VI-VII-i. It does not have bIII, bVI and bVII in the natural minor diatonic scale as stated in the image I have deleted. The sources are from Tonal Harmony by Stephen Kostka and Dorothy Payne and Harmonic Practice in Tonal Music by Robert Gauldin. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Composer Unknown (talk • contribs) 22:56, 10 April 2015 (UTC)

You are only deleting half of the image tag, leaving a ragged fragment of it. This looks plainly like vandalism. If you have got a problem with the image, bring it up on the Talk page, and get it corrected. Don't just remove it with no comment.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 23:33, 10 April 2015 (UTC)

Baddish rewrite

Hello - could you please have a quick look here? - it's been a bit of a mess for a while and I am not sure how to fix it as it's not my topic. Thanks! DBaK (talk) 07:33, 16 April 2015 (UTC)

Oops. That was my baddish, wasn't it? I agree with your strategy of removing actual names in favour of generic descriptions ("major producers"), since we are not exactly dealing with celebrities, and adding one person automatically provokes the addition of dozens of other unfamiliar names. Record production isn't my topic, either, but that article is on my watchlist because of the electronic-music connection.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 16:00, 16 April 2015 (UTC)

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooo I'm so sorry; I have been totally unclear. The baddishness to which I was referring was in MY attempt to sort it out, not yours. I was just slightly disconcerted because your perfectly sensible removal - that is, reversion, really - of a name left a hole which, bizarrely, had been there for quite some time before its most recent er er er infilling. So I felt I should tidy that up, and one thing led to another, and here we are. But I make no claims at all for the quality of what I wrote; rather the opposite! What I have now left there is sort of OK but not very: please feel very free to sort it out! But no, really, I would not under any circumstances be accusing you of baddish editing! With best wishes DBaK (talk) 19:35, 16 April 2015 (UTC)

Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees, I should have noticed that my reversion left that awkward hole, never mind that it had been there before. I don't see any urgency to convert that sentence from its current, rather utilitarian character into the proverbial silk purse but, now that you have called my attention to it, I shall try to think of something better to do with it.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 00:27, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

Bruckner

The recording of ONE symphony is obviously not nearly sufficient to characterize Boulez as "being known" for his performances of Bruckner symphonies. AlterBerg (talk) 20:34, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

In the body of the article, one of Boulez's several Bruckner symphony recordings (the Eighth) is singled out for special mention. Since the lede ought to honestly reflect the article's content, it seems to me that Bruckner ought to be included. It is also true (though this is not documented in the article itself) that Boulez's performances of Bruckner before live audiences (as opposed to his recordings) have been well received.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 21:57, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

Revert

Jerome, I probably shouldn't have reverted your revert.

Perhaps we can find a way of not stating point-blank that tonality is based on a central tone. There are strong technical reasons for delineating the tonal period (15/16–19 century) on the basis of a central triad, not a central tone. Perhaps more inclusive wording can be found, referencing not only the existing source, but one or two others? Tony (talk) 10:23, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

If you reverted my revert, then, no, you should not have. It is totally unacceptable to alter actual quotations from reliable sources, simply because your mistaken ideas are not confirmed by them. Similarly, it will not do to change the lede section to conflict with the cited material in the article itself. The lede is meant to summarize the article, not initiate a debate with it. You are clearly bent on changing the article to focus exclusively on tonality₈, to the exclusion of the other seven senses of the word. If you can figure out a way of retitling the article to reflect this, and then split out the other senses into one or more new articles, then I certainly will not stand in your way but I doubt that this is possible. For one thing, it is an ingrained habit for most people to speak of "tonality" as if it were a single monolithic entity about which "everybody knows" the meaning, intuitively, at least. For another, it is a polemical issue (as the New Grove article makes very clear, though with too much emphasis (in my opinion) on Schoenberg, and not enough on more recent theorists of popular music (the less-highly regarded ones—again, in my opinion). A third issue is that theory of tonality is generally confused with the actual practice of what this theory is meant to describe. That practice, for example in Schubert's compositions, is a fixed entity (that is, the notes in the scores are the same now as they were when the ink was still wet), but theories have changed wildly over the past century, so that explanations of what "tonality" might mean in Schubert (by comparison with, say, Mozart on the one hand and Wagner on the other) varies over time. (Keep in mind that even the sense of tonality₈ only began to come into existence late in Schubert's lifetime, and was not fully articulated until half a century later.) None of this can be summed up in a beginner's textbook like Benward and Saker (about which you have yourself expressed some reservations), but it lies right at the heart of what is wrong with the "Tonality" article at present: a titanic struggle has been going on for several years now between forces that want to make it simple and straightforward (I believe you are on this side) and others who want it to accurately reflect reality. I am certainly on the latter side, though at the same time I want to make this very complicated subject as comprehensible as possible.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 15:59, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

"English Horn"

Hi Jerome:

French Wikipedia gives five different derivations of the name of the instrument. It says that the matter is under debate. Spanish Wikipedia (the only other language I can read fluently) is quite definite that the name came from cor anglẻ, meaning "bent horn". It gives the following reference:

Michael Finkelman, "Oboe: III. Larger and Smaller European Oboes, 4. Tenor Oboes, (iv) English Horn", The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell (London: Macmillan Publishers, 2001)

I haven't read it. Maybe you'd find it interesting.

When I was a kid in England in the 1950s, I remember a music teacher at school teaching us the cor anglẻ derivation He may have been wrong in this case, but generally he knew what he was talking about.

Of course I agree with you that Wikipedia is not a reliable source. That's why I edit it!

Cheers.

DOwenWilliams (talk) 20:28, 3 May 2015 (UTC)

(talk page stalker)I'm looking at that Grove reference online right now (thank you Haringey libraries, thank you thank you) and it says: "The open-belled straight tenor oboe and particularly the flare-belled oboe da caccia reminded people of the angels’ horns depicted in medieval and later religious imagery, especially in German-speaking central Europe. In Middle (High) German, the word engellisch meant ‘angelic’ (as engelgleichin modern Hochdeutsch). With the Middle German word for ‘England’ being Engellant, the word engellisch also meant ‘English’. These dual meanings naturally became conflated, and ‘angel's horn’ thus became ‘English horn’. This unlikely epithet remained with the curved, bulb-belled tenor oboe even after the oboe da caccia had faded (c1760) and in the absence of any better denominations." That article, in its current form, certainly does NOT mention the cor anglẻ idea. A couple of others do mention it, but not the Finkelman; where it is mentioned, it is said to be "possibly" or "maybe" a corruption ... but no stronger than that, that I have found yet anyway. Hope this helps. best wishes DBaK (talk) 20:47, 3 May 2015 (UTC)

Hi, guys. I take it from this discussion that neither of you have actually looked at the paragraph in the article Cor anglais where this angle (if you will pardon the expression) is discussed. I inserted this sentence myself to replace an earlier, unsourced claim and if New Grove had discussed the problem, I would certainly have included it. Instead, I cited four sources that do discuss this etymology: Michael Kennedy's Oxford Dictionary of Music, A. J. Greimas's Dictionnaire de l'ancien français jusqu'au milieu du XIV siècle, Adam Carse's Musical Wind Instruments, and Sybil Marcuse's Musical Instruments: A Comprehensive Dictionary. The first two sources broach this theory, the second two contest it, "on grounds that there is no evidence of the term cor anglé before it was offered as a possible origin of anglais in the 19th century." What is interesting here (and, I must add, entirely typical of the Wikipedia reliability problem) is that the Spanish Wikipedia cites an English-language source that utterly fails to support the claim. This needs at least to be challenged on Spanish Wikipedia or, better, be changed there to reflect our far more ample discussion of this proposed etymology here on English Wikipedia. Perhaps, DOwenWilliams, you would like to take care of this, as your Spanish is probably better than my own?

I notice, by the way, that the French Wikipedia article has no sources at all, and there is a "réf. nécessaire" tag on one portion of the etymology discussion. FWIW, the German Wikipedia claims the "anglé" derivation is the "Wahrscheinlichster Ursprung des Namens" ("most likely origin of the name") but, like the French Wikipedia, is utterly devoid of sources. Both the Hungarian and Hebrew Wikipedias appear to have condensed versions of the German, and of course no sources. Portuguese Wikipedia is more cautious, and does actually cite a website (in English) with a short self-published essay that looks suspiciously like it may be based on the English Wikipedia article: The Origin of the name "English Horn". Catalan Wikipedia reflects the English Wikipedia exactly, though like the French and German, it cites no sources. Esperanto Wikipedia cites no sources, but appears to give the same balanced view as Portuguese and Catalan. Czech Wikipedia is absolutely certain that the name derives from anglé, but this extremely short article also has no sources at all. The Dutch Wikipedia seems to be the best of all, citing one source each for and against the anglé etyology (the first in French—to the shame of the French Wikipedia—and the second in Dutch). I am also able to read (with a dictionary) the Simple English Wikipedia article, which says "many weasels people" believe the "anglé" theory though, again, no source is offered. I cannot read Japanese at all, but the Japanese Wikipedia cites exactly the four sources I put into the English article, so I suppose it must be translated from English Wikipedia. A quick check of the Finnish Wikipedia (another language I cannot read) also shows that it has no sources, but it mentions this dubious etymology all the same. Most of the other Wikipedia articles on the instrument are extremely short, and few if any mention this etymological wrinkle.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 23:32, 3 May 2015 (UTC)

I hope Wikidata doesn't have an "etymology of instrument" field, or they will no doubt go with the Spanish! Johnbod (talk) 02:36, 4 May 2015 (UTC)

No tengo ninguna problema con eso. ¡Ojalá solo que los franceses no tomará ninguna parte en esto! (Nota para algunas francófonos que lean esto: se trata de una broma. Todo el mundo respeta profundamente su cultura y erudición.)—Jerome Kohl (talk) 15:20, 4 May 2015 (UTC)

Bariolage

I would appreciate if you could take a look at bariolage. Hyacinth (talk) 06:45, 5 May 2015 (UTC)

Sure thing.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 16:24, 5 May 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. Hyacinth (talk) 08:47, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

Ondes Martenot: Cynthia Millar

Hi Jerome,
re your last edit removing non-notable ondes Martenot players: I believe Cynthia Millar does indeed belong on this list. She is THE ondiste in the USA, especially Hollywood, having played on over 100 film scores, especially for Elmer Bernstein, but also for Richard Rodney Bennett, Maurice Jarre, Henry Mancini, and Miklos Rozsa. Whenever you hear an ondes Martenot in a Hollywood film score, chances are high it was Cynthia Millar. Best, Martin -- megA (talk) 07:40, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

I had very similar thoughts on seeing that edit – she is well known in the UK too – but until we have an article on her, or at least a good reference, I don't think we can justify including her on that list. --Deskford (talk) 08:48, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

Deskford has taken the words right out of my mouth. I had never before heard of Cynthia Millar, though I am not especially well-acquainted with the worlds either of ondes-Martenot performance in general or of Hollywood film-studio recording in particular. If in fact Millar is so widely known, then she certainly deserves a biographical article on Wikipedia, for which it should not be difficult to find the necessary reliable sources. This would in turn automatically solve the problem of how to differentiate her from the two other red-linked names I removed in that same edit.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 20:27, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

Yes, I suspected that that would be the problem. It might take some time to draw up an article, as I am very busy right now, but would this list from the Discogs database be a reliable source for it, as a starting point? I suspect that most information would be available from CD credits (which are compiled on Discogs), concert programmes, composer interviews, etc. -- megA (talk) 03:41, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

I don't think that a list of recordings by itself counts as a reliable source, but with a list that long, it shouldn't be too difficult to find a few third-party sources that can be used to verify notability.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 03:50, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

Thank you. This looks like some work ;-) Will need some time... -- megA (talk) 18:14, 22 May 2015 (UTC)

Horn again

I had plans for this morning and spent it changing French horn to Natural in the Baroque works on my watchlist. (I had changed most earlier, but still many). How about Mozart? French horn in a work by the 12-year-old feels wrong. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:06, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

I have already changed the links in at least two of the Mozart entries (Symphony No. 40 and one of the Horn Concertos) to "natutal horn". Mozart died in 1791, and the valve mechanism we identify with the term "French" first came into existence only in 1815. (A number of years ago I heard Hermann Baumann play Mozart's Third Concerto on modern valved horn. He nonetheless played the C minor passage in the central portion of the rondo movement with hand-stopping, because that strange, muted sound is what Mozart would have gotten by suddenly modulating to that key for a horn in E♭. This was not explained in the programme notes, and I'm sure that many in the audience thought he was doing something weird to make his performance sound "avant-garde".)

A more difficult problem is what to do with, say, the Berlioz Requiem article. Although this work was written a few years after the valve horn was invented, and although Berlioz was a great enthusiast for new inventions, it is unlikely that many horn players even in Paris were playing the new-fangled contraptions, and it would take a careful examination of the score to determine whether he wrote his horn parts for natural or valved horns. Indeed, even if the parts are entirely playable on natural horns, this would not be conclusive evidence, since on the one hand "lipping" and hand-horn techniques (combined with crook changes) permit the natural horn to play notes that one might think available only on the valved instrument and, on the other, composers' habits continue to favour writing the kind of parts characteristic of natural horns long after valved horns became the norm in orchestras after about 1860. We know, for example, that Brahms continued to write his horn parts for the natural instrument, long after they had largely disappeared from the orchestra. Doubtless he thought it was a passing fad, and he didn't want to write music that would no longer be playable, once these impractical machines were no longer anything but rusting junk. Charles-Marie Widor, in his manual of orchestration published in 1904, still describes the natural trumpet and horn, and recommends that the budding composer learn to write his horn parts for the natural instrument, both for the discipline and because the parts will be more grateful to even the valved instrument. That change of article name has stirred up a whole nest of worms that were undoubtedly not foreseen by the editors who decided (against all the evidence) that a consensus had been reached in favour of the change.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 20:59, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

Thank you, enlightening! - What can we do, about the article and the works? - It's a bit as if they had moved "keyboard instruments" to piano, and then replaced all keyboard instrument by piano, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 21:52, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

I think the best thing is to let events play out. I believe it will eventually become evident to everyone that this name-change was a huge mistake, but I would not like to see it moved back until a lot of people have expended a lot of effort changing all those links. Only when they have completed this Herculean task should the article name be reverted, so that they can change all the links back again. I think that sounds fair, don't you?—Jerome Kohl (talk) 22:00, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

Horn (instrument) is now an article.

Please note that Horn (instrument) is now an article, and no longer a redirect. Cheers! bd2412 T 01:41, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

Yes, I only just discovered this after reverting your change. My apologies. I do fear there is going to be trouble over this new article, but you have certainly got my support.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 01:43, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

About the Years in music tables

I used the small tags to keep the table from breaking. Or is it just my computer?

I think fitting the information to the table makes it easier to read and grasp. And I thought keeping the tables aligned had precedence over font size. But if most users prefer having everything in the same size rather than having it aligned I won't use this tag anymore, I don't really mind since I can shrink the font via CRTL + mouse (actually I think it's better with everything shrunk one font size). Pakhtakorienne (talk) 12:34, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

I think it must be just your computer. When I resize the window on my browser (I use different versions of Safari on different Macintosh computers, all with the same result), the column widths change and the text within each cell wraps differently. It is similar when I change viewing size within a fixed window (which I think is what you are doing with the "CTRL + mouseclick" function on your browser).

Let me take the opportunity to thank you for initiating the recent activity on the "classical music" sections of the "1950s [and I see now moving on to the 1960s] in music" lists. Although like some other editors I find the flag icons rather garish, this seems perfectly in keeping with the way the pop-music sections are managed on many of these pages, and so supplies a certain balance in terms of catching readers' eyes. I wonder if similar tables should be created for the "compositions" section which, as things stand, look like a poor relative of the "premieres" tables. In table format, the "compositions" section could break out the scoring information into a separate column, and perhaps add columns for things like commissions and dedicatees. What do you think?—Jerome Kohl (talk) 16:50, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

Hypermetre

Hi Jerome—I see that you've edited the article on metre. Are you familiar with the literature on hypermetre? I ask because I'll be publishing on the area towards the end of this year, and at some stage would appreciate knowing your opinions or getting feedback from you. Tony (talk) 12:04, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

Hi Tony. I am not very familiar with the literature on hypermetre, though I am superficially acquainted with the concept. Like all amateurs, I am always pleased to tell you professionals where you are going wrong ;-) so, by all means feel free to ask!—Jerome Kohl (talk) 16:53, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you kindly; it won't be for a while yet—I hope to complete the analytical tasks over the next month or two; the writing up will take at least another month or two. Tony (talk) 05:45, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

Twelve-tone, dodecaphonic, etc.

Having taken the Monty Python and the Holy Grail option over at EAR (i.e. "Ayeee! Run away! Run away!), I do have a decidedly low-brow question: I'm one of those persons who had some musical exposure (played trombone in the elementary, junior high, and high school stage "big band" and marching bands), but because my small school didn't have an orchestra, all of that was pretty much jazz and marching band and popular tune stuff. I don't recall any classical pieces and if we had them, they didn't come with any theory or real education about classical music. (Not that we got much on the rest, either; it was more of a "Here, play this." situation.)

Having said that, I've listened to and enjoyed quite a bit of classical music through the years, but I've never quite understood the appeal of — and I'm not sure of my terminology here — atonal music. (Though I must say that in preparation for writing this note I pulled up Spotify and am listening to Schoenberg's Suite for Piano, Op. 25, played by Roland Pöntinen and am enjoying it, which hasn't been my experience with this kind of music in the past.) Ultimately, I suppose my question is this: Is appreciation of this kind of music more intellectual than appreciation of the prior forms of classical music were or was intellectualization always really in the forefront among the cognoscenti? I know that among true classical music aficionados that intellectualism — knowledge of the structure, context, history, and music theory (and ?) — is a substantial part of the appreciation, but for the rest of us who are ignorant of such things (I wish I wasn't, perhaps that's something I'll pursue after I retire) with the older music even the great unwashed could say, "Gee, that sure is purty." That's much more difficult with atonality (and with progressive jazz, let me add). Has intellectualism taken the forefront over the "purty" in modern classical music, or was the "purty" never really the point in the first place?

After having written the foregoing, I was flitting through the classical music articles and found the quote by Karel Goeyvaerts attached here Serialism#Reactions to and against serialism, comparing Anton Webern's work to that of Piet Mondrian. Having taken a art history class, I have at least a basic appreciation of nonrepresentational art (and, indeed, Mondrian is one of my favorite artists, especially his post-1918 grid-based paintings), that at least in the most nonrepresentational forms that they're only about what they are, not about what they represent. (And with that understanding, you can then understand work which is abstract in part and representational in part.) Is that the key to understanding atonal music, too, that it's about enjoying those works for just what they are rather than some predefined concept of beauty?

Or does all of this just entirely miss the point and display entrenched ignorance and low-brow taste? I'm open for education or, perhaps, just some references if you don't care to do it yourself. And, indeed, I won't be offended if you just take the Monty Python approach and tell me to figure it our for myself: I know I'm asking a lot here. Best regards, and thanks in advance, TransporterMan (TALK) 16:30, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

Having myself adopted the Holy Grail approach on many occasions, I can sympathize with your position! The direct answer to your question is: your approach with the Schoenberg Op. 25 is the right one—just listen to it. If you like it, great; if you don't, then you at least know it is the actual music you don't care for, rather than some irrelevant academic babble. Most listeners wouldn't recognize a tonality if it walked up and slapped them in the face with a wet fish, so why should atonality be any different? Music comes in such a wide variety of styles, sizes, shapes, and colors that there is no point in complicating your life by worrying about whether details of its construction might either enable or prevent your enjoying it. I think it is sad when people find themselves recoiling from a piece of music because someone has slapped onto it a label in a language they cannot read. The analogy to Mondrian (whose "grid" paintings are also amongst my favorite art works, though perhaps for different reasons than your own) is apt, but not perfect. Music is seldom if ever capable of being "representational" in the way a painting or sculpture can be, and when for example it tries to depict the devious intricacies of a murder mystery in a country house, the results are seldom attractive. The main thing is to recognize that every sort of music comes with both a few good and a lot of bad examples, but that on the other hand your personal preferences are not likely to be guided first and foremost by ethical principles. Beauty, as they say, is in the eye of the beholder. Don't let intellectual clutter block your view. The Danish composer Carl Nielsen was once asked by his young daughter why he did not write "prettier" music, and he replied, "If I take up my sword and strike a stone so that sparks fly, is that not also beautiful?" I think this was in reference to his Chaconne for piano. It might be a tonal or an atonal piece, or somewhere in between, I really have no idea and I don't care, but I do know that the sparks fly when the sword meets the stone, and it is indeed beautiful. That is all that matters. Enjoy your adventure.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 17:52, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for your response. Sometimes enjoyment is in just finding the right one. My bad experiences in the past with atonal music were symphonic and until today I may not have ever listened to piano music of that kind. Perhaps the symphonic was just too complex for me to grasp the underlying beauty. Simplicity is also one of the reasons I prefer Mondrian over, say, Pollock. Not surprising, I suppose, because I also like the elegance-through-simplicity of the Arts and Crafts movement and the expression of wabi-sabi in the Japanese esthetic (and that's something I had not put together and realized about myself until this point in time, so thank you for that opportunity as well). Best regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 20:41, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

My pleasure. Perhaps your bad experience with symphonic atonal music was the misfortune to have heard a really lousy piece of music—or a very poor performance of a good piece. You are unlikely to get Mondrian-like simplicity from a work for symphony orchestra, although there are exceptions (Webern's Six Pieces for Orchestra comes to mind, or some pieces by Feldman). If you are in a contemplative mood, an energetic orchestral blast is not going to work well, any more than a peaceful, slow piano piece will be satisfying when you are all jazzed up and ready to dance. I personally am almost as fond of Pollock as I am of Mondrian, though of course they are very different painters, and I have never had the opportunity of seeing a Pollock "in the flesh". (The passage you mention from Goeyvaerts includes an expression of disappointment when he finally had the opportunity of seeing Mondrian's actual canvasses, which seemed very rough and imperfect compared to the reproductions he had seen in magazines and books. This "imperfection" is deliberate and involves some surprising facets of Mondrian's technique, which is one thing that fascinates me about his paintings.) You may wish to know that there is a connection between the Arts and Crafts movement and early atonal music, since the former inspired the Bauhaus aesthetic of simplicity and functionality, and Schoenberg was closely associated with Bauhaus artists (in fact he was also a painter, who exhibited canvases alongside those of Kandinsky and Marc). Mondrian also had Bauhaus connections. But now I am trying to fill your head with ideas which, as I said, is the wrong way to go about things. The conductor Sir Thomas Beecham once famously said that the British concert-going public does not understand music, "they only like the noise it makes." I think this is usually understood as an expression of exasperation with his audiences, but it could just as well be a compliment: they have no need to intellectualise about something they simply enjoy for what it is. The main thing is that you don't have to like all noises indiscriminately—you are allowed to choose the ones you prefer.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 22:29, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you very much. I'm tempted to try to keep this going so I can mine you for suggestions: I listened to Webern's Six Pieces, which I thoroughly enjoyed, and am listening to Feldman's Trio, which is a bit more challenging but still enthralling, and I have to say that I do now begin to understand the appeal of modern classical music. So, that's the answer to my initial question and I particularly appreciate you taking the time to help me get here. If I can impose on you for one last thing, I do a lot of dispute resolution here at WP and I hope I may call on you for advice if I ever get stuck in a case on a musical matter. Best regards and thanks again, TransporterMan (TALK) 03:52, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

You're on the right track, that's for sure. If you found Feldman's Trio somewhat hard going, I might suggest trying Rothko Chapel or Coptic Light—two of my favorite Feldman pieces. Rothko Chapel is meditative and peaceful, Coptic Light hypnotic but internally energetic. Amongst the "classics", Schoenberg's Variations for Orchestra and Berg's Violin Concerto are particularly easy on the ear, though the Berg is a bit of a "cheat", since he does his best to write "tonally" while using the twelve-tone technique. Berg's Lyric Suite is also very accessible, I find.

Of course I would be happy to give advice on musical matters whenever you like.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 04:56, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

Ralph Shapey

Hi! I noticed that you removed the infobox for Ralph Shapey. If I may ask, why? You stated that it was because the infobox contained information "not supported by the article," but as far as I can tell, all the infobox contained were Shapey's birth and death places and dates, and the fact that he was a composer, violinist, conductor, and educator. Were any of these facts not adequately supported by the citation of his obituary? If you would like, I can provide more evidence of the locations and dates of his birth and death. Michael.A.R.Lee (talk) 23:16, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

As an example, there is a line in that template for "background", and it was filled by "composer", which is at least foolish. In general, composer infoboxes are a bad idea for reasons enumerated at: Wikipedia:WikiProject Composers#Biographical infoboxes. Not everyone agrees with these reasons, but I do, and so do a substantial number of the editors who work on "classical" music articles.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 23:22, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

Understood, thanks! Michael.A.R.Lee (talk) 18:22, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

Shamanism in Siberia

Hello, Jerome -- If you want an unusual task, you might look at Shamanism in Siberia#Songs, music. I made some judicious copy-edits but could go no further because I was not familiar with the subject matter. It seems this was written by a non-native speaker of English. I think only someone knowledgeable about this topic can make further improvements to the prose. There are parts that are barely comprehensible. The part about yoiks, in particular, needs attention. CorinneSD (talk) 02:40, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm afraid I'm out of my depth here, as well. This section has very little to do with music per se, but seems instead to concentrate on the imitation of nature sounds in music. The only thing that puzzles me is how there can be non-onomatopoeic imitation of nature sounds. I thought that was the definition of onomatopoeia.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 05:26, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you!

		The Music Barnstar
		For all your work on Lituus and Medieval lituus, I thank you. The latter was one of the articles I worked on early in my wiki-career and I see now that it was deficient in several ways. I am glad to see interest in improving it. Laser brain (talk) 13:12, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you. It is always gratifying to learn that my efforts are appreciated. There is still work to be done with those articles, but I have enjoyed learning something about a group of instruments about which I had little inkling before coming across your own work.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 16:10, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

P. G. Wodehouse

Hello, Jerome -- I've made a few copy-edits to P. G. Wodehouse, including adding no-break spaces after the period in initials, and those have been reverted. I checked on MOS and it says to add the spaces. I left a note at WP:Peer Review in the on-going peer review of P. G. Wodehouse under the heading "Comments from CorinneSD". Some of the other editors say to ignore that rule in MOS. I tried to find the guidance in the Chicago Manual of Style on-line, but since I don't have a subscription, it is not available to me. I wonder if you have access to the Chicago Manual of Style or the MLA style guide. I wonder if this is an American English/British English difference. CorinneSD (talk) 16:53, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

I do have an older edition of the Chicago Manual at home, and access to the current 16th edition in my institution's library. It is also possible to get limited preview access through the Amazon website. I think the issue with not breaking initials at line ends may not be entirely straightforward, since my preliminary glance at the Chicago Manual does not find a definitive answer to your question. The Wikipedia Style Manual, however, should prevail here. My personal taste would be not to let a break occur between the P and the G, but to allow one after the G. I shall take a look at the edit history of the P. G. Wodehouse article and see if there are any issues there beyond style manual prescriptions.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 18:00, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply and your sleuthing, Jerome. Perhaps I wasn't clear, and the discussion about this at Peer Review is kind of evolving, but the issue isn't specifically whether there should be a non-breaking space between initials but (to my surprise) seems to be whether there should be any space at all after the first initial. CorinneSD (talk) 18:56, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

See the latest comment. Here's the link to the discussion. [3] If they have their way, names beginning with two initials will now look like this: P.G. Wodehouse instead of P. G. Wodehouse (and this may lead to changing many WP article titles). CorinneSD (talk) 19:01, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

I have seen that practice as well, and it sometimes makes me laugh because it is an antiquated kludge from the days before HTML added the   function sometime in the late 1980s. A similar "feature" (let us not call it a "bug") on Wikipedia is the use of suspension points (…) instead of ellipses (. . .), but with the substitution of the word "ellipses" for "suspension" and, to put the icing on the cake, the deprecation of the case suspension points (…) in favour of unspaced periods (...). Suspension points are of course the standard mark used in most European languages, but not in English (one thing at least that American and UK practice agrees on), which universally (except on Wikipedia) uses spaced ellipses instead. This is so quaint! Five hundred years of evolution in typography, wiped out in a decade by computer scientists who aren't yet old enough to drive! This is even worse than Microsoft redefining "ellipse" as "oval", and then trying to concoct a new word for the one they just got done misappropriating. What next?—Jerome Kohl (talk) 19:13, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

See SchroCat's reply to my comment at [4]. I don't think he proved that no space after the period of the first initial is really British usage, and I don't think he understood my rhetorical question. CorinneSD (talk) 04:38, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

I did look at SchroCat's reply, and would have responded to it had the discussion not already been closed by the time I got there. A little researcxh shows that indeed this is a British usage—a minority one, which I suspect is fed by the usual misplaced anti-American sentiments that also support -ise endings over the -ize endings that were all but universal in British usage up until about 1920 (with exactly four exceptions), and still upheld as the standard in so-called Times/Oxford English. As for the spacing of initials, the New Oxford Style Manual (the latest edition of Hart's Rules) is probably the last word on the subject, so far as British usage is concerned. On p. 101 it says: "Initials before a surname are separated by full points, with a space after each: J. S. Bach, E. H. Shepherd, Hunter S. Thompson, although some modern designs, particularly those of newspapers, omit the full points and spaces: MR James, PJ Harvey George W Bush. Normally, names given entirely in initials have points but no spaces (J.A.S., E.H.S., J.R.R.T.) When people are commonly known by their free-standing initials, these forms have neither points nor spaces (FDR, LBJ)." Notice here the name "J.R.R.T.", given, as stated, "entirely in initials"—not when initials are used with a surname, which according to the stated rule should be spaced: "J. R. R. Tolkien". One does nevertheless see the unspaced-with-surname form as a variant in some British sources, most notably biographies of P. G. Wodehouse. I find this ironic, since the rabid anti-Americans tend to be rather far left on the political spectrum, whereas Wodehouse tilted decidedly in the opposite direction.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 05:29, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm skeptical about the existence of national differences: Hollywood sometimes omits spaces and Penguin Books has changed its mind. Other surprising variants are ETAHoffman (this might well be a national style; German seems to use CPEBach, C.Ph.E Bach and K. P. E. Bach alike) and H D Wells, unless GBS' take is an artifact of digitalization. Sparafucil (talk) 06:54, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

You are undoubtedly correct. Various house styles account for many differences in such matters, regardless of nationality. What really matters here is Wikipedia's house style. Unfortunately, in too many areas this remains unresolved. This is highly unprofessional but, then, Wikipedia is not at root a professional organization, is it?—Jerome Kohl (talk) 17:02, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

Well, thanks for the information, Jerome. I've noticed that whenever I'm editing an article at the same time as SchroCat, we differ on punctuation and capitalization, and s/he never bends. Perhaps it's not too late to share the information you found, on the P. G Wodehouse talk page, SchroCat's talk page, or the P. B. Wodehouse FA review talk page. (I thought the PR discussion was closed rather quickly, though.) I hadn't realized there was anti-American sentiment among British English-speaking editors to that extent. I thought it was more of an age thing, with the younger editors more used to texting and preferring to communicate with as few written words (and letters, and punctuation) as possible. Thanks for sharing your thoughts and links, Sparafucil . CorinneSD (talk) 21:43, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

The age thing may also be a factor but I have run into quite a few Brits (not only on Wikipedia) who are quite zealous about rooting out what they perceive as "Americanisms" from their language. Often they are perfectly correct in identifying Americanisms, but in other cases (the -ise endings I mentioned, for example) they are unaware that their own preferred usage is a recently developed Briticism, and their preference may not be shared by all their countrymen. If you are an American and SchroCat is a Brit (or vice versa), then you are bound to have differences on matters of style. The WP:ENGVAR guidelines advise remaining as "international" as possible, but there come times when a choice must be made to adopt one or another regional style of English. When there are variations within one national style (as is plainly the case here), it would seem best to choose the variation that is most widely accepted internationally. But when an editor or group of editors stubbornly insist that their favo(u)rite variant is actually "the only" national style (or that maintaining the most distinctively nationalistic style is of paramount importance), it can be difficult to convince them otherwise.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 22:17, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

Hello, Jerome. Corinne recommended this discussion, and I found it most interesting, particularly your 'exactly four exceptions', which I'd never come across. I can think of eight verbs that end in the sound -ize that I can't remember ever seeing spelt that way: advertise, comprise, compromise, despise, disguise, exercise, surmise and surprise (not counting Jane Austen's 'surprize'). So which should I remove from that list? Rothorpe (talk) 19:30, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

Hello, Rothorpe. I see I did not express myself very well. What I meant to say is that there are exactly four exceptions to the agreement between US and Oxford-UK usage regarding -ze vs -se endings. As far as I am aware, none of the words you cite are ever spelled with an -ize ending in American English. The four exceptions are "analyse", "dialyse", "electrolyse", and "paralyse"—always spelled with a Z in US English, always with an S in UK English. All four, by the way, have y rather than i, strongly implying derivation from the Greek which, according to the rule given in the OED should mandate Z instead of S. However, due to the convoluted thinking of CT Onions (also known as C.T. Onions or C. T. Onions ;-) and his band of merry lexicographers, these words (though Greek in origin) actually entered English via French, and so retain the French spelling with S. My brain hurts. I think I need to sit down.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 21:35, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

Thanks, very interesting. I assume there are no other -yse/-yze words. I hope you've made a full recovery. Rothorpe (talk) 00:29, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

They all seem to be from nouns ending in -lusis (I'll spare you and myself the Greek letters), loosening, so not surprisingly a small class. So presumably the American Z is merely by analogy with the -ize verbs? Rothorpe (talk) 01:17, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

As I understand it, American practice assumes a Greek origin for these words, whereas British practice assumes derivation from French (albeit ultimately from the Greek). It seems an awfully fine distinction to me, but the excuses matter less than the facts of how things are done.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 02:00, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Indeed, thanks. Rothorpe (talk) 03:25, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Your edit in the article Microtonal music

Dear colleague, you replaced 'modern Russian music theory uses' with 'some modern Russian theorists use'. The situation here is exactly reverse: the term 'microchromatics' (and related 'microchromatic interval') is fixed in all Russian dedicated encyclopedias and dictionaries, e.g. in the 'Music of the 20th century' dictionary by Levon Akopyan, 'Russian Grove Dictionary', in the universal Great Russian encyclopedia etc., in several Ph.D. dissertations (authors coming from Moscow, Ekaterinburg, Vladivostok, that is from all Russia), in the textbooks for musicologists (as 'Theories of modern composition of music' by the Moscow Conservatory), while some musicologists use 'микротоновая музыка' indeed, following English sources, however even those 'some' do not use 'микротоника' and 'микротональность'. Would you revert your edit please, or should I load the article with a dozen of references, all in Russian language? Olorulus (talk) 07:14, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

Do please feel free to load the article with your references. I have got three (in Russian, and all published in Russia) that use микротоновая музыка instead of "microchormatics" (two from 2011 and one from 2013). None of them, it is true, is a dictionary or encyclopedia, but it only takes one example to demonstrate that not all Russian musicologists adhere to Kholopov's terminology, and you yourself admit that there are exceptions—so what is the problem? I would be happy to replace "some" with "most", if you can come up with a reasonably authoritative source that says this is the case, but to say "all" would be foolish when it is so easy to demonstrate this is false.

As for those ill-advised possible derivative terms 'микротоника' and 'микротональность', as far as I am aware their equivalents in German, French, Italian, Dutch, or Spanish, do not occur any more than they do in Russian. Unfortunately, "microtonality" in the sense of "tonality using micro-intervals" (not "tonality with only a weak sense of tonal centre") has been used in English by at least two writers, to describe their own theoretical explanations of harmonic systems in ekmelic (or xenharmonic, or ultrachromatic, or whatever you care to call it) music. Up to this point I have refrained from adding these examples, but shall do so if required. I wonder, too, if we should not include the preferred practices of other languages than just English and Russian, in order to give some world-wide context for what may or may not be an inter-lingual consensus on what the best choice of term is for this phenomenon.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 23:55, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

I never told 'all Russian musicologists', my rendition was 'Modern Russian music theory uses' etc., please don't ascribe me statements I did not do. As I understand the purposes of Wikipedia, it is to represent the common order of things as common, and exceptional view as exceptional. Your edit distorted this overall principle implying the new sense that 'some use this, some use that...' Don't you feel? Common things are established in dictionaries, encyclopedias, textbooks. Examples happily landed in the Google Database, which you found, might be just exceptional 'examples'. If I am wrong in my encyclopedic assumptions, please correct me. Olorulus (talk) 08:28, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

Olorulus, thanks for your contributions, which are appreciated. On this occasion, I think Jerome is exercising a caution grounded in logic. Tony (talk) 11:18, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you Tony1, for clarifying a fine point: I indeed prefer to err on the side of caution here. To Olorulus I wish to say that I did not find those three citations with a Google search; they are listed in RILM, a resource which I find more useful than Google when it come to finding reliable sources.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 13:52, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for all your recent edits, especially for conformity of English Wikipedian reference tagging, a real bête noire for me. As for 'caution' principles, for me 'cautious' was and is to apply directly to a native speaker who is inside the tradition, to clarify what is 'common' (say, 'microtonality') and what is exceptional, debatable or how you'd call this (say, 'microtonalism'). How reliable Internet could appear, you never know how representative it is. That was my point. Olorulus (talk) 08:41, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

You are welcome! Just to be absolutely clear: I trust you completely (how could I not?) to know what is representative of the Russian "tradition". Our only point of difference was on the question of whether Kholopov's terminology is exclusively used in Russian scholarship, and I think we have resolved this problem now. I sympathize with you about reference formats. I have a strong personal dislike of those templates, and would prefer to format everything manually. However, there is a strong tendency to use citation templates all across Wikipedia, while at the same time there are six or seven competing ones for use with different citation styles. It does not appear that a single citation style will be adopted on Wikipedia anytime soon, so the necessity of learning how to use these different templates will continue. There are also different formatting conventions in different languages, so the best advice I can give is to go ahead and use the conventions of Russian scholarship, and let other editors like myself make adjustments for English. Obviously, one important aspect is transliteration from Cyrillic to the Latin alphabet but, as you can see from what I have done with the "Microtonal music" article, sometimes this involves substitution of English place names or translations of titles, since it is much less common for English readers be able to understand Russian than is the case with, for example, French, German, or Spanish.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 17:33, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for your understanding of my formatting pains. As for Russian tradition (if you are interested), there is a strong trend to borrow single English terms (as with the 'mikrotonovaya musika' in the recent publications). People do it without reflecting the system of interrelated terms in its integrity. For example, 'mikrotonovaya musyka' sounds ok, but then if one also produces the related 'microtonalnost' (translation of 'microtonality'), it comes to oddities. It turns out then, that a complete 'net' of terms cannot be implanted (at least, not with ease) from one language to another, the thing many young English-readers from my country often oversee. Olorulus (talk) 12:02, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

I believe it is generally understood on Wikipedia that editors may insert references in whatever form they can manage, so that another editor at some later time may adjust the formatting to match the established style. Nevertheless, making an effort to match the existing style is much appreciated. Thank you.

I imagine speakers of all languages face the problem you describe. We certainly have got this problem in English where, as you know, the German words Tonalität and Tonart have both been adapted as "tonality", with the result of a confusion of concepts. A similar problem results from adopting a well-developed concept from another language, but attempting to translate the foreign word instead of simply borrowing it. In music theory, the German words Durchführung and Entwicklung represent distinct conceptions, but are both usually rendered as "development" in English. The problem with a freshly devised "system of interrelated terms" tends to be that it is either unfamiliar to too many readers, or is perceived as awkward and artificial. The words "xenharmonic" and "ekmelic" are good examples in English. They avoid certain perceived problems with the terms "microtonal" and "microtonality", but at the expense of being incomprehensible to most people.

I can see an additional reason, though, for using a borrowed expression like mikrotonovaya musyka and maybe even microtonalnost: It reflects the practice not only in English but also in German, Dutch, French, and—perhaps a little less exactly—also in Italian, Spanish, Romanian, and probably other languages. This makes it slightly easier for foreign readers to understand a Russian article, but also may give Russian authors and readers a sense of being more "connected" with the rest of the academic world.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 17:47, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for considerations you shared. I appreciate them. Olorulus (talk) 06:54, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

Horn concertos

Thanks for cleaning the compositions for horn, - do you think Horn concertos would be worth an extra article, or a section in the general? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:26, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

That list needs a lot more cleaning than I have done so far, particularly in the Baroque area. I'm not sure about a separate article. I see that there are ones for violin concertos, piano concertos, and oboe concertos, but none for flute concertos, clarinet concertos, viola concertos, etc. How useful are these separate article really? Of course there is an enormous quantity of concertos for violin and for piano, but fewer for oboe and not really very many for horn (and neither are a lot of oboe or horn concertos particularly distinguished pieces of music). I would say leave it be.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 22:39, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

Ping

Jerome, I'm emailing you about my unsuccessful attempts to contact a US music academic whose work I'll probably need to cite. Tony (talk) 08:19, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

Arnold's Symphony No. 1 premiere

I changed it from 1951 in music to 1952 in music because it says in the table it was premiered on 6 July 1952. However, now that I've looked into its own article it says Arnold conducted the first performance at the Cheltenham Music Festival in 1951, with The Hallé Orchestra. and a Google search confirms it, so that has to be a typo, sorry for not checking it out before moving it. I'll change the number instead. Still I'm surprised you didn't notice it says 1952 when you moved it back.

As a sidenote, how about stating the year of composition in brackets when it wasn't written the same year it was premiered? Like Symphony No. 1 (1949) Pakhtakorienne (talk) 11:44, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

You are right, I did not notice the date in the table said 1952, and that has to have been my own typo. Even Homer nods! What surprised me about your removal of this event from the 1951 table is that there were two references (one an announcement, the other a review) dating from July 1951. It is true that reviewers were a lot sharper in those days than they have latterly become, but I don't think even those marvellous critics were capable of describing performances a full year before they actually took place! I think it is an excellent idea to add the year of composition in brackets whenever there is a difference from the year of the premiere. Thanks for mentioning this.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 22:07, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

Seattle Wiknic 2015

In the Seattle area? You are invited to the Seattle Wiknic 2015 on Sunday, July 5, 2015, 11am to 2pm at the Washington Park Arboretum, in the meadow area to the south of the Graham Visitors Center, approximately at 47.637435°N 122.293986°W / 47.637435; -122.293986. Click here for more details!

Thank you, Jerome Kohl, ...

... for cleaning up messes behind others, such as me (without reverting). Not the first time either. Educative and much appreciated. ---Sluzzelin talk 22:37, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

You are welcome, and thank you in turn for the courtesy.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 00:43, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

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