Metronome marking anomaly.
Posted: Sat Apr 12, 2014 7:12 am
Hallo.
I've occasionally come across what seems like an anomaly in metronome markings, and just seen an example now - so I thought I'd ask people's opinions on it here.
The thing I'm thinking of arises in pieces in compound time, like 6/8, where the basic beat is a dotted note of some kind, but the metronome marking is given in terms of an undotted note of that type. For instance, if the piece is in 6/8, the beat is the dotted crotchet, but the metronome marking might be given, for example, as "[crotchet, not dotted] = 60".
Should this be interpreted as "[dotted crotchet] = 60", and the assumption made that the dot was carelessly left out? Or should it be taken literally as meaning an undotted crotchet, and so the beat adjusted accordingly? (If I've figured out the arithmetic correctly, "[undotted crotchet] = 60" is equivalent to "[dotted crotchet] = 40" - so why not just print that? - since that is the relevant unit in 6/8 time, and it makes it easier to figure out the real tempo.)
What do people think about that? An undotted crotchet is a rather unnatural unit to choose for the metronome marking in 6/8 time, so it does lead one to think it could be a misprint.
Regards, Michael.
I've occasionally come across what seems like an anomaly in metronome markings, and just seen an example now - so I thought I'd ask people's opinions on it here.
The thing I'm thinking of arises in pieces in compound time, like 6/8, where the basic beat is a dotted note of some kind, but the metronome marking is given in terms of an undotted note of that type. For instance, if the piece is in 6/8, the beat is the dotted crotchet, but the metronome marking might be given, for example, as "[crotchet, not dotted] = 60".
Should this be interpreted as "[dotted crotchet] = 60", and the assumption made that the dot was carelessly left out? Or should it be taken literally as meaning an undotted crotchet, and so the beat adjusted accordingly? (If I've figured out the arithmetic correctly, "[undotted crotchet] = 60" is equivalent to "[dotted crotchet] = 40" - so why not just print that? - since that is the relevant unit in 6/8 time, and it makes it easier to figure out the real tempo.)
What do people think about that? An undotted crotchet is a rather unnatural unit to choose for the metronome marking in 6/8 time, so it does lead one to think it could be a misprint.
Regards, Michael.