The mint command determines melodic intervals only for pitch tokens within individual spines. Pitch intervals across spines are not determined by mint.

No interval is calculated for the first pitch token; initial pitches are simply echoed in the output -- appearing in square brackets. These initial pitches are referred to as offset values, since they indicate the starting value from which subsequent intervals are calculated. Offset values can prove useful in attempting to reconstruct the input, but the user may wish to eliminate offset values in subsequent processing (see below).

The mint command is able to handle multiple-stops. Data-flow interruptions such as the occurrence of barlines can be handled using the -s option. By defining regular expression patterns, the user may select which types of data tokens should be ignored by mint. (See EXAMPLES below.)

Note that the output spine generated by mint preserves the same record-type structure as the input, and so may readily be pasted with the input file using the Humdrum assemble command.

The mint command is able to accept any of the pitch-related representations listed below. For descriptions of the various input representations refer to Section 2 (Representation Reference) of this reference manual.

It is recommended that output files produced using the mint command should be given names with the distinguishing `.mnt' extension.

**kern	core pitch/duration representation
**pitch	American National Standards Institute pitch notation (e.g. "A#4")
**solfg	French solfège system (fixed `doh')
**Tonh	German pitch system

-a	output absolute pitch interval without distinguishing ascending/descending
-b regexp	break; do not calculate difference for tokens matching regexp;
	restart interval calculations with next pitch token
-c	output compound intervals as non-compound intervals
-d	output diatonic interval size only, without the interval quality
-e	used only with -s option; echo skipped data tokens rather than
	outputting null tokens
-h	displays a help screen summarizing the command syntax
-s regexp	skip; completely ignore tokens matching regexp; output null
	token(s) instead

By default, mint distinguishes ascending and descending intervals by prepending a plus or minus sign. If the -a option is invoked, then only unsigned (absolute) intervals are output.

The "skip" function takes precedence over the "break" function, so input strings matching both the skip (-s) and break (-b) regular expressions cause a skip rather than a break.

The subsequent output value (+P5) indicates a melodic interval of an ascending perfect fifth. This is followed by an ascending minor third (+m3) followed by a descending diminished fifth (-d5).

Notice that the null-token in the sixth record has been echoed. Null-tokens have no effect on interval calculations and are treated as though they are non-existent. In addition, mint correctly echoes (and ignores) both rests and kern-like barlines. Note that pitch intervals spanning a rest continue to be calculated and that intervals greater than an octave remain as "compound intervals."

Depending on the application, users may wish to suppress the calculation of intervals across rests. In this case, the mint command can be invoked using the "break" (-b) option. Consider the command:

mint -b 'r' input > output.mnt

Each time mint encounters a data token that matches the letter `r' it echoes the input token and begins looking for a new offset value. Applied to the above sample input file, this command produces the following output:

**mint

=1

[c]

+P5

+m3

.

-d5

=2

+m2

8r

[C]

-P5

=3

*-

The -s (skip) option can be used to allow the user to selectively identify records that should not be involved in processing. For example, the command

mint -s '^[^4]+$' input > output.mnt

will cause any data token not matching the number 4 to be skipped during processing. Given the sample input, intervals will be calculated only between quarter-notes and dotted quarter-notes:

**mint

=1

8c

8g

[b-]

.

8e

=2

-P4

8r

8C

-P15

=3

*-

The mint command is also able to process numerical data tokens containing multiple-stops. Consider the following following sample input:

**pitch

C4

B3 D4

A3 C4 F4

C4

C4

*-

In processing successive multiple-stops mint does not calculate all of the possible permutations. For example, in the case of two consecutive triple-stops, mint will calculate three intervals corresponding to the first notes in both triple-stops, the second notes, and the third notes.

Where the number of multiple-stops changes, mint operates under some special conventions. Consider, for example, the case of a double-stop followed by a triple-stop: the pitches P+Q followed by X+Y+Z. All of the possible (interval) differences might be enumerated as follows: X-P, Y-P, Z-P, X-Q, Y-Q and Z-Q. Mint first calculates the "outer" interval distances (X-P and Z-Q). It then calculates a permuted set of "inner" intervals (Y-P and Y-Q). The remaining intervals are considered unlikely or implausible and are not calculated by mint.

In the above example, moving from the double-stop to the triple stop between records three and four generates two "outer" interval distances (B3 to A3 -> -M2; D4 to F4 -> +m3), as well as the permuted "inner" intervals (B3 to C4 -> +m2; D4 to C4 -> -M2). Both the resulting inner intervals are printed in parentheses. A similar process occurs when moving from records four to five. Three intervals may be traced from the 3 initial pitches to the subsequent single pitch.

Depending on the goal, the presence of the parentheses makes it easy for the user to eliminate the inner intervals using the Humdrum stream-editor humsed. For example, the command

humsed 's/([^)]*) //g' input > output

can be used to eliminate inner intervals. Alternatively, the command

humsed 's/[()]//g' input > output

can be used to eliminate the parentheses surrounding the inner intervals. Offset values can be transformed to null-tokens using the command

humsed 's/\\[[^]]*\\]/./g' input > output

records containing offset values can be eliminated using the command

humsed '/\\[.*\\]/d' input > output

One final example illustrates how several spines can be processed concurrently by mint.

!! J.S. Bach, keyboard Sinfonia No. 13

**Tonh	**pitch	**kern
*M3/8	*M3/8	*M3/8
*a:	*a:	*a:
=7	=7	=7
A3	G4	16ee
.	.	16ff#
H3	F#4	8.dd#
H2	.	.
.	.	16ee
=8	=8	=8
E3	E4	4ee
.	F#4	.
.	G4	.
.	A4	.
r	B4	[8gg
.	C#5	.
=9	=9	=9
r	[D5	16gg]
.	.	16bb-
.	.	16aa
.	.	16gg
.	.	16ff
.	.	16ee
=10	=10	=10
r	D5]	[4.ff
*-	*-	*-

mint -a -d input | humsed 's/\\[[^\\t]*\\]/./g' > output

Notice in the corresponding output that the initial offset pitches have been changed to a null tokens (due to the humsed command).

!! J.S. Bach, keyboard Sinfonia No. 13

**mint	**mint	**mint
*M3/8	*M3/8	*M3/8
*a:	*a:	*a:
=7	=7	=7
.	.	.
.	.	2
2	2	3
8	.	.
.	.	2
=8	=8	=8
4	2	1
.	2	.
.	2	.
.	2	.
r	2	3
.	2	.
=9	=9	=9
r	2	1
.	.	3
.	.	2
.	.	2
.	.	2
.	.	2
=10	=10	=10
r	1	2
*-	*-	*-

• Pertinent description in the Humdrum User Guide
• Index to Humdrum Commands
• Table for Contents for Humdrum User Guide