Melodic Accent

REPRESENTATION

melac — melodic accent representation

DESCRIPTION

The melac representation is used to characterize the degree of pitch-related stress (melodic accent) for successive moments. Three types of tokens are recognized by melac: stress-tokens, rests, and barlines. Stress-tokens encode decimal values ranging between 0 (no stress) and 1 (maximum stress).

Barlines are represented using the "common system" for barlines — see barlines.

FILE TYPE

It is recommended that files containing predominantly melac data should be given names with the distinguishing `.mac' extension.

SIGNIFIERS

The following table summarizes the melac mappings of signifiers and signifieds.

0-9 melodic accent values specified as integer or real value; measure numbers r rest = barline; == double barline =; barline with pause sign —– ——————————————–

Summary of melac Signifiers

EXAMPLES

The following sample document shows a single spine of melac data for the bass line of J. S. Bach’s two-part keyboard Invention No. 1. The corresponding kern and semits representations are also shown:

!! J.S. Bach, Two-part Invention 1 (BWV 772)
**kern **semits **melac *C: *C: *C: *M4/4 *M4/4 *M4/4 =1 =1 =1 2r r r 16r r r 16C -12 1 16D -10 0.33 16E -8 0.221 16F -7 0.556 16D -10 0.121 16E -8 0.241 16C -12 0.121 =2 =2 =2 8G -5 0.241 8GG -17 0.17 4r r r 16r r r 16G -5 1 16A -3 0.33 16B -1 0.221 16c 0 0.556 16A -3 0.121 16B -1 0.241 16G -5 0.121 =3 =3 =3 *- *- *- ———————————————- ———— ———–

Notice that melodic accent values can be either real or integer values. Rests are represented by the single letter `r'.

PERTINENT COMMANDS

The following Humdrum command produces melac data as output:

melac calculate melodic accent values for successive pitches – ————————————- ——————————————————–

TANDEM INTERPRETATIONS

The following tandem interpretations can be used in conjunction with melac:

meter signatures *M6/8 key signatures *k[f#c#] key *c#: —————— ————

Tandem interpretations for melac