modes tutorial update

Subject: modes tutorial update
From: Jack Campin
Date: 03 Feb 09 - 07:44 PM

I have a tutorial on modes in Scottish traditional music (though in fact applying to most folk music from Western Europe) which has grown to book-length over several years:

http://www.campin.me.uk/Music/Modes.abc

It's been getting very unwieldy to edit, so I've split it up into sections:

http://www.campin.me.uk/Music/Modes/

Does anybody prefer it the old way, or can I phase that out? At present the content of both versions is the same.

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: Nick
Date: 03 Feb 09 - 07:57 PM

What is it best open it in Jack? In Notepad (which it opened in) the formatting is such that it's hard work to read - which is sad as the content is so good

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: Jack Campin
Date: 03 Feb 09 - 08:48 PM

You need an ABC application. I used BarFly for the Mac. The best I've seen for Windows is ABCMus. Neither is under active development any more.

Look at my homepage for more applications. I link to the ABC homepage there. Most people these days use abcm2ps and abcmidi, both of which are free and multi-platform.

While it might be a bit slower than having an application running on your own machine, you could use one of the on-line converters - the folkinfo one I link to, or the one at concertina.net. Keep the text open in a browser window or tab (fixed width font!), have the converter site open in another window or tab, copy and paste to the converter site's entry box.

I'll explain all this when I link the new version into my homepage.

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: pavane
Date: 04 Feb 09 - 08:06 AM

Have you tried loading it in my program HARMONY? Does that work?

HARMONY, at least, is still under development, if any is needed.
(Been busy on other things, non-musical, lately)

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: pavane
Date: 04 Feb 09 - 08:07 AM

(PS If it works, maybe you could add a plug?)

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: Jack Campin
Date: 04 Feb 09 - 01:05 PM

HARMONY doesn't run on any version of MacOS and I don't now have access to a Windows machine I can load software on. (If it runs on Win98SE, I might be able to load that under the Sun emulation environment, as I have both lying around somewhere).

I doubt the tune examples would be a problem for it (they deliberately don't push the envelope with unusual ABC constructs), but I couldn't guess what the user interface would feel like. Somebody care to try? You need to be able to read the text and ABC source and play and/or display the tunes at the same time.

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: Joe Offer
Date: 04 Feb 09 - 01:11 PM

If you have the room, Jack, I think it's best to leave it in both formats. The one-page text version is easy to download and save, but the newer HTML version is a pleasure to read and use. If you don't had the bandwidth on your Website, it can be posted here. It's a nice piece of work.
-Joe-

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: pavane
Date: 05 Feb 09 - 07:08 AM

Sorry about the lack of MAC support. It was written, many moons ago, in VB. 200k lines of code is too much for me to consider rewriting in C, even if I knew how...

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: Newport Boy
Date: 05 Feb 09 - 09:23 AM

I agree with Joe - it would be nice to be able to access both versions. The HTML version is ideal for reading on-screen, but the text version is more usable for anything else.

A great piece of work - it's going to give me days of study.

Phil

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: Jack Campin
Date: 05 Feb 09 - 03:59 PM

So far, the only change I've made is to split the file up into a lot of smaller ABC files with an HTML index. Adding more HTML does give more options, particularly clickable external links.

The main issue isn't space or bandwidth, but the effort and error-proneness involved in keeping two differently structured versions consistent. But I'll stick with it that way for a bit longer.

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: wysiwyg
Date: 05 Feb 09 - 04:52 PM

Jack, I have had to deal with that (bi-formatting), in the Spirituals Permathread. I use Office a lot because I can move things back and forth from Excel to Word and use search/replace functions to add lots of HTML into the columns. The backups are always on my disk to remind me what the heck I did, and how.

~S~

Subject: modes tutorial update
From: Jack Campin
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 08:40 PM

I have posted yet another update to the modes tutorial on my website. Done in a bit of a hurry but there is quite a lot of new material.

http://www.campin.me.uk/Music/Modes/

The single-file version has not been updated and probably won't be, I don't have time.

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: s&r
Date: 29 Aug 09 - 06:13 AM

Jack - what a huge amount of work. I've bookmarked your site for study. I note your current ill-health and would like to send hope and good wishes for your treatment and recovery.

Sincerely

Stu

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: 12barblues
Date: 29 Aug 09 - 04:59 PM

I'd like to add my thanks. I've hardly scratched the surface of Jack's site, but it looks like a wonderful resource.

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: Jack Campin
Date: 29 Aug 09 - 05:56 PM

One thing on my want list is tetratonic tunes - tunes spanning a full octave but which use less notes than a pentatonic scale. I suspect there will be some I haven't come across yet from the more archaic part of the Gaelic repertoire of the Western Isles, so if anybody's got good resources on that area and can take a look for me I'd appreciate it.

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: Tangledwood
Date: 29 Aug 09 - 06:14 PM

Thank you very much Jack. Understanding modes isn't coming easily to me so your work will be invaluable.

Sorry to hear about your ill health, my best wishes too.

Subject: RE: modes tutorial update
From: SylviaN
Date: 30 Aug 09 - 06:34 AM

For most of us here, modes are fascinating, difficult and essential - so a huge thank you from me.

As Tanglewood says, sorry to hear you are ill - but it seems there's no keeping a good man down. xxx