Music Notation - Percy French Songbook

Subject: Music Notation - Percy French Songbook
From: Tiger
Date: 21 Apr 01 - 01:56 PM

I've just acquired a couple of old Percy French songbooks, published in London, I'm guessing to be 40+ years old, can't tell (not dated, but the original price was 5/-). Several songs are copyright 1957, so that's probably the year.

My question concerns the odd notation above the vocal staff. There's a vertical bar at each measure, that part's easy, and a squiggly line at the beginning and end of each line, I'm not too concerned with those either.

What's really strange is the marks above each note - could they be chords? This one is in the key of G.

    :s1  |s1   :m  :m   |m    :r    :r |r  :-.d    :d  |d   :-
   Oh!   Ma - ry! this Lon - don's a  won - der - ful sight,    

:t1 .l1 |l1   :s1 :s1  |s1   :l1  :t1 |r  :d  :-.d  |d   :-
   Wid the peo - ple here work - in' by  day and  by   night;    

Those 1's aren't really that - they're small vertical bars. Even though the notation may not work out quite right, I'm sure someone will recognize it and tell me what's going on.

Thanks for your help.

Subject: RE: Music Notation - Percy French Songbook
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 21 Apr 01 - 02:16 PM

It's "tonic sol-fa" notation.  There are a number of past threads on the subject which can be found through the "Digitrad and Forum Search" on the main Forum page.

Subject: RE: Music Notation - Percy French Songbook
From: Tiger
Date: 21 Apr 01 - 03:28 PM

Thanks, Mal. I guess I should have paid more attention to those sol-fa threads as they went by. It seemed at the time (still does) that sol-fa notation fills a badly needed void :-)

Maybe OK as a shorthand exchange notation, especially before computers, but what's the point of printing it above the staff containing the actual dots?

As a demi-trained, and only half-serious music student, I can't imagine the rationale of singing (or learning to sing) from this notation, or shape notes, for that matter.

Same way I can't understand how a professed piano player says he can't play even a simple tune without sheet music.

Subject: RE: Music Notation - Percy French Songbook
From: GUEST,John Andrews
Date: 15 May 10 - 05:43 PM

Hi Tiger
You asked about sol-fa -
"but what's the point of printing it above the staff containing the actual dots? "

The sol-fa is not tied to any set key (as are the dots on the stave,) so sol-fa provides pitch spaces relative to whatever note you sing as doh. Eh presto a great aide to transposition and getting a song into a range you can sing when the printed dots go too high or too low.