Synaesthesia and chord markup

Subject: Synaesthesia and chord markup
From: Jack Campin
Date: 18 May 14 - 08:35 PM

I just had a little brainwave. I want to mark up a song text with diatonic autoharp chords. It's pretty simple, just Bm, A and D. Nobody but me needs to read it. Scrawling chord letters into a printed text looks messy.

I have key/colour synaesthesia. It sometimes comes in handy.

Highlighter pens. Bm - pale blue, A - green, D - yellow. No symbols, just streak through the text.

The same coding would work for anyone, but for me it's a natural code.

Subject: RE: Synaesthesia and chord markup
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 19 May 14 - 09:26 AM

That's interesting, Jack. The human mind is an amazing thing.

I happen to use yellow for dissonance.

Subject: RE: Synaesthesia and chord markup
From: GUEST,John Foxen
Date: 19 May 14 - 11:29 AM

An interesting idea Jack. The only problem would be getting musicians to agree on the colour of a key -- I have known fierce arguments to break out on this subject.
But you could widen the scheme perhaps by using the colours of the rainbow and the jazz chord system:
Red         I
Orange II
Yellow   III
Green    IV
Blue       V
Indigo    VI
Violet    VII

Then you'd have a book that could be played by anyone in any key.

Subject: RE: Synaesthesia and chord markup
From: Stu
Date: 19 May 14 - 11:43 AM

We've done this one a few times over the years, but mine are:


Em = purple

D = brown

G = bright yellow

Am = beige

Bm = greyish blue

C = red

In sessions this can be a way of knowing which key we're playing in for me. I play Irish trad, but if I go to an English session with it's larger number of G tunes the whole thing becomes too yellow.

I did a painting of how my tinnitus looks via synaesthesia when it's in its 'quiet' state.

Subject: RE: Synaesthesia and chord markup
From: Marje
Date: 19 May 14 - 12:16 PM

That's the problem with synaesthesia - people don't agree on the colours. I still can't get on with the Radio Times colour-coding for the days of the week, introduced years ago - the only day they've got right is Wednesday (green).
G isn't yellow, by the way, it's green like Wednesday.

Marje

Subject: RE: Synaesthesia and chord markup
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 19 May 14 - 02:28 PM

Rubbish - Wednesday is orange.

The 'problem' with synaesthesia as a system is that people don't get to choose what colour to see things in - it just happens and you are stuck with it.

PS   G is brown.

Subject: RE: Synaesthesia and chord markup
From: Jack Campin
Date: 19 May 14 - 04:38 PM

Nearly. It's a sorta reddish brown.

The only way you could make this idea suit more than one person would be by putting the markup on transparent overlays.