Notation Must Die: The Battle For How We Read Music
If you're at a loose end and have time to listen to how written music evolved, then click the below (maybe watch Full Screen). I must admit that for someone who doesn't read music, seeing all those demi-semi-demi quavers and keys with six flats is really off putting. Thing is, it's not just the notes that are played as I can work those out. Lines and spaces matching notes with letters A to G (and why they didn't call C "A", as playing up the white notes you would then have had A to G, and back to A as an octave). The problem is the timing, and how long notes are held for. It's this that makes the music so difficult to interpret.
When you start the video going, you will think you are watching the wrong video, as it is all about CHESS. But stick with it! He is explaining to us that music is not the only area where nobody could seem to agree on the best way of recording (ie. writing down) what is happening so that others can follow it.
You can skip to the parts of the video that may interest you (with me, it was all of it that interested me!). I am just glad that I didn't live with the ancient Greeks, as melody was the be-all and end-all of music, and as I love to listen to the harmony in a piece, this wouldn't have suited me at all!
00:00 - Setting the stage
09:26 - Notation must die INTRO!
15:12 - Ancient Greek notation
19:40 - The history of western notation
31:57 - Chromatic staves
36:15 - The piano roll
42:54 - Clefs (and resistance to change)
44:42 - Muto method
46:45 - Notation & the aristocracy
48:25 - Tablature
51:40 - Guitar Hero
52:51 - Klavarskribo
54:08 - Other types of keyboard notation
55:47 - Musitude!
1:01:18 - Dodeca
1:03:01 - Accessibility
1:04:31 - Farbige Noten
1:06:49 - Jullian Carrillo's system
1:08:26 - The best of the rest
1:11:52 - Where can we go from here?
Hugh