# Beautiful new music notation, Pitch Bracket Notation



## cory (Nov 6, 2017)

I have created a new music notation called Pitch Bracket Notation. My notation makes beautiful music look amazing. Pitch bracket notation uses a _melody line_ rather than a staff. A _melody line_ is like a staff line (i.e. has a certain pitch) but the pitch of a melody lines can be changed by writing pitch brackets. The parenthesis pitch bracket adds one scale step; the angle bracket adds two scale steps; and so on for the rest of the brackets. Nested pitch brackets reveals the structure of music which is not obvious with traditional music notation.

Pitch bracket notation bridges the gap between music and mathematics. In particular, music can be written as mathematical expressions. Algebra can be used to generate new music. I've written Beethoven's 5th symphony in pitch brackets and matching math expressions. Please see my website to learn all about this fascinating new notation!

pitchbracket.com


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

When things aren't broken..


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

eugeneonagain said:


> When things aren't broken..


Yup. I don't think ole Guido D'Arezzo needs to have any sleepless nights yet. Our current notation system is most likely still going to be in use a thousand years from now, if for no other reason than the Lindy Effect.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Music is a physical as well as an intellectual phenomenon. We hear tones as having duration (short and long) and pitch (high and low). Both of these dimensions are represented by the physical position of notes on the staff. Our common notation thus gives us a physical image which parallels both of music's primary physical characteristics. It makes music visible through the phenomenon of perception neuropsychologists call "cross-domain mapping."

When I look at your notation, I don't see music. I don't see something with physical characteristics parallel to the sound and feel of music. I don't see something that appeals to my body as well as my mind. How is that an improvement?


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## Timothy (Jul 19, 2017)

Woodduck said:


> When I look at your notation, I don't see music. I don't see something with physical characteristics parallel to the sound and feel of music. *I don't see something that appeals to my body* as well as my mind. How is that an improvement?


Lol, what? :lol:


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## Tones6 (Nov 7, 2017)

Hello, @cory Nice notation


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Timothy said:


> Lol, what? :lol:


Just think about it.

No, feel it. That's the point.

(You too, hpowders.)


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## cory (Nov 6, 2017)

In mathematics, one learns arithmetic first, then algebra, and then calculus. Each level builds on the previous, adding new abstractions and concepts. No one would argue that algebra is more basic or easy to understand than arithmetic. But the benefit to learning algebra or calculus is that one gains more powerful tools for expressing mathematical relationships. The same is true with pitch bracket notation. This notation is not as basic or obvious as the 2D layout of standard sheet music, but it provides new tools and ways of understanding the pitch relations in music.

One final comment. I never intended pitch bracket notation to someone replace standard music notation. Rather, I adore standard notation which miraculously combines so many different elements of music into a single visual representation. No new notation will rival that. My notation focuses on one particular aspect of music, pitch. As a result, more sophisticated concepts about pitch and pitch relationships can be expressed, relationships that might get lost in the multitude of elements expressed in standard notation.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

How is the concept of pitch in standard notation problematic?


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## musicrom (Dec 29, 2013)

Cool idea, but that it doesn't take into account rhythm is disappointing.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

cory said:


> In mathematics, one learns arithmetic first, then algebra, and then calculus. Each level builds on the previous, adding new abstractions and concepts. No one would argue that algebra is more basic or easy to understand than arithmetic. But the benefit to learning algebra or calculus is that one gains more powerful tools for expressing mathematical relationships. The same is true with pitch bracket notation. This notation is not as basic or obvious as the 2D layout of standard sheet music, but *it provides new tools and ways of understanding the pitch relations in music.*
> 
> One final comment. I never intended pitch bracket notation to someone replace standard music notation. Rather, I adore standard notation which miraculously combines so many different elements of music into a single visual representation. No new notation will rival that. My notation focuses on one particular aspect of music, pitch. As a result, *more sophisticated concepts about pitch and pitch relationships can be expressed, relationships that might get lost in the multitude of elements expressed in standard notation.*


It's reassuring that you don't think of your notation as replacing the existing system, but it isn't clear to me that it has any needed purpose at all.

I know of only one function of notation: it enables music as conceived by one person to be realized as sound by another. Can your notation system fulfill that function efficiently, or at all?

What does it mean to "provide new tools and ways of understanding the pitch relations in music," and to "express more sophisticated concepts about pitch and pitch relationships"? What concepts about pitch do we need notation to represent beyond, e.g., "this is middle C and this is the G a perfect fifth above it"? That statement gives us an absolute pitch (assuming A = 440hz or some other standard) and an intervallic relationship. Isn't that all there is to it?


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