Double Bass What say ye, thou highly estemed of music fundamentals??? Upper or lower case???

[Don Hergert]

I just spent over an hour reading differing opinions on lowercase and uppercase letters used for note names in music notation...

Stringed instrument people tend to use lowercase for higher notes and uppercase for lower notes. Most guitarists just use all uppercase for note names and chord names. Most uke and banjo players believe noting a tuning like gDGBD specifies a re-entrant tuning.

Some music fundamental specialists say the break point is middle c, above which notes will be lowercase, below which notes will be uppercase, and, chord names are different -- uppercase chords are major chords, lowercase chords are minor chords. Some music fundamental specialists will say a re-entrant tuning is simply a tuning which has a high note first, out of order for the rest of the strings, and they look to middle c to determine uppercase or lowercase, whether it's re-entrant or not.

Many instruments don't span scales across middle c, either living higher or lower for their whole life. How do they relate to this? Should their notes be properly named with a number indicating the scales they live in?

And, a lot of us just don't know, it can be pretty confusing.

Your thoughts???

 

[Steve Freides]

I just spent over an hour reading differing opinions on lowercase and uppercase letters used for note names in music notation...

That's an hour you'll never get back. As long as everyone knows what you mean ...

-S-

 

[JRA]

That's an hour you'll never get back

Your thoughts???

i'm with @Steve Freides --- if everyone can 'get on the same page' it's a win!

 

[Steve Freides]

Most uke and banjo players believe noting a tuning like gDGBD specifies a re-entrant tuning.

I wasn't aware that one was supposed to tune a banjo ...

What happens when you leave a banjo in the back seat of your car unlocked overnight? You come out the next morning and find two banjoes in your back seat.

I own and can play both a 4-string and a 5-string banjo.

Gawd, I feel so much better having admitted that in public now.

-S-

 

[DoubleMIDI]

That comes from German note naming which is also used in some other European countries.
I’m not that much familiar with the US note naming system, but I think Piano middle C is named C4.
I the German system this is c’. The c an octave above is c”. Any octaves above get a tick more.
The octave below does not get a tick, but is still lower case (Viola lowest octave).
The octave below that gets an upper case letter C (cello lowest octave).
The octave below the cello gets a prepended Kontra- in front of the upper case note name (lowest fifth 4-string DB).
The octave below that gets a Subkontra- in front (lowest note 5-string DB).

Any lower notes are of no big interest and I cannot remember the names for even lower octaves.
Octaves go from c to b natural (which is called “h” in German, b in German means Bb in the English/US-System).

 

[Don Hergert]

That comes from German note naming which is also used in some other European countries.
I’m not that much familiar with the US note naming system, but I think Piano middle C is named C4.
I the German system this is c’. The c an octave above is c”. Any octaves above get a tick more.
The octave below does not get a tick, but is still lower case (Viola lowest octave).
The octave below that gets an upper case letter C (cello lowest octave).
The octave below the cello gets a prepended Kontra- in front of the upper case note name (lowest fifth 4-string DB).
The octave below that gets a Subkontra- in front (lowest note 5-string DB).

Any lower notes are of no big interest and I cannot remember the names for even lower octaves.
Octaves go from c to b natural (which is called “h” in German, b in German means Bb in the English/US-System).

Well, I'm glad it isn't confusing at all.

I think if someone brings this up in person, I'll just pretend I'm dead. It's easy to do if you play banjo...

 

[Don Hergert]

I own and can play both a 4-string and a 5-string banjo.

Gawd, I feel so much better having admitted that in public now.

The truth shall set you free. Or alternatively, you might actually play banjo, but hey, freedom isn't always all it's cracked up to be.

 

[DoubleMIDI]

Upper case and lower case letters in chord symbols can be used for major and minor chords, but adding a lower case m after the root note name is also common for minor chords. At least over here in Germany.
But at least in jazz and pop/rock education the British/US-chord naming convention is now used here.