Musical Transcription

I. Introduction

Music transcription refers to the analysis of an acoustic musical signal so as to

write down the pitch, onset time, duration, and source of each sound that occurs
in it. In Western tradition, written music uses note symbols to indicate these
parameters in a piece of music. The loudness (and the applied instrument in the
case of pitched instruments) is normally not specified for individual notes but is
determined for larger parts. Besides the common musical notation, the
transcription can take many other forms, too. For example, a guitar player may find
it convenient to read chord symbols which characterize the note combinations to
be played in a more general manner. In a computational transcription system, a
MIDI file is often an appropriate format for musical notations. Common to all these
representations is that they capture musically meaningful parameters that can be
used in performing or synthesizing the piece of music in question. From this point
of view, music transcription can be seen as discovering the “recipe”, or, reverse-
engineering the “source code” of a music signal.

A complete transcription would require that the pitch, timing, and instrument of all
the sound events is resolved. As this can be very hard or even theoretically
impossible in some cases, the goal is usually redefined as being either to notate
as many of the constituent sounds as possible (complete transcription) or to
transcribe only some well-defined part of the music signal, for example the
dominant melody or the most prominent drum sounds (partial transcription).

II. Notation

A. Instrumental Music

Ornamentation: You should include the pitch of the ornamentation, and

show them as grace notes, with the stems joined together for multiple grace
notes. Consider the audience for your transcription, what is the purpose of
the transcription?

Key signature: Standard Western staff notation has a long history and wide
currency. Understand basic notation and use it for transcription. Therefore,
do not use a key signature unless you mean to imply both the given pitch
set should be used throughout the piece but also the use of a tonic.
Remember some tunes are cyclical. You may want to include a key
signature, but be clear to show that this is an approximation, some
instruments do not operate under diatonic rules, or equal temperament.
However, if the piece is in a particular key, use the correct key signature.
Also, remember, for comparative purposes it is sometimes helpful to have
various tunes all transposed into one key, to aid analysis.
Rests: Silence can be used effectively in every music, so remember to
include it in transcription.

Pitch Set and Range: The pitch set of a tune is very simply what notes are
used. However, it is important to remember that a pentatonic tune, may
occasionally use a sixth, passing note usually shown in brackets, but this
does not mean it is not a pentatonic melody. For example:
Tetratonic = 4 notes
Pentatonic = 5 notes
Hexatonic = 6 notes
Heptatonic = 7 notes
Diatonic = only using the notes of a particular key (usually heptatonic scale),
eg. D major

Tempo: The metronome markings are sometimes written with ‘c.’ (‘circa’)
however many beats per minute. Speeds do vary within a performance, but
unless it is a major departure from the indication on the transcription do not
worry (unless this is important). Also directions, as in art music can be used,
but remember who the audience for the transcription is; if it is traditional
musicians then they will be expected to understand the average tempos
and performance practice of a piece. However, if it is for analysis, say of
one performer’s rendering of the same tune over a period of years, then it
might be interesting to take account of the various speeds. M.M =
metronome mark.
In addition, pauses (also known as fermata) can be used.
B. Vocal Music

Remember: The grace notes and problems of transcribing instrumental

music are often the same as in instrumental music, however, the words are
an extra factor in transcription. In general, these are placed under the notes
using the rules of proportionality to put the right syllables under the right
notes. If you need to split a word the use a hyphen to show it, and be careful
to represent the correct length by altering the length of the hyphen in
proportion with the stave above.

Pitch: Remember the singer’s pitch range may not fit on the stave
comfortably and you may need an unwieldy number of ledger lines. In this
case transcribe the whole performance. Make sure you make a note of the
actual pitch at the start of the transcription.

Pulse: Remember to use metronome markings when the pulse is regular.

Make sure this holds for the entire performance, if a regular pulse at a new
 speed is achieved later in the performance, put in another metronome
marking.
If there is no regular pulse, or it’s very irregular, you can use a time line or
even graph format. Do not in this case use crotchets and quavers; use solid
note-heads instead, without tails.
Another method where bars etc. is unclear is to use one line of stave per
phrase, or breath.

III. Non-Western Notation

Cultures that distinguish between art music and popular music and those
that have a body of music theory are most likely to have notation, if only for
theoretical or didactic purposes, as in Arabic-speaking cultures, Perhaps
the earliest to survive is from Mesopotamia. The musical cultures of China,
Japan, Korea, and India have all made extensive use of notation, often
based on solmization syllables of a kind, sometimes with supplementary
signs for duration and performance technique, and with instrumental
tablatures playing a prominent role.

Notation was used in China by the 6th century and underwent considerable
development in the 10th.

Numbers 1 to 7 represent the musical notes (more accurately the scale degrees).
They always correspond to the diatonic major scale. For example, in the key of C,
their relationship with the notes and the solfège is as follows:
Note: C DE F G AB
Solfège: do re mi fa sol la si
Notation: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
 Perhaps soon thereafter, a neumatic notation was developed in Tibet. A
notation based on Sanskrit syllables survives in India from the 13th century,
and letter notation is employed in Arabic theory of the same period. By
perhaps the 16th century, a notation was in use for gamelan music in
Southeast Asia. The 19th century saw the development of more notations
for non-Western music, many under the influence of Western notation.

IV. New Methods

Computers have revolutionized the way we do many things, and music is

no exception. Just as word processors allow text to be entered, edited and
printed, so music notation software (such as Finale or Sibelius used on
mfiles) allows music notation to be entered, edited and printed. Indeed, the
type-setting of music (just like newspapers, magazines and books) is
generally done on computers today. Notation software makes many things
easier, including the making of corrections in the middle of a piece, the
extraction of parts from orchestral scores, the transposition of music
between different instruments, changing the key of a piece and many other
tasks that continued to be time-consuming even in the world of mass
printing facilities. The power of software even allows music to be played
using sampled instruments which give a good impression of what it would
sound like with real instruments.
Other types of musical software use different ways to represent the
underlying music. One method with a real life analogue is the "piano roll"
representation. Piano rolls were originally rolls of stiff paper or card with
holes punched in appropriate places to trigger the playing of a note by
mechanical means, for example on a "player piano" or other instruments.
On a computer screen horizontal lines represent the different notes with the
length of the line representing the duration of the note.

Another method for representing music in a computer is called MIDI. This

stands for "Musical Instrument Digital Interface" and was originally
developed (and still used) to allow electronic instruments and devices to
exchange information. Midi (and its different extensions) includes an ability
to apply different effects to the music, typically electronic effects which were
not available when musical notation was developed.

Nevertheless, despite all these new developments if you want a musician

to play some music, then the musician will generally expect you to use a
form of musical notation to represent that music. While music notation has
evolved considerably from its early beginnings it looks as though its
foreseeable future is secure.