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Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Classical music/Archive 62

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Latest comment: 9 years ago by Francis Schonken in topic oboe-player (oboeist?) appears to pass WP:42, but might be deleted on WP:SPIP grounds
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Latest comment: 9 years ago14 comments4 people in discussion

Following the discussion I initiated at Talk:St Matthew Passion#Merge proposal, where I saw WP:EGG linking to "structure" articles such as [[St Matthew Passion structure|St Matthew Passion]] as one of the arguments for a merge, I saw this is applied broader than I thought, and for a variety of "structure" articles, e.g. [1], [2], [3], [4],... (the last two are particularily telling, as they link to the article with the least info on the context of where the link is applied)

How do we deal with these? Or what are the opinions on these? --Francis Schonken (talk) 05:25, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

A bit of history: When Messiah (Handel) was prepared for FA in 2011, the authors decided that it was too much to have details about the music in the main article. Therefore (!) articles Messiah structure and three more on the parts (Messiah Part I etc) were created following this request, by me. Perhaps - looking at the criticism above which is reflected in many reverts - I should have named it Messiah music or in another way that shows the focus is on the music? - In the same spirit, I created articles with details on the music for other works. When I write about singers who perform them I think it's justified (and no Easter egg) to link to the details to the music. They sing the music, not the history of composition and publication. When a particular movement is discussed it makes sense to link to the movement within the structure. Francis, I would like you to revert your changes. Should we rename, for example Mass in B minor structure to Mass in B minor music? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:53, 3 July 2015 (UTC)
Gerda, sorry, but you're indulging in sophistry. One can as easily say they sing the music itself, not the structure. In any case, it's not a question of what the performers perform, it's a question of what the reader should expect when they click a link. You just can't say that they want to read about the music, not the history of composition and publication -- you just don't know what readers will want to read. And changing the title from structure to music is just a change of title; it doesn't change what the article is about. There's nothing wrong with having separate structure articles, but imho linking to them and piping that to the name of the work itself is a clear easter egg. Any mention of the B Minor Mass should link to the article Mass in B minor, no ifs, no buts. And then, if the reader wants any more detail of the music, then Mass in B minor#Movements and their sources links to Mass in B minor structure as main article, and readers can follow that link if they wish. --Stfg (talk) 10:31, 3 July 2015 (UTC)
The article Messiah structure is about structure, but the article now called Mass in B minor structure is about music. Should it be renamed? - The article St Matthew Passion structure is at present only about the structure, but planned to be expanded to music, - should it then be renamed, or now be merged, as suggested? (A merge was not my idea, because - see Messiah - a secondary article was requested on purpose.) Every secondary article has a link to the primary at the very beginning. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 12:04, 3 July 2015 (UTC)
The topic here is neither renaming nor regrouping of content, but linking habits. If the content of a page doesn't match its title, rename it, merge it, split it, regroup content or whatever, not something we're discussing here. Agree with Stfg that renaming Mass in B minor structure to anything else doesn't solve a thing for the EGG issue, so can we stay focussed on that and drop the other subjects?
As for the attempt to negotiate on the basis of "Every secondary article has a link to the primary at the very beginning": sorry, but negative, I'm rather on Stfg's side here: apply what users expect to be linked to when clicking the link, that is the primary article, unless when making it explicit, e.g. "The piecemeal composition of the Mass in B minor over an extended period had a profound influence on its structure" - you see, no easter egg; all other cases: easter egg. --Francis Schonken (talk) 13:26, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

[ xxx material now moved to section below. ]

Again, I started this thread regarding the problem of the WP:EGG linking, not on splitting, merging, renaming, regrouping of content, etc. I hope we can discontinue getting off-topic. WP:Content fork explains why it is a bad idea to have two parallel articles that treat the same. It is not the topic of this thread. The possible merging of St Matthew Passion structure into St Matthew Passion is discussed at Talk:St Matthew Passion#Merge proposal. It is not the topic of this thread. That the renaming of Mass in B minor structure didn't solve anything is discussed in the next section #Mass in B minor music. It is not the topic of this thread. Any other such merge/split/etc discussion should be brought up on the appropriate article talk pages, before bringing them here.

The topic of this thread is:

  1. Do we want these WP:EGG links that go to "structure"-like pages? Thus far I'm inclined to believe that my objections against these seem justified.
  2. If we don't want them, what will be done to sort the problem? --Francis Schonken (talk) 16:47, 3 July 2015 (UTC)
Well, all right, I for one think any links to "structure" articles should be labeled as such and not be Easter eggs. Opus33 (talk) 17:13, 3 July 2015 (UTC)
@Gerda Arendt: can we count on you too to clean up these WP:EGG links, whether they go to "XYZ structure", "XYZ music", "Description of XYZ", or whatever similar form that is not the main article on the composition when the context of the link lets assume the link is about the composition, not about a limited aspect of that composition? I'm asking you specifically, while you seem the only one not wholly convinced of the desirability to proceed with such cleanup. --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:01, 4 July 2015 (UTC)
We are in the process of merging The Creation which will render your concern moot, and then (!) will take care of others. I call Easter Egg to land in the middle of an article, as you produced yesterday. The theme of the Bach cantata of last Sunday is the parable of the mote and the beam. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:34, 4 July 2015 (UTC)
Indeed landing in the middle of an article is not intended, unless "structure" is the specific intent of the link – so that's not the fault with where the redirect ends, but a lot of WP:EGG links that still need to be cleaned up. Are you going to cooperate with that cleanup or not, see examples I gave above: [5], [6], [7], [8],... There's still a lot of cleanup in this sense to be done: are you on board or not? --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:43, 4 July 2015 (UTC)
(ec) E.g. do you have any further doubts about this re-redirect? --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:37, 4 July 2015 (UTC)
That's Messiah, so I replied at Messiah. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:06, 4 July 2015 (UTC)
Again, are you on board for replacing WP:EGG links by links that go to the main article on the composition? That is a general question, about the EGG links. --Francis Schonken (talk) 09:20, 4 July 2015 (UTC)

Progress

Separate articles discussing musical structure

Latest comment: 9 years ago33 comments8 people in discussion

Why do some people make separate articles discussing musical structure? To me this seems very wrong. - kosboot (talk) 15:33, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

  • I organised in subsections below. Where there's no discussion on the concerned article talk pages yet, maybe best to start posting notifications on these talk pages. --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:12, 4 July 2015 (UTC)
    • This is getting ridiculously complex, the answer, Kosboot is quite simple: Articles that get too long and complex need to have some sections "spun off" into new articles. For a featured article on a complex topic, it's even more critical this be done. That's a clear demand of the MOS. Take, for example, Richard Nixon, which has multiple spinoffs. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Montanabw (talk • contribs)
So it seems that it's preferable to leave all the information in a single article, the exceptions being those articles which are excessively long, usually occuring because the works involved are similarly long or freighted with a lot of history. One work I would think would fit into this category is Symphony No. 9 (Beethoven) - but all the information is in a single article and it looks fine (perhaps could be expanded a bit). I was concerned that this forking was going to become a guideline but I'm glad to see that it's only in the cases of exceptions. - kosboot (talk) 13:09, 7 July 2015 (UTC)
I know only four exceptions: Messiah, Bach's two great Passions and the Mass in B minor. As said below, we work toward one article for The Creation. - Messiah - repeating: it was not my idea to split, but I wanted more music, and was told by the main editors of the FA-to-be (at the time) to take it elsewhere, which I did for that and the other articles with 20+ movements. The Ninth Symphony has only 4 ;) --Gerda Arendt (talk) 13:31, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

Structure of Handel's Messiah

Answer above: Messiah got too long. The others followed. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 15:36, 3 July 2015 (UTC)
I think the difference is that for Messiah the content of the main article got too large (it is a composition with a very broad history section, a history that is larger than e.g. what is known on the early history of all of Bach's passions taken together). So definitely this should be treated on a by article basis, not assume that while it works splendidly for one article → otherstuffexist → let's do this everywhere.
That being said, for the time being I doubt the long-term viability of Structure of Handel's Messiah, imho:
  • Their is no detail about individual movements in "structure", - I mean in what was structure before you moved it again to not an article but in the middle of one, where the reader doesn't even see a header, and nothing is explained but you find a list of titles only. I don't edit war. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:49, 4 July 2015 (UTC)

The Creation structure

Following up on Kosboot: I would note that The Creation structure is, seemingly, a flat-out alternative article to The Creation (Haydn). The latter article already had quite a bit of discussion of structure, and was not excessively long when The Creation structure was installed.
I wouldn't want to deny the possibility that some editors would think that running paired articles on the same subject is ok. Perhaps a Wikipedia that offers two (three? ten?) separate articles on every subject would be a richer and more informative one. On the other hand, when we run just one article on a topic, it's liable to be checked more often by other editors, which I think is a good thing. For example, I feel that The Creation (Haydn) (which I've worked on before) could use some improvement. I'm really too busy to edit its doppelgänger article as well. Opus33 (talk) 15:53, 3 July 2015 (UTC)
What do you think of moving the table in the other article? I thought (see Messiah, third time) it would be too much. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 16:00, 3 July 2015 (UTC)
If the suggestion is, move the table into The Creation (Haydn) and turn The Creation structure into a redirect, I'm all for it. Opus33 (talk)
Moving would just create duplication with The Creation (Haydn)#Musical numbers, which has commentary not in the structure article. It would involve merging, which seems a sensible thing to do as there is content forking (e.g. regarding the libretto) and the main article is only 88kb. --Stfg (talk) 17:30, 3 July 2015 (UTC)
I tentatively inserted the three tables for the three parts. Please look if you like it. Before making the other a redirect, let's see if we like it and what else perhaps to take over. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:18, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

I agree with this course of action. Many times, including only earlier this week, I've looked to follow the Wikipedia article(s) while listening to die Schöpfung, and it has been strange to have two articles going through the structure. Also, it is the overall article - not the specific structure one - that does the better job of outlining the structure, so we shouldn't carry the tables over. Syek88 (talk) 08:19, 4 July 2015 (UTC)

Usually this means that the material in the "main" article needs to be moved to the "fork" and then a link back provided. Far better way, thus allowing the more technical subject to be discussed in detail. Montanabw(talk) 19:40, 4 July 2015 (UTC)
The structure of a piece is the most important thing we can put on the piece's Wikipedia page. We should not "fork" the most important content. Syek88 (talk) 03:53, 5 July 2015 (UTC)
That's what I tried to do in the combined version. Comments welcome. I will try to beautify the tables. but not today, very limited time. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:47, 5 July 2015 (UTC)
Work is in progress, further comments on the article talk please, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 13:33, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

Mass in B minor music

Mass in B minor structure was moved without a discussion to Description of the Mass in B minor. How would that be found by someone typing "Mass in B minor" in the search function? Brainstorming for a better name, please, a name which could be piped to "music of the Mass in B minor". --Gerda Arendt (talk) 15:09, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

The move happened without leaving a redirect. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 15:14, 3 July 2015 (UTC)
I reverted that because it distorts article history, beginning on my user page to DYK and Peer review, keep "to avoid breaking links, both internal and external, that may have been made to the old page name." --Gerda Arendt (talk) 15:20, 3 July 2015 (UTC)
Worth: the article history is now broken, because some functions don't work with a redirect, Wikipedia:Peer review/Description of the Mass in B minor/archive1 does not take to Wikipedia:Peer review/Mass in B minor structure/archive1. Easiest solution would be to revert the move. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 15:39, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

I wrote an article Mass in B minor structure. Even if that name is not the best of names, it has a history, up to a peer review for FA. User:Francis Schonken made it a redirect to a section in Mass in B minor, breaking links, and reverted my correction. I don't edit war. Do I have to seek help, or is describing the problem here enough? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 16:36, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

Oops, didn't see this, started the same discussion at Talk:Mass in B minor structure#Article history. I think a bot will restore the links to the archives (after a few hours or so). Whether GA people are automatically notified so that the GA qualification stays with the page I don't know, best to contact them. Again, like I said elsewhere, starting parallel articles has a much higher risk of treading on feet than the usual "add content until it gets too bulky → split" MO of Wikipedia. I'm sorry it's your feet this time, I don't wish that for you but it happened as predicted. --Francis Schonken (talk) 16:55, 3 July 2015 (UTC)
Your move without discussion was a bold edit, consider to revert it and start a normal move request, per WP:BRD. Your new article name is not even a good name. No bot will pick up anything because you didn't leave a redirect. I don't want to make fuss on the article talk. I will ask one admin now to look into this. If things have not moved to at least a redirect by tomorrow I will have to go to a noticeboard, - something I have not done ever and don't want to do. Pinging Tim riley and Brianboulton, the authors of Messiah who encouraged me to handle the details about the music separately. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 19:46, 3 July 2015 (UTC)
  • I moved it back. Francis Schonken, I don't care about anyone's feet, and I thought it could be safely assumed that you would a. think and b. discuss these things beforehand. Not leaving a redirect...for someone who's been here for so long, that's pretty...unexpected. Drmies (talk) 21:29, 3 July 2015 (UTC)

St Matthew Passion structure

Discussed at Talk:St Matthew Passion#Merge proposal. --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:10, 4 July 2015 (UTC)

Thank you, Francis, for improving the main article. At present, with two ugly tags, I believe in modesty that the readers should be happier than ever if they'd arrive at St Matthew Passion structure instead, which you generously decleared EGG. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 13:39, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

General thoughts

Normally, the structure of a work is a valid part of the article, for example BWV 243a. When an artivcle has many movements and/or much related content such as composition history, performance history and reception, it can make sense to split content. For Messiah, it was decided (not by me) to not have details on music in the FA. I was the one to organize it and felt that it was too much to handle even that in one article. I wrote what I would like to read. For The Creation, I felt that the details I would want to read ere too much for the main article, therefore started the other. We can now look at the alternatives:

  1. article without table of structure
  2. additional table of structure
  3. a combination of the two in one

and to decide if we want one article or two, to better serve different types of readers. If we want a combination we should find a way to improve the referencing.

Rapid page moves don't help a discussion, and older links should still work, even if a name seems not the best.

For Bach's St Matthew Passion and Mass in B minor, I lean toward no merge because of even greater complexity, but will not resist it if a majority is for it, - actually it's nice to feel upgraded from modest side dish to main course, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 10:36, 4 July 2015 (UTC)

  • Comment: Redirecting articles with similar titles to a "main" article instead of the relevant spinoff article is ill-advised; WP:SPINOUT is clear: Spinoff articles can be very appropriate, particularly for large, extensive works. Merging can sometimes create a long, unwieldy article that is not readable.

100 kB Almost certainly should be divided; > 60 kB Probably should be divided (although the scope of a topic can sometimes justify the added reading material)

Montanabw(talk) 19:40, 4 July 2015 (UTC)
Sheer size should not be relevant. The works are complex and should stay one article, not divided. Part I of the Passion will not be performed separately, while Part I alone of Messiah is a Christmastide staple. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:05, 5 July 2015 (UTC)
I've refactored to clarify that the blockquote from WP:SPINOUT is part of Montanabw's posting, not Gerda's. Please note that those figures refer to "readable prose size", not file size nor any of the other sizes you get using Dr pda's prosesize tool, nor the Page length (in bytes) you get using the standard page information tool. The current figure for Messiah (Handel) is 44kB, and for The Creation (Haydn) it's 21kB. --Stfg (talk) 10:50, 5 July 2015 (UTC)

Lists

  • What do you think of finding a better name for the articles now called "structure"? "List of movements of ...", "Table of movements of ..."? "Music of ..."? A name with the name of the work in the beginning would be preferable, because readers searching for the piece would find it more easily.
  • Once a name is found, what do you think of a hat note at the top of all related articles. Some readers may be more interested in such a thing, others not at all. (As some readers prefer to read a lead, others an infobox.) I would call it a different approach to a piece, not a content fork, not an Easter Egg. I am proud of Mass in B minor structure, and believe that a reader arriving there will not be disappointed.
  • Needless to say: even when a better name is found, the old one needs to be kept as redirect, otherwise the many previous links to it are broken. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:05, 5 July 2015 (UTC)
The term easter egg refers to an inappropriately piped link, not to an article title itself. An different article giving a "different approach to a piece" is a content fork. That's the definition of content fork by definition. And Gerda, if I may say so, please stop banging on about infoboxes. It really sours the atmosphere here. --Stfg (talk) 10:58, 5 July 2015 (UTC)
We talk about St Matthew Passion and Mass in B minor where I don't see a desire to merge because of the complexity of the topics (while we are in the process of merging The Creation). The I understand that a major free source for music also links to the structure article. - I am sorry that my comparison, intended to show that different readers have different interests, soured you, while you just proved my point: different readers have different interests. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:15, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

Cape (Town) Philharmonic Orchestra

Latest comment: 9 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Does anyone know if the Cape Philharmonic Orchestra has changed its name to the Cape Town Philharmonic Orchestra, and if so, when and why? Please comment at Talk:Cape Philharmonic Orchestra#Requested move 3 July 2015. --Deskford (talk) 16:55, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

Alexander Glazunov

Latest comment: 9 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion

Alexander Glazunov will be 150 soon. Any plans? Not even all symphonies have an article. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 19:18, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

I just added small stubs on symphonies #2, #6, and #8 (which didn't yet have articles). Double sharp (talk) 21:00, 22 July 2015 (UTC)
He is pictured on the Main page, with the Commemorative Cantata for the Centenary of the Birth of Pushkin. I take the opportunity to return to the project, if you don't mind. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 06:59, 10 August 2015 (UTC)

Music community

Latest comment: 9 years ago2 comments1 person in discussion

Participants may be interested in a notice posted to the Signpost suggestion page: [[9]] - essentially 3 corporations have created an article Music community to justify their interests. - kosboot (talk) 19:12, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

The article has been tagged AFD: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Music community - kosboot (talk) 20:56, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Use of music notation examples in articles on compositions

Latest comment: 9 years ago47 comments13 people in discussion

Profbounds is adding a large number of gigantic musical notation images to classical music articles. The notation images overwhelm the articles and make many of them nearly unreadable. Note for instance Symphony No. 5 (Tchaikovsky). And in Symphony No. 1 (Mahler), which he's just now started in on, they are not only distratcing, they are also redundant to the audio samples already in the article. Other examples are in his contributions history: [10]. I suggest urging him to stop before he creates more problems. He's already been told that the numerous gigantic notations are distracting in a draft article he has been trying to submit: Draft:Hérodiade (ballet). Anyway, any help on, or attention to, this matter would be appreciated. Softlavender (talk) 02:48, 15 August 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, I don't understand. In which way has Symphony No. 5 (Tchaikovsky) become "nearly unreadable", and how can notation images be redundant to the audio samples? — Tobias Bergemann (talk) 06:06, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
If you do not think the 21 gigantic musical-notation images have made the article virtually unreadable, then we disagree. They are also redundant to the audio samples already present because they include audio samples. Softlavender (talk) 06:42, 15 August 2015 (UTC)

I agree: that is far too much notation. It overwhelms the article and is often accompanied by no verbal explanation. Score excerpts have their place on Wikipedia articles, but not to this extent (Piano Concerto No. 24 (Mozart) being an indicator of my own preference). Those who cannot understand notation need to be able to understand Wikipedia articles: text should therefore be the foremost vehicle, with score excerpts serving illustrative purposes for those who can understand them. If the musically proficient reader wishes to read larger extracts from a score, there is always IMSLP (at least for Tchaikovsky and Mahler). Syek88 (talk) 06:18, 15 August 2015 (UTC)

I understood the complaint differently, to be saying that the images display too large. This is certainly true for me: they disappear off the right margin, outside of the scroll capability of my browser (Safari). They appear to be inserted directly from a music-typesetting program, instead of being converted to a PNG or similar format and stored at Wikimedia Commons. If they were then imported in the usual way, it would be possible to set the display image size to make them more readable. The issue of example overload is separate, but also a legitimate concern.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 06:24, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
Hm. At least for me (using Mozilla Firefox 4.0 for Ubuntu) the notation examples appear perfectly reasonably sized. However, the examples make use of the <score>...</score> extension (see Help:Score. So maybe there is a problem with this feature? — Tobias Bergemann (talk) 06:55, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
Even on Firefox the 21 images and their audio samples overwhelm the article and render it difficult to read and nearly impossible to follow. If nothing else, Wikipedia's image policy precludes this massive intrusion of images. As per the policy: "If an article seems to have too many images for its present text, consider moving some of them temporarily to the talk page". I think this should be done on these articles, until there is community consensus about what to do with the images, and, if any of them are deemed relevant, which ones to use and how to handle/place them. Softlavender (talk) 07:09, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
At least for me both the notation excerpts and audio samples are a very welcome (in my view even necessary!) addition to an article discussing a major symphonic work. I really don't try to be difficult but I really don't see how they render the article "difficult to read and nearly impossible to follow"? Well, apparently mine is a minority view, and of course Wikipedia is based on consensus. — Tobias Bergemann (talk) 07:20, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
Just to make sure we are talking about the same thing: I have created a screenshot of the beginning of Symphony No. 5 (Tchaikovsky)#Analysis as it is rendered for me. Ignoring the number of the musical excerpts for a moment and just looking at their size could you please have a look at the screenshot and then tell me if and how that differs from what you see using your setup? Thanks! — Tobias Bergemann (talk) 09:21, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
  • On the whole I support Profbounds' efforts to add more music notation examples to various articles. For a good understanding (and not to go overboard):
    • Articles should be primarily based on a variety of secondary sources (that's why Draft:Hérodiade (ballet) can't be allowed to mainspace yet)
    • My rule of thumb is that all "primary source" material (including illustrations, and in this case, music examples) taken together should occupy no more than about 50% of the surface of an article. See Wikipedia:Wikipedia is a tertiary source for some more context on that recommendation. So for Symphony No. 5 (Tchaikovsky) I don't really see a problem (yet), but the balance is maybe a bit going too much in the direction of being "overwhelmed" by primary source material (note that WP:PRIMARY, the policy on the matter does not use the term "overwhelmed", but puts it this way: "... be cautious about basing large passages on [primary sources]"). For the Tchaikovsky No. 5 I see no need to remove any primary source material and, for that one, I'm sure there's more secondary source material to be found that could be added to the article, and that would be my preferred method to get primary vs. other material balance right again there. --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:14, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
Clarification: The problem (even in the Draft:Hérodiade (ballet); read the reviewer's comment about the images) is not the primary source factor. The problem is that the images, in their number and size, are grossly impeding the readability of the article. Wikipedia doesn't allow that, and they need to be moved to Talk until a consensus is formed on what to do with them, and whether to have any of them on the article or not, and if so, in what form. Softlavender (talk) 08:30, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
Re. "Wikipedia doesn't allow that" – where would Wikipedia not allow that? The only above-essay guidance on that would afaik be WP:PRIMARY as quoted. Or am I missing something here? So, for the time being nothing needs to go to talk page afaics. --Francis Schonken (talk) 09:26, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
Francis, anything can go to talk page if editors want it to; and here there seems in fact to be some consensus here (especially if you include me in) that the notation is over (or in your own opinion close to for Tch 5) excess. To deny that Wikipedia is against impediment of readability is, if I may say so, disingenuous to say the least.--Smerus (talk) 10:09, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
Pardon? Where do I deny that "Wikipedia is against impediment of readability"? Don't you put words in my mouth I never said, tx. The music samples in music notation are, for me, as readable as the mathematical formulas in Fibonacci number#Closed-form expression are readable to someone with an above-average understanding of mathematics. Neither mathematical formulas generated with <math>...</math> tags nor music notation generated with <score>...</score> tags fall under Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Images per se, so all what I was pointing out is that afaik no other "above-essay" guidance can be found about this than WP:PRIMARY, and that "Wikipedia doesn't allow that" is too strong an assertion.
Maybe we can also get to a less WP:BITEy style of conversation towards the apparently relatively new editor Profbounds? Would appreciate that. Also, I do very much appreciate how this editor adds music score examples to articles on compositions, they seem expertly done, and a better contribution to the article as a whole than the ones used at St Matthew Passion structure#Movements.
Also, I'm all for consensus on the matter, but afaics there's no consensus to move such music score examples to the talk page for any of the mainspace articles discussed in this section. --Francis Schonken (talk) 10:43, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
  • Minor comment: I'm finding it difficult to think up any criteria for this issue other than I like it / I don't like it, which seems to cover the majority of what is said here. One point, though: once again we're debating presentation when there's a much bigger issue of content. At the top of Symphony No. 5 (Tchaikovsky)#Analysis there's a great big 5-year-old {{Original research}} banner that's very well justified by such opinionated drivel as "Some elements of absurdity can be observed, for example, hemiola and unbalanced phrase structure at the outset of the movement" and "... strikes the listener as reminiscent of the tragic opening of the symphony, although perhaps in a ridiculed manner by integrating hemiola, a light-hearted character displayed everywhere in the movement". If that were fixed, perhaps it would become clearer which snippets support the text and which may not. --Stfg (talk) 11:34, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
    • True, but also true that this isn't really the topic of this discussion (and I wouldn't like to wander off-topic on this one). FWIW: I'd rather like to see the notes as written by the composer than some subjective WP:OR analysis of these notes, so in that sense Profbounds' music samples were a big step forward, and allows to remove the questionable descriptions of what is now present in music notation. --Francis Schonken (talk) 12:01, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
      • Francis, you miss part of my point, which is that if we get the text right, it will be clearer what music examples are suitable, while if we don't, the discussion reduces to like/dislike. I'm suggesting that the presentation of excerpts is the bicycle shed here. --Stfg (talk) 14:08, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
        • Re. "chicken or egg" discussion: conversely, when all musical themes are set apart in clear music notation examples, it helps writing the description of the music, avoiding lyrical off-topic interpretations of that music. --Francis Schonken (talk) 21:21, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
          • Francis, until we have citations for an analysis, calling anything "theme 2", for example, is original research. How do we know that it isn't a variation of theme 1? How do we know that there isn't another theme between theme 1 and the alleged theme 2? etc. See? What constitutes separate themes is never obvious enough that a lay person can establish it simply by inspecting the score. It requires competent analysis, and that constitutes original research. The first few bars of a movement are the most that one can identify without using analysis. --Stfg (talk) 11:27, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
            But true, similar sourcing should be done for the article on Tchaikovsky's 5th. In the event such source exists (like the one for the Bach's Magnificat) I'm rather indifferent whether one first adds the music score examples or the explanatory text to the Wikipedia article. --Francis Schonken (talk) 19:12, 16 August 2015 (UTC)

As a musician and teacher, I like musical examples. For me, they add to the the article. However, I do understand the concern over how they overwhelm the page. I would appreciate any input from someone with Lilypond experience on how to code a smaller font. Maybe Wikipedia is not the right venue for musical examples. I will gladly cease and desist if this goes against Wikipedia. I have noticed quite a variance on how various platforms render the Lilypond examples and whether the playback capability is supported (i.e. Safari, Waterfox, IE).Profbounds (talk) 16:35, 15 August 2015 (UTC)

  • I discovered the parameter to shrink the font size of the musical examples. I applied this to Symphony No. 5 (Tchaikovsky) only. Does this fix the size issue that some are experiencing? I understand that there is also a content issue, as well. I will do nothing else until I hear some feedback. Profbounds (talk) 21:06, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
  • Re. "cease and desist", please don't: they're valuable additions. As said there's nothing that goes against Wikipedia per se. There may be some recommendations on how to improve, but indeed let's not confuse such recommendations by getting carried away by a dismissive tone.
As an example, this source, p. 394, gives two motives I'd loved to have available when writing Magnificat (Bach)#1. Magnificat, just I don't have a clue how to produce these with the <score>...</score> tags. So if everyone contributes what they're good in we'll have excellent articles. --Francis Schonken (talk) 21:21, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
 
 

Profbounds (talk) 17:54, 16 August 2015 (UTC)

Tx! added to the article FYI this is how you ping me: {{ping|Francis Schonken}} --Francis Schonken (talk) 19:12, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
  • Comment: All other issues aside, the layout of the images is too large and does overwhelm the article. My suggestion is to make these into images and post them at commons, then insert them as graphics, perhaps in an annotated gallery. I have seen this done to good effect in articles on artwork, I think this could be a good compromise here; notation for the musicologists and those with an expert's level of interest, but structured so as to allow the text to be more readable. I see this primarily as an issue of layout, not content. My own view favors structuring an article so that it is useful to both the casual reader and the more experienced one... i.e. put the simple descriptions early on in the article (assuming the casual reader using a phone is only going to hit the lede and initial paragraphs) and then after the basics are covered, go into the in-depth analysis, with notation where needed. Montanabw(talk) 00:12, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
I appreciate the opportunities provided by the <score>...</score> extension, but it doesn't mean that it is always the best tool for the intended purpose. Replacing existing images with <score>...</score>s is almost never an improvement of article layout; it should primarily be used when we don't have images to illustrate the point made in the text. Compare this version (before) of Tchaikovsky's 5th with this (after). -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 01:36, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
    • I completely agree with the purely visual aspect that smaller is better. I started with PNG images for that reason, but discovered the inclusion of the Lilypond snippets in Wikipedia and prefer it for the simple fact that (on certain supported browsers) you can play the musical example. This seems less cumbersome than uploading an image and a sound file. It is quite easy to code with Lilypond. Profbounds (talk) 17:31, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
  • Comment: Just a general comment in support of including musical incipits (I was recently working on some unidentified Haydn String Quartets; the Wikipedia articles would have been much more helpful had they included notation). That said, I agree with Michael Bednarek, that his first example (which image files) was much better than the score format. And yet, even those files were excessively large and luxuriously spaced (unnecessarily). - kosboot (talk) 02:26, 16 August 2015 (UTC)


  • Comment: Would moving the examples to a bottom section of each article allow for the text to be read clearly but, also, give those who want access to musical examples for further understanding a place to go? Profbounds (talk) 17:31, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
    • No, not usually I think: best to keep music examples in the proximity of the text where they're explained. Often they're aligned at the right margin (see e.g. String Quartet No. 12 (Dvořák)), but always in the proximity of the explanatory text.
    Articles on compositions are often structured starting with one or more sections on the genesis of the piece, then one or more sections describing the piece itself (that's where musical analysis, score examples, content of the libretto etc go), concluding the body of the article with sections that relate to the reception history of the piece (e.g. including discography), see Wikipedia:WikiProject Classical music/Guidelines#Structure. Separating the analysis from the music score examples would not be a good idea. --Francis Schonken (talk) 19:12, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
    I agree that score examples should be placed with the analysis, but there's almost no discussion of the musical elements at Tchaikovsky's 5th, just a wall of score snippets. I think that's what others here objected to as "overwhelming" and "unreadable". I recommend browsing the article's history; the "Analysis" section has been added at least twice (27 July 2007, 1 May 2010), and removed once (27 May 2008), and trimmed some more just yesterday. Maybe it should be removed again. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 08:21, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
    Perhaps it could be taken to a separate article, with hopefully added analysis? name "WORK analysis", similar to "WORK discography"? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:31, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
This seems hardly the way to go for Tchaikovsky's 5th, and even if, I still think that an example like
 
works better than an example like
  (taken from St Matthew Passion structure#Movements)
for various reasons (including that the first uses English expressions like Flute and the second unexplained German expressions like Takte – which seems simpler to correct when using the <score>...</score> format) --Francis Schonken (talk) 09:12, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
As said above "I'm rather indifferent whether one first adds the music score examples or the explanatory text to the Wikipedia article", so oppose removing score snippets for the reason given by Michael. When examples are removed for WP:CHALLENGE (a lot of time has been given to provide adequate sourcing as Stfg pointed out above) I could live with it, until examples & analysis of Tchaikovsky's 5th can be brought back with adequate references. But all of that is rather for the article's talk page to be discussed (it's about the individual article and its issues), not about the general topic of how score snippets are presented, which is the topic of the discussion here. --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:37, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
The images of incipits at the St Matthew Passion structure serve the purpose very well – identifying labels for the work's movements. I'm sure they could not be replicated with the Wikimedia extension "Score". That extension is not a fully-fledged music notation program, and even most of them have shortcomings and don't replicate proper music engraving, so there is a place for Wikimedia's "Score", but it's not always the better, or even appropriate, solution. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 13:46, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
".. identifying labels for [a] work's movements" is for a catalogue - says pretty little about a work's structure (not even speaking about the structure of individual movements).
Re. "I'm sure they could not be replicated with the Wikimedia extension "Score"." – seems pretty prejudiced. Did you actually have a look at the incipits contained in St Matthew Passion structure#Movements? They are very botched-down excerpts, done by a music notation device with apparently very few features, probably less than what can be reproduced in <score>...</score> format.
Sure, "it's not always the better, or even appropriate, solution" – at least on topic for this section. However, determining when it is a better or appropriate solution is best not done based on misplaced platitudes imho. --Francis Schonken (talk) 15:59, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
Challenge accepted.
 

It is quite a versatile tool and once again renders the ogg vorbis musical playback which the image file doesn't have. However, it could never replace an image file in the case of the composer's original manuscript. I chose to hide the rests in the soprano part in measures 1, 3, and 5 although you could easily include them. Profbounds (talk) 22:41, 17 August 2015 (UTC)

Am I right that both the above and commons:File:BWV 244 Incipit Nr. 10 Buß und Reu.svg were generated with Lilypond (see lilypond code included in the image page at commons)? So what is the difference? --Francis Schonken (talk) 05:57, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

Bar

Now look how easy it is to translate the German Takt to the English bar:

 

Two seconds and fixed... No knowledge about a music program needed... how much more effort would it take to fix File:BWV 244 Incipit Nr. 10 Buß und Reu.svg for use on English-language Wikipedia? --Francis Schonken (talk) 05:04, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

Size

Just to compare the options:

1. Image without <score>...</score> tags ([11]):

 
Primary Theme 2

2. Using <score>...</score> tags without size reduction ([12]):

 

3. Using <score>...</score> tags with size reduction ([13]):

 

The whole discussion seems to be a lot of ado about nothing (the <score>...</score> actually reduces surface from where I stand)... I'd prefer #2, seems the clearest. --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:33, 16 August 2015 (UTC)

#3 looks like cue notes and #1 is way too widely spaced. Agree that #2 is the clearest in this case. Double sharp (talk) 09:39, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
Asking the question to the tech people: mw:Extension talk:Score#Display size of score samples? --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:49, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

MOS:MUSIC

Looking for guidance on the issue I could find none, so I posted a notice to the discussion here from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Music#Score extension – I hope that if we reach some agreement on this, MOS:MUSIC can be updated accordingly. --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:49, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

José Melchor Gomis

Latest comment: 9 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion

Señoras y señors, yo (aaaand that is where my microscopic knowledge of Spanish runs out) have just started this article.
I know nothing at all about this composer apart from what I've read in this article in El País. Please jump in and improve it.
Peter in New Zealand aka --Shirt58 (talk) 10:51, 23 August 2015 (UTC)

I've added a bit.--Smerus (talk) 13:59, 23 August 2015 (UTC)
Thank you @Smerus:!--Shirt58 (talk) 09:07, 29 August 2015 (UTC)

About User:Ḱléwos n̥dhgwhitóm/Early Music New York

Latest comment: 9 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion

Hello again all,
The userspace draft about this ensemble is up for WP:G13 speedy deletion. Could you possibly have a look at this? (I know almost nothing about the subject area.)
If it gets deleted, it would be fairly uncontroversial for me to un-delete it for further consideration.
Thanks! --Shirt58 (talk) 09:19, 29 August 2015 (UTC)

Afaics fails WP:BAND. Significant recordings? Press reviews? Or is their self-appraisal on their website all we've got? --Francis Schonken (talk) 09:45, 29 August 2015 (UTC)
Yeah, you're right - The Tallis Scholars they ain't. I sometimes forget that I'm supposed to be a "Notability Czar" as well as being a very junior member of WP:CLASSICAL. --Shirt58 (talk) 10:49, 29 August 2015 (UTC)

Help with Piano Sonata, WoO. 51 (Beethoven)

Latest comment: 9 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

I created this article over the last few days, but somehow managed to miss the fact that in 2007 or so new information was discovered that revealed that what had been considered to be an incomplete Sonata for Piano (This is how it is descibed on the IMSLP and on the List of compositions by Ludwig van Beethoven for example.) for the past 170 odd years was in fact written for an Orphica, an instrument I had never heard of.

Unfortunately "The Beethoven Journal" does not appear to give out sample articles (The key issues are "Volume 22, no. 1 Summer 2007" and "Volume 23, no. 1 Summer 2008"), so I have no idea of exactly what they say in regards this. I have located a summary on the Beethoven-Haus archives but this has no name attached to it so I am loath to consider using it as an authoritative source.

I am planning to expand/revise the current article to incorporate this information. I would like to ask that people refrain from renaming the article until I have made these changes. If anyone has access to the relevant journal articles I would be very grateful if they can summarise the contents. Graham1973 (talk) 04:55, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

oboe-player (oboeist?) appears to pass WP:42, but might be deleted on WP:SPIP grounds

Latest comment: 9 years ago13 comments2 people in discussion

Please see Wikipedia:Miscellany_for_deletion/Draft:Robert_Bloom_(2)#Draft:Robert_Bloom_.282.29. Thanks. 75.108.94.227 (talk) 17:06, 29 August 2015 (UTC) From a bit of further digging, this person was the founder of the Bach Aria Group. Any fans of Johann Sebastian? Preferably a wikipedian from outside the USA, if possible, since the beginning-editor specifically requested somebody *from* the USA, perhaps hoping that would endear the newly-recruited-eyeballs to the subject of this BLP-article? In any case, I'm happy to help teach the beginning-editor the wiki-ropes, but am out of my depth on the music-specific stuff. 75.108.94.227 (talk) 22:45, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

  • This is not a WP:BLP article. The guy died nearly quarter of a century ago. --Francis Schonken (talk) 03:16, 31 August 2015 (UTC)
    • Hello User:Francis Schonken, you are correct, this is a WP:BDP-article, sorry. And it needs a wee smidge of pruning. Can you point me to an existing article about a somewhat-similar-classical-music-biography, which is about the same as this draftspace-BDP-article in terms of prose-length and source-count and source-depth? The initiating-editor of the oboeist-draft incorrectly believes that the wikipedia article on Eleanor Roosevelt is a good starting-point (aka ~7000 words body-prose), and is attempting to write Draft:Robert_Bloom_(2) with a similar amount of detail and a similar length (right now ~4500 words body-prose), which is NOT possible with the five-or-so fully-independent sources *actually* available. Is there a good example-article in the five-paragraphs-or-so size (~300 words), that I can offer as a more-suitable exemplar? 75.108.94.227 (talk) 22:53, 1 September 2015 (UTC)
      • In some ways your original post reminded me of Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Classical music/Archive 60#Lea Luboshutz, although that one didn't have a dedicated website and/or the bulk of detail Blooms page seems to be suffering from... however the basic problem was somewhat the same: about three quarters of the page was inadequately referenced. See the diff of what eventually ended up in mainspace - here, instead of (but comparable to the problems of) a dedicated website, there were some "unpublished" documents, I believe deriving from family members, that were attempted as supporting material, which is of course unallowable as reliable sources for Wikipedia, so, in the end, I still had to eliminate a few of such sources by commenting them out.
      However, your WP:BDP assessment is also incorrect: BDP is "six months, one year, two years at the outside" beyond the date of death, not over 20 years. There's no BLP/BDP aspect here, except maybe for some people mentioned on the page that are still alive. There is however probably a huge (but apparently undeclared) WP:COI issue regarding the draft's main editor SLBloom.
      Anyway, get rid of the list of non-notable pupils (maybe, if you can find a few that have a Wikipedia page keep those, but get rid of the others). And indeed, maybe in a first step trim all material that doesn't have a reference (yet): Wikipedia's page history will keep it, so it is always possible to bring back later what can be referenced. —-Francis Schonken (talk) 04:32, 2 September 2015 (UTC)
      • Terminology question, then... I've always thought that "BLP" applied to living people, and also to recently-dead-people-and-their-loved-ones (informally "BRDP" aka Biography of Recently-Dead Person). I've always thought that "BDP" applied specifically (and only) to dead-for-more-than-two-years cases, but you apparently use that term, to refer to what I've dubbed "BRDP" situations. Have I just been mis-using "BDP" all this time, when referring to Isaac Newton as a BDP-article, and the like? And nobody bothered to correct me?  :-)       Now that you've brought it up, I see the prose as WP:BDP is actually somewhat ambiguous... it talks about 'this policy' applying to recently-dead-persons, and I've always read the prose as meaning 'this BLP policy' ... but maybe your terminology-usage is correct, and the reference to 'this policy' is actually talking about 'this BDP policy' since the prose is in that WP:BDP subsection of the overall WP:BLP page? 75.108.94.227 (talk) 16:57, 3 September 2015 (UTC)
        • Sorry about getting confused over acronym semantics. I clicked the link without wondering too much what the acronym was standing for. Yes the subject is D(ead), not R(ecently)D(ead).
        That being said, in the course of action I discovered there is a major BLP issue with the article, it regards Blooms wife, Sara Lambert Bloom who features in the article, and might be the same as the WP:COI editor SLBloom. --Francis Schonken (talk) 05:44, 4 September 2015 (UTC)
        • See, about the BLP-vs-BDP-terminology-thing, that is my question, I think *I* might be the confused one. *Is* it wiki-kosher to call Isaac Newton a BDP-article? Because that's usually the way I would use 'BDP' ... but I rarely work on such articles, so I don't know if I'm speaking wiki-correctly. Most of the bios I've worked on are in the BLP-article category, or in rare cases the "BRDP-article" neologism, so I am not actually sure that 'BDP' is ever used in the way I've always understood it. Except by me.  :-)     Have you seen other people saying 'BDP-article' when talking about long-dead musicians? If not, then I suspect my own use of the terminology needs revising! Hence our side-discussion here, I think I'm about to have a teachable moment for my own wiki-lingo-usage.
            And yes, it is a plausible assumption that User:SLBloom, and the large list of sourced edited by or authored by real-world-human Sara L. Bloom, wife of the deceased, are one and the same person. This statistically likely linkage was noted by User:timtrent on the article-talkpage. But regardless of the question of username-COI-disclosure, there is the more fundamental question of status-as-WP:RS-related source-independence: I don't think we can use a book, edited by Robert Bloom's spouse, and self-published that I can tell besides, for anything but WP:ABOUTSELF material. Similarly, we don't know who wrote the 'foremost' bit at Yale, from the first sentence of the BLP-article, since the name of the writer was not given. 75.108.94.227 (talk) 13:05, 5 September 2015 (UTC)
      • Pruned and promoted – don't know where that leaves the open MfD, see my comment added to that page. --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:27, 2 September 2015 (UTC)
        • Appreciated, thanks. I believe that 'some' of the un-pruned-as-yet paragraphs in mainspace, are cited to self-published (and in a few cases unpublished) material, such as personal letters. When you said you had to "eliminate a few such sources by commenting them out" , did you means using hidden-HTML-comments? Now, please note, I am more than happy to do that commenting-out-work, that I've suggested, but I'd like somebody to eyeball whether or not I've correctly pegged the unpublished-and-self-published bits, first. Please see Talk:Robert_Bloom#independence_of_some_of_the_sources, when you have a few minutes. Also, I will see if I can find online copies of the remaining cites that are prima facie legit, so somebody can review them without visiting the library. 75.108.94.227 (talk) 16:57, 3 September 2015 (UTC)
          • Please go ahead. The overview of issues-to-be-solved on the talk page isn't of much use if it isn't followed by mainspace edits that sort them out. Preliminary vetting of a list that mainly exists of items to be checked isn't of much use. Just check the issues, and go from there.
          Re. commenting out: don't do this in a first approach (just remove), in the Luboshutz article I only commented out, leaving a rationale in the invisible comment, after two passes of removing them and having seen them brought back.
          Please try to keep a "notability indication" in the lead paragraph. The present one isn't a good one, nor in terminology, nor in independentness, it should be replaced by something more appropriate.
          Please also get a good grip of the WP:SELFPUB policy: self-published sources can't be used in a WP:GNG logic (they lack independence for that), but they can, and often should, be used to flesh out an article when conforming to the five conditions set out at WP:SELFPUB. --Francis Schonken (talk) 05:44, 4 September 2015 (UTC)
          • Okay, will begin removals. The main point of me listing that stuff on the talkpage, was that I figured it would shortly be deleted from mainspace.  :-)     Some of the factoids might be rescued, in the future. As for the present, I will zap all the material which depends on cites to unpublished letters, or to books without independence. We can put it back later, in revised boring-neutral-just-the-facts-tone, if needed. Agree 100% about the using-WP:SELFPUB-for-fleshing-out, please feel free to re-insert any bits I delete, that you think add something helpful to the BLP-article. Thanks, 75.108.94.227 (talk) 13:05, 5 September 2015 (UTC)
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