Re: guitar/bass as a transposing instrument and midi

[David Kastrup]

bb <address@hidden> writes:

> A /transposing instrument/ is one in which the absolute pitches of the
> notes played on the instrument are shifted up or down by a certain
> amount, compared to how they are written in notation. \clef "treble_8"
> for guitar takes account of, but is not always written, as that
> transposing property ias a standard. Bass is a transposing instrument as
> well. \clef "bass_8"works as well but I found it never written in any
> bass notation.
>
> Writing tabulatures  can easily be corrected with \transpose in the 
> \new TabStaff code section. 
>
> That does not work the easy way for midi. The resulting midi-sound is an
> octave higher in tone.
>
> i cannot find a solution to lower the pitch for midi only. Every
> \transpose alters the written notes as well. Eventually one has to write
> an aditinal special music for midi? 

Looking in the Notation manual under "Instrument transpositions"

<http://lilypond.org/doc/v2.18/Documentation/notation/displaying-pitches#instrument-transpositions>

I read:

    When typesetting scores that involve transposing instruments, some
    parts can be typeset in a different pitch than the concert pitch. In
    these cases, the key of the transposing instrument should be
    specified; otherwise the MIDI output and cues in other parts will
    produce incorrect pitches. For more information about quotations,
    see Quoting other voices.

        \transposition pitch

    The pitch to use for \transposition should correspond to the real
    sound heard when a c' written on the staff is played by the
    transposing instrument. This pitch is entered in absolute mode, so
    an instrument that produces a real sound which is one tone higher
    than the printed music should use \transposition d'. \transposition
    should only be used if the pitches are not being entered in concert
    pitch.

So where did you look for a solution?

-- 
David Kastrup