time-signature question

chas · Post by **chas** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 8:28 pm

I had a book with the complete Playford Tunes on inter-library loan awhile back (took at least six months to get it, so not getting it back for awhile). The first edition was, I think, about 1659. Anyway, there's a time signature that is the same as cut time but with the C backwards. I presume this is faster than cut time, i. e., roughly 1/1.

Anyone familiar with this? I have dug on the web for some time and found references to it, but no explanation.

TIA.

Loren · Post by **Loren** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 8:37 pm

chas wrote:I had a book with the complete Playford Tunes on inter-library loan awhile back (took at least six months to get it, so not getting it back for awhile). The first edition was, I think, about 1659. Anyway, there's a time signature that is the same as cut time but with the C backwards. I presume this is faster than cut time, i. e., roughly 1/1.

Anyone familiar with this? I have dug on the web for some time and found references to it, but no explanation.

TIA.

Maybe that's the sign for "Cut and Run" time - you know, the time when they start throwing bottles at the chicken wire cage you're playing in......

Loren

Tony · Post by **Tony** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 8:48 pm

Blues Brothers... loved that movie!

Chas, I didn't see a backwards C...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cut_time

The letter C ("common time")—deriving from the broken circle used in early music—may be used in place of the 4/4 time signature. A similar C with a vertical line through it (¢) can be used in place of 2/2, also known as "alla breve" or, colloquially in English, "cut time" or "cut common time". This "cut" symbol, doubled, is also occasionally used for 4/2, although, confusingly, some examples omit the doubling.

Innocent Bystander · Post by **Innocent Bystander** » Fri Dec 01, 2006 3:34 am

Eric Taylor:The AB Guide to Music Theory wrote: Time signatures were not always written in figures: they were formerly expressed by symbols such as circles and half-circles, sometimes crossed with a vertical line. Most of these symbols had disappeared by the early 17th Century, but two survived well into to 20th Century, though in a modified form: C and c/.

Wikipedia says something similar but even more briefly.
I'm sure I've seen a semicircle like a rotated C - but I don't know what the time signature is meant to be.

Bloomfield · Post by **Bloomfield** » Fri Dec 01, 2006 7:52 am

I think it means 2/4.

Source. (don't know how reliable it is.)

Flyingcursor · Post by **Flyingcursor** » Fri Dec 01, 2006 11:10 am

I once downloaded the whole Playford book from online. It was a bunch of .gif files. I then pasted them into a Word document and printed them. I'll have to try and find it. I'd forgotten about it. Never noticed the backward C

The Weekenders · Post by **The Weekenders** » Fri Dec 01, 2006 1:26 pm

The copyist was dyslexic.

Redwolf · Post by **Redwolf** » Fri Dec 01, 2006 2:06 pm

Dumb question, but could it be a clef rather than a time signiture? Some of the odd clefs (such as alto) look a little bit like a backwards "E"....

Redwolf

Cayden · Post by **Cayden** » Fri Dec 01, 2006 2:15 pm

The ABCs for Playford are here

BoneQuint · Post by **BoneQuint** » Fri Dec 01, 2006 3:01 pm

Bloomfield wrote:I think it means 2/4.

Source. (don't know how reliable it is.)

Looks pretty conclusive. Lilypond is a well-known, well-researched program.

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