"hummingbird": a new musical notation

[chaos]

http://www.hummingbirdnotation.com/

as a musician this seriously hurts. who the fuck thought it was a good idea to remove the key signature, and replace plain-as-fucking-daylight sharp and flat symbols with subtle "tails"? i sigh a breath of relief when i click the "traditional" button.

discuss.

 

[KnightoftheWind]

"The soft, bubbly forms are fun! Hummingbird is inviting when traditional notation can feel intimidating."

What.

 

[chaos]

I wanted to think it was an april fools joke but look at the circle jerk in the twitter comments
https://twitter.com/search?q=http://www.hummingbirdnotation.com/

 

[THE_IRON_...KENYAN?]

so are these the new XY unknowns ive been hearing about on serebii?

 

[Physicism]

Oh God no.

 

[Arch]

What the fuck. It's not like it's hard to learn how to read music. I don't understand why people are so intimidated by it.

 

[Steamroll]

I wanted to think it was an april fools joke but look at the circle jerk in the twitter comments
https://twitter.com/search?q=http://www.hummingbirdnotation.com/

hey musicians I got a musical note in my name just try to not take me seriously. This seems like an April Fool's joke two weeks too late.

 

[Fishy]

uh, this is disgusting, and seems far more confusing/messy to look at than traditional notation. as if it's less difficult to learn all these new symbols than just learn how to associate notes with respective time signatures. what in the fuck.

 

[Focus]

I've practically grown up playing instruments, and...this is mildly interesting. Though standard musical notation is flawed, I think most of us can agree that it is pretty much fine as it is. I do like Hummingbird's modifications, though. It is certainly easier to tell in an instant what a certain note is without spending a split second interpreting those ledger lines. And I'm sure there are some piano players out there who freak out upon seeing big clumps of notes with accidentals. There are a couple of minor problems that I see with Hummingbird, like the sharp symbol looking like the 16th rest (and like it's flipping the bird! ahahaha). So I would see this being nice if it were all made standard (lol). Heck, at the very least it might be a stepping stone that might not make some elementary school kids lose focus in music class, assuming those testimonials were true. Of course, where would that leave those kids who inevitably prefer the standard notation? Who knows. It's still nice to see people doing something to try and make the ubiquitous language of music more accessible.

 

[RitterCat]

Ugh i think the tweets are worse than the retarded notation

 

[Bummer]

Sharp pitch will have none of your shit.

 

[Mr.E]

As someone who is only vaguely familar with musical notation to begin with, traditional notation isn't that hard to figure out...

I've practically grown up playing instruments, and...this is mildly interesting. Though standard musical notation is flawed, I think most of us can agree that it is pretty much fine as it is.

...but I admire their attempt to fix the problems they feel exist. As a science major, I always found it pretty annoying how many flawed conventions we uphold just because something has always been done/named/noted "that" way and the scientific community is simply too lazy to modernize and teach it in a better manner for future generations.

 

[Myzozoa]

I can't read hummingbird at all, I doubt it's easier to learn, since there is probably no one who can teach it. Reading music isn't hard, playing it on an instrument is hard.

 

[Hipmonlee]

Different symbols for different notes seems a needless complication, otherwise it seems sensible enough.

Transposition seems like it would be confusing when you are trying to contend with symbols and not just positions of notes.

Key signatures are kinda important though, I personally would find it a little annoying to have sharps and flats indicated when they are part of the key, half of the usefulness of marking sharps or flats is that it indicates the note is out of key.

If I had designed this I would have made it so it can fit in completely with current notation. So its like something you can write over the top of existing music to help kids learn this shit. On the other hand, I have taught some young kids music, and they dont really struggle with learning notation. The instrument itself is a much tougher learning curve, but that is brass.. If you played something easy like piano maybe that would be different..

Also how do you do triplets?

 

[scampy]

Sharp pitch will have none of your shit.

 

[WaterBomb]

Oh my

scampy I love you

 

[yond]

A fresh take on music notation — easier to learn,
faster to read, and simpler for even the trickiest music.



I thought this was way harder to understand and much more complex... having to read the shadings at a fast tempo would be a nightmare... I also don't see how it would be easier to learn. This is not a fresh take at all.... it stinks.

 

[Mr.E]

The soft, bubbly formes are fun!

Fan Rotom is inviting when traditional Rotom can feel intimidating.

 

[Birkal]

lol

If someone gave me a score with this kind of notation and told me to accompany them, I'd drop 'em in a heartbeat. Ain't got time for this. Neither does the rest of the competent musical world. I'd argue that this is comparable to writing an essay in Webdings.

 

[Solace]

excuse yourself birkal i've written many a competent essay in webdings

｡◕‿◕｡

i don't really read music anyway but this seems incredibly difficult to read when playing since everything looks so similar. aesthetically it is ~prettier~ imo but not practical at all

also the sharps and flats are so cute uwu

 

[Heroes Fall]

It's not that bad. I can't follow it as well as I can normal music, but that's to be expected for something new. It's a novel idea, but I wouldn't try to fix what isn't broken. I'm not quite sure how they notate 16th/32nd notes etc, but if someone is raised on this new method I think it could work.

 

[internet]

Oh god yes different icons for different notes

Everything else isn't that much of an improvement

 

[Mari]

I think the traditional notation is much easier to read. The Hummingbird symbols are very complicated. The different filled note heads are very confusing and deterrent. The replacement for ties and dots is very incomprehensible. Moreover I miss the beams of the traditional notation, the array of the Hummingbird notation is not directly connected with the notes and it is hard to see the connection at a glance. I think the 1/32 notes and 1/64 notes are hard to distinguish, the same with the associated rests.

Even this is much clearer than Hummingbird:

I would never support this project.

 

[Jorgen]

Unless you're looking at millions of ledger lines, there's really no need for those separate symbols for notes. Also why make everything more subtle when the idea is clarity? I guess some piano scores can get a bit cluttered, but still, now it's just cluttered with less obvious symbols, it seems.

 

[Hipmonlee]

So what I would do would colour notes differently for different pitches, then you can add the other shit like the lines after notes and the flats and shit, but keep stems and noteheads exactly as they are.