Pitches:
      Basic notes are entered as solfege syllables:
          Major = DO, RE, MI, FA, SO, LA, TI     Natural Minor = DO, RE, ME, FA, SO, LE, TE
                                                Harmonic Minor = DO, RE, ME, FA, SO, LE, TI
Additional chromatic inflections are also allowed (e.g., ra, fi, se, etc.). Diatonic notes (i.e., those in the key signature) will always appear without accidentals; chromatic notes will have accidentals. You can manually insert an extra accidental sign before a note by typing '#', 'b', or '=' (for natural sign) followed by a space. The absolute pitches for these symbols will change depending on the key signature (e.g., C major: MI = E; D major: MI = F#; etc.). As a shortcut, diatonic scale degrees can also be entered as a single letter or number:
          d, r, m, f, s, l, t      or      1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
[Note: In minor keys, these one-letter symbols will only produce natural minor.]
For rhythms only, you may use 'q' as a generic note; use 'z' for rests. Use 'n' (or 'N') for placeholder notes (i.e., you know a note goes there, but you have no idea what the pitch or duration is).

Register:
      The case (lower- and upper-) of the letters changes the octave register as follows (from lowest to highest): Do, DO, do, dO. The default register varies depending on the specific clef and key in order to keep 'do' (i.e., double upper-case) on the staff. Most melodies should fit comfortably writing within the 'DO' and 'do' octaves. (Note that you can easily switch back and forth between these using the [Caps Lock] key.) Single-letter abbreviations correspond to these same two octaves (D = DO, d = do); numbers are only in the upper octave (1 = do). If necessary, you can change the default register to transpose everything up or down an octave without re-writing the symbols.

Durations:
      By default, the duration of a plain solfege pitch (e.g., RE or mi) will appear as a quarter note. Tags can be added to the end of the pitch syllable to modify the duration, such as adding dots ('do.') or 'flags' ('do/'). Adjacent flagged notes (8ths and 16ths) are automatically beamed together. If you want to force a beam break, add an extra space between the notes. To insert a tie, type '-' (followed by a space). The following is a complete list of available duration tags:

   " " or q = quarter note (DO or DOq)      / or e = eighth note ( DO/ or DOe)      // or x = sixteenth note (DO// or DOx)
    . or q. = dotted quarter (DO. or DOq.)  /. or e. = dotted 8th (DO/. or DOe.)    //. or x. = dotted 16th (DO//. or DOs.)
     2 or h = half note (DO2 or DOh)        2. or h. = dotted half (DO2. or DOh.)       w = whole note (DOw)
   (3 or q3 = triplet quarter note         /3 or e3 = triplet eighth note         //3 or x3 = triplet sixteenth note
   (2 or q2 = duplet quarter note          /2 or e2 = duplet eighth note         //2 or x2 = duplet sixteenth note

[Note: 'e' can't be used with single-letter solfege. You must use '/' or the two-letter solfege + 'e' (e.g., R/ or REe).]

The single-letter durations (q, e, x, h) can be used alone for unpitched rhythms and will appear with a staccato mark. These can be modified with dots and tuplet numbers (e.g., e., x3); 'q' can also be modified with flags. Likewise, 'z' rests can be modified with flags, dots, etc to produce different durations of rests. The default note length can be changed using the pull-down menu. This will automatically adjust all of the duration values relative to the new default. For example, if the default note length is an eighth note, then plain notes ('DO') will appear as 8ths, a single flag ('DO/') will appear as a 16th, 'DOh.' will appear as a dotted quarter, etc.

Clef/Tonic/Mode:
      Use pull-down menus to select the Clef (None, Treble, Alto, Bass), Tonic (e.g., C, D, etc.) and Mode (Major or Minor). As stated above, the octave register automatically adjusts depending on the clef and key. When no clef is selected, a one-line, percussion staff appears for notating rhythms only. Rhythms may be entered using the letter 'q' for the basic note and will appear with a staccato mark. All solfege syllables will automatically appear as a generic note when there is no clef, but will return to their normal pitches when another clef is selected. Thus, if you want to temporarily view the rhythm only for a melody (without the visual clutter of moving up and down), just remove the clef.

Meter:
      You may select a Meter with the pull-down menu. Time signatures are displayed in key-beat format: the top number is the number of beats; the note symbol is the actual beat unit; the placement of the beat on the staff shows the tonic ('do'). This type of time signature is based on a proposal in Jean-Philippe Rameau's 1722 Treatise on Harmony, and is similar to that used by Carl Orff. It is a much clearer representation of compound time (e.g., 6/8 = 2 beats with a dotted-quarter as the beat unit) and avoids any confusion between keys which share the same time signature (e.g., Bb major and G minor both have 2 flats). Please note, however, that the time signature is only a display; SoMiDo is not 'meter-aware.' In other words, it does not check to see if you have the correct number of beats in a measure. Furthermore, the beat unit for a given meter is completely independent of whatever default note length is selected for calculating durations.

Other:
      This website was created primarily facilitate online melodic and rhythmic dictation in aural skills courses. As such, input boxes are provided for entering your Name, a Title for the transcription (e.g., Quiz #2, question #5), and the Course you are in. You may provide any additional comments or questions you wish to include in the Comment box.
To submit a finished dictation to your instructor: click the [Select ABC] button to highlight all of the raw ABC notation, copy the text, and paste it into the appropriate answer box in your online quiz. If is of course, also possible to email the copied ABC notation to someone. If you wish to have a copy of the actual printed music notation, you can [Pop up] the score alone into a separate window to print or take a screen shot.

ABC Notation:
      so.mi/do is a kind of transposable script which is converted into a language called ABC notation. Although not well known to most Classical musicians, ABC notation is extremely popular as a system for the transcription of traditional folk songs and fiddle tunes. It has the advantages that it is text based so it is easy to send a tune to someone else, it is straight-forward enough so that simple melodies can be read and performed directly from the ABC version, and it is sophisticated enough that it can be used to render complicated music in printed staff notation.
If you want to get fancy, you can edit the raw ABC notation directly on this page. Click on a notehead on the staff to highlight the corresponding part in the ABC notation. Insert "|" to add bar lines. Delete spaces to beam consecutive notes (e.g., join together two flagged 8th notes). Press Enter/Return to start a new line. For more instruction on using ABC notation, see this ABC Notation Primer. The note rendering on this website is driven by abcjs, an open source ABC notation editor.

http://www.wmich.edu/mus-theo/somido/index.html
© 2013 - David Loberg Code - code{at}wmich[dot]edu