IMSLP Forums

Hi,
I was wondering if there is some place here where errata can be submitted.
Today I downloaded the viola part of Bach's 4th orchestral suite and I found a wrong note in it (first movement, bar 169, half note d' should be f#').
It would be practical if such errors could be submitted in an errata-file for later users to consult.
What do you other users think of this?

Yours,
Rein

A good place to begin would be the Edition Notes for the corresponding IMSLP #. If the error is not clear-cut, or there are numerous errors that would be awkward to describe in brief, use the Edition Notes to make a note directing users to the work's Talk page, and put all of the discussion there.

Regards, Philip

When there have been problems with typesets or things that the uploader would probably have to fix, I have tried to get in touch with the uploader. I haven't always been successful, since not all of them are contactable via the forums, and not all of them have user pages or check their user pages regularly.

The problem with only using the talk pages, is that it may be a very long time before someone who is in a position to fix the problem actually goes to check the talk page.

Since the score is a scan, the error is already in the printed edition, so it's not the scanners/uploaders task to correct it. Rather, it should be documented on the "discussion" page of the score, so people can see that there is an error in the printed score already.

As I said, single wrong notes can be covered in the Edition Notes directly below where the file link appears. Sometimes however there are textual differences between editions or a composer's revisions which need to be clarified at greater length, and for want of a better place for it the discussion might be better on the Talk page rather than cluttering up the bottom of the work page; also, anyone who has a work page included on their watch list will also receive notification of modifications to the Talk page, so changes should not go particularly unnoticed (that's what watch lists should be used for).

PML

pml wrote:A good place to begin would be the Edition Notes for the corresponding IMSLP #. If the error is not clear-cut, or there are numerous errors that would be awkward to describe in brief, use the Edition Notes to make a note directing users to the work's Talk page, and put all of the discussion there.

Where is this "Edition Notes"? I can't find it on the relevant page, eg http://imslp.org/wiki/The_Nutcracker_(b ... ky,_Pyotr)

I found a couple of misprints (I believe) in the Finale, and would like to note them somewhere.

I think what he means is the field called "Misc. Notes". Each edition posted will have its own field for this, so it is definitely not the "Comments" field at the bottom of the page (for comments relating to the work as a whole, and not to one edition but not other editions).

By the way, if you don't see a "Misc. Notes" field in the edition space, it probably is just currently empty; field names don't show unless there is some information actually in them. Click on edit, and then you will see "Misc. Notes" under the copyright and publisher information fields. Once you fill it in and click on "Save Page", it will show.

steltz wrote:I think what he means is the field called "Misc. Notes". ...

I added a note to the page : http://imslp.org/wiki/The_Nutcracker_%2 ... ,_Pyotr%29

I couldn't even see how to insert a newline, so the result is not very neat. I think that really speaking a systematic treatment of typos in scanned scores would be very desirable: it would help both users of the score, and anyone setting out to make a typeset. Very ideally*, one would be able to add a "pencil" note at the top of the relevant page (* but not impossible, given a pdf guru and a bit of time). Or an Errata section would surely be easy to add to the standard template. Errata pertain to a specific file (e.g. a section of a work, or "Oboes") rather than a specific version of a work, but I don't know if it would be simple to add something, e.g. after "ratings". In general it would need to be a link to an errata sheet, but that should actually be very simple to implement.

I've fixed the clarinet errata to add the natural and sharp signs, but I can't work out your second horn erratum. What symbol do you mean? On my screen (this is a font issue), it's coming up as "C♭A should be CA♭". Do you also think the voicing should be reversed?

steltz wrote:I've fixed the clarinet errata to add the natural and sharp signs, but I can't work out your second horn erratum. What symbol do you mean? On my screen (this is a font issue), it's coming up as "C♭A should be CA♭". Do you also think the voicing should be reversed?

The natural sign is on the C, when I think it should be on the A.(Same notes as the trombones)

Incidentally, I'm not sure how to indicate bar numbers. If the conductor says "Two bars after H" I would expect to start exactly two bars later than the barline indicated by H. But if the conductor says "From H, count - one - two - three - four - five - six. Sei-no...*" I would count whole bars following H, and expect to start at the *beginning* of the sixth one. In the first scheme, the bar starting at H is "H+1"; in the second scheme, it would be "H+0". I don't know if there is a convention about this, but as a sometime C programmer I would actually advocate H+0, even though it doesn't seem to be what I did.

* Means "Ready get set go". Sei-no is what professional Japanese musicians seem to say. Amateurs say things like "wan-tsuu-surii", and rank amateurs probably 'ichi-ni-san'.

Imaginatorium wrote:Incidentally, I'm not sure how to indicate bar numbers. If the conductor says "Two bars after H" I would expect to start exactly two bars later than the barline indicated by H. But if the conductor says "From H, count - one - two - three - four - five - six. Sei-no...*" I would count whole bars following H, and expect to start at the *beginning* of the sixth one. In the first scheme, the bar starting at H is "H+1"; in the second scheme, it would be "H+0". I don't know if there is a convention about this, but as a sometime C programmer I would actually advocate H+0, even though it doesn't seem to be what I did.

Ha, ha, ha -- I wish I had a dollar for every time this caused problems in rehearsals with conductors saying one thing that the musicians take as the other!

Seriously, though your other problem is now solved, I think. it is done in a format readable to everyone -- use {{flat}}, {{sharp}}, or {{natural}} to get symbols that will show on every screen. Have a look: http://imslp.org/wiki/The_Nutcracker_%2 ... ,_Pyotr%29