- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - An Introduction to ABC Music Notation by John Chambers Here's a simple example of ABC notation for a well-known Irish jig: X: 1 T: The Kesh Jig T: The Kincora Jig R: jig M: 6/8 L: 1/8 K: G D \ | "G"~G3 GAB | "D7"~A3 ABd | "G"edd gdd | "D7"edB dBA \ | "G"~G3 "(Em)"GAB | "Am"~A3 "D7"ABd | "G"edd gdB | "D7"AGF "G"G2 :| |: A \ | "G"~B3 dBd | "C"ege "G"dBG | "G"~B3 dBG | "Am"~A3 "D7"AGA \ | "G"~B3 dBd | "C"ege "G"dBd | "C"~g3 aga | "D7"bgf "G"g2 :| This is fairly easy to read, and once you understand it, you can quickly start typing in your own tunes. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - HEADERS First, there are a bunch of "header" lines that say things about the tune as a whole. The X: line merely gives an index number. If a file has several tunes, they should all be given different X numbers. Some ABC software lets you use the X: number to extract tunes from collections, sort of like the way that some CD players let you pick the order of play. The T: lines give titles. This tune has two titles. I put "The Kesh Jig" first because, in my experience, that's the one that is the best known. Printing software will typically show the first title in a larger font than others, which are considered "subtitles". The R: line ("rhythm") says it's a jig. This is also used by some software. For example, f you're on a Unix-like system you could use a command like: grep -li "R: *jig" *.abc to locate all the jigs in a directory of abc files. The M: line gives the meter, 6/8 in this case. You can use M:C and M:C| for the obvious "common" (4/4) and "cut" (2/2) times. You can also say M:none for no time signature at all. The L: line gives the basic or default length of a note. In this case, L:1/8 says that a note without any time modifier is an eighth note (quaver). This is only used in converting ABC to printed music. The K: line gives the key. In this case, the key is G major. "K: Gm" would mean G minor. The abc standard also includes the classical modes, so that "K: Gdor" means G dorian (one flat), and "K: Amix" means A Mixolydian (two sharps). The mode can be spelled out or abbreviated to three characters, and minor can be abbreviated to just m. ABC's rules say that the X: and T: lines must be first, and the K: line is the last of the header lines. Then comes the fun part, the music. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - MUSIC First, if you play a melody instrument, you can ignore all the stuff in double quotes. Those are called "accompaniment chords". They are to be played on guitar or accordion or harp or whatever. Now that you know what they are, you can probably understand the chords in this tune. So we can ignore them, and the first part of the tune is: D \ | ~G3 GAB | ~A3 ABd | edd gdd | edB dBA \ The backslash means "continued on next line", and is used to merge several lines of abc into one staff. When reading, we can ignore backslashes, and the result is: D | ~G3 GAB | ~A3 ABd | edd gdd | edB dBA The letters A-G and a-g are notes. Large notes are the bottom half of the staff, and lower case is the upper half. The scale actually runs CDEFGAB, with C being the C below the staff, and B being the line in the middle of the treble staff. Similarly, cdefgab is the scale from the c in the middle of the staff to the b above the staff. Programmers hate this odd order of letters, but musicians will see why it's a good idea. A number after a note is a note length. So G3 means a G three times as long as the L: value. In this case, it's a G of length 3/8, or a dotted quarter note. You can also use fractions if you wish. So G3/2 would mean a G of length 3/16, or a dotted eighth note. You can omit a numerator of 1 or a denominator of 2, so G1/2, G/2 and G/ all mean the same thing, a G of length 1/16 in this tune. The only thing left to understand the above line is knowing that ~ is notation for a "turn". It is displayed as a large ~ symbol above or below the note, and played however you feel like playing it. So, to translate this all into rather coarse ASCII graphics, here are the first two bars of the above line: ,| ,| ,/ | |\ ~ ,/ | ~ ,/ | ----|/--#----------|--------------,/---|-|------------,/-|---|-| / | ,/ | | | | | | | | ---/|-----6--------|---|-------|---|---|-|---|-------|---|-(*)-| / | | | | | | | | | | | -/--|----------|\--|---|-------|---|-(*)-|---|-------|-(*)-----| ( /| \ | | | | . | (*) | (*) . (*) | -\--|-/---8----|-|-|-(*)-----(*)---------|---------------------| \ |/ | ' | | | ----|----------|---|---------------------|---------------------| J (*) Wow, that was difficult to type! The ABC notation is much easier, especially if you're a keyboard player. But anyone who plays any instrument should find ABC fairly easy to type. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Let's see, what else do you need to know? Oh, yes; in the above tune, you'll see |: and :| symbols. You guessed right; these are repeat symbols. I left out the |: at the beginning, as is done in a lot of printed music. You can also indicate first and second endings: |: ... |1 ... :|2 ... || where ... represents any music. The || symbol represents a double bar, and you can use [| and |] to get the thick+thin or thin+thick styles of double bars. You can also use :: in the middle of a line as a shorthand for :||:, that is, double bars with repeats on both sides. There's also notation for two more octaves. It is sort of pictorial, using a comma (,) for "one octave down" and an apostrophe (') for "one octave up. So G,A,B, are the three lowest notes on a fiddle or mandolin, and c' is the second leger line above the treble staff. It's also useful to be able to include rests. The ABC symbol for a rest is the letter 'z' (and note that it's lower case). It is used just like a note, and takes lengths in the same manner. Something not covered in the above example is accidentals. There is an obvious problem with the ASCII character set: It has a sharp sign, but no natural or flat sign. The solution is simple: _G is a G flat; =G is a G natural, and ^G is a G sharp. Note that this is a bit inconsistent with the notation for keys and chords: K:Gb and K:G# are how you indicate keys of G flat and G sharp; "Gbm" and "G#7" are G flat minor and G sharp seventh chords. But since 'b' is used for a note, it can't be used with notes to indicate a flat. So the pictorial _=^ symbols are used. You can also indicate ties and slurs. A tie (or single-note slur) can be indicated with a hyphen. If the above tune had started G3- GAB it would have meant to tie the G to the G in the second group of notes. To get a slur, put parentheses around a group of notes. Thus, in the above example, you might indicate a generic jig bowing by writing: D | ~G2G (GA)B | ~A2A (AB)d | (ed)d (gd)d | (ed)B (dB)A | A few words about spacing: I've used more spaces in the above examples than you really need. About the only spaces that are needed within the music are the ones that separate groups of notes. This is used by abc display or print programs to determine how notes are beamed together. If the third bar had been |eddgdd|, the result would be six notes all beamed together. If you write |ed dg dd| you would get a waltz-type beaming, with three groups of two notes each. |edd gdd| gives two groups of three notes each. Spaces around the bar lines aren't needed, but they help a lot if you want your ABC to be readable by humans. Also, the header lines don't need spaces after the colons, but they add slightly to readability. There are some other useful header lines. C: is used to indicate the Composer. O: is used to comment on the Origin. S: is used to give a Source. B: is used to list Books where the music can be found. D: means discography (recordings). H: is used for Historical notes. N: is used for random other notes. And you should put your name and email address on a Z: line, which is used to indicate who did the transcription. (T: was already taken.) You can see O:Trad in a lot of old tunes. And Q:120 or Q:1/4=110 may be used to indicate a metronome setting. There's more to ABC, but this is all you need to know to read or write typical folk tunes. Now go to your favorite editor and type in a few tunes. And check out the ABC home page: http://abcnotation.com/ You'll find pointers to lots of software and music collections there. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - This is the second file from my set of ABC documents. Some others: http://trillian.mit.edu/~jc/music/abc/doc/ABCtrivial.txt http://trillian.mit.edu/~jc/music/abc/doc/ABCintro.txt (this file) http://trillian.mit.edu/~jc/music/abc/doc/ABCprimer.html http://trillian.mit.edu/~jc/music/abc/doc/ABCtut.html