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As I occasionally rename work pages (mainly over-capitalized French titles), I see both ' and ’ characters used as apostrophes.
Is there an official rule about this at IMSLP?

My (humble) opinion:
- When I typeset documents or scores, I am very careful in using only the typographical apostrophe (’) and banishing the straight one.
- But I think that when dealing with computer filenames, the standard typewriter apostrophe (') should always be used.

Hi Pierre,

the titles of pages also do double duty as URLs, which is why I believe there might be an official rule to suggest the title for non-Romanic works should be transliterated to vaguely normal Latinate text, so that we don't end up with URLs like:

http://imslp.org/wiki/%D0%9D%D0%B0%D1%8 ... n,_Mark%29

There's no way human beings can read the title of that page when its URL-ified, without being an idiot savant of some kind to parse the hexadecimal Unicode, hmmm. At least with some of the examples below, it is possible to get an idea of what the squiggles might have been! Also, possibly due to some weird MediaWiki bugs, there are certain filenames that have the effect of breaking URLs that weren't adequately trapped, which means you can upload a file that is virtually impossible to delete. If you upload a file named Nuits-d'été.pdf, each of the offending characters will usually get turned to a double underscore (__) in the filename on the server. So probably, simpler is better with file titles (and stands a better chance of not being underscore soup when it gets downloaded).

Anyway, I suspect I know where you’re coming from, since earlier, I noticed this page move from the curly right-hand quote mark version, http://imslp.org/wiki/Les_nuits_d%E2%80 ... _Hector%29
to the plain old straight dash apostrophe version, http://imslp.org/wiki/Les_Nuits_d%27%C3 ... _Hector%29
so I have to say, it’s not really that much neater with the plain apostrophe, as it has to be mapped to %27 anyway, and the curly quote is %E2%80%99. We suffer these indignities anyway by virtue of all of the Romanic languages with accents that aren't in the ASCII layout (hello Dvo?ák!), so I would suggest use the curly quote – it not only looks nicer, it is the right character, typographically.

As for capitalisation, I noticed this is one where you reversed the trend, and added a capital that wasn't there from the page’s beginning. Now, this is where I suspect (possibly mistakenly) some national habits of mind come into play. David Kern Holoman’s webpage capitalises Les Nuits d’été; however, the webpage is a poor substitute for volume 25 of the New Berlioz Edition, which I don’t have a personal copy of, so usually for titles of works I defer to Hugh Macdonald’s Berlioz (Dent, 1982), where there is usually very much less capitalisation (Les nuits d’été). More exempli, gratiæ:
Les Francs-Juges [DKH] — Les francs-juges [HM]
Grande Symphonie funèbre et triomphale — Grande symphonie …
La Carnaval romain — La carnaval romain
Le Corsaire — Le corsaire
L’Enfance du Christ — L’enfance du Christ
La Damnation de Faust — La damnation de Faust

Shall I make a gross generalisation by suggesting the US habit is to over-capitalise the first letter of every word and then think about removing the ones that are obviously mistaken, whereas the more European habit is to grudgingly add them aside from the first word of a title, and excepting proper nouns? (Like all generalisations, throw a bucket of salt over your shoulder.)

Anyway, when doing previous moves of the Berlioz pages to incorporate the Holoman catalogue numbers in preference to the Opus numbers, I deliberated long and hard about the rights and wrongs of capitalisation, curly quotes, fidelity to the composer’s work title (where this is known – there are fewer autographs than one would like, and even fewer facsimiles of title pages easily perused on-line), and I would give myself maybe 7/10 - I think some of the titles are still Not Quite Right™. However, I felt I couldn't get away with any more changes than I had already gotten away with, because the Entrenched IMSLP Habit seems to be to Capitalise Things.

For example, the Holoman catalogue numbers could be represented in exactly the same way as the Deutsch or Köchel-Verzeichnis numbers currently are, which is to use an abbreviation [H.] rather than a contraction [H]. However, as I was brought up on the style that enforces a space after a full stop before the following number (e.g., Op. 1), I find this aspect of the IMSLP style guide damned ugly, which would make a capital letter followed by a space the more attractive option. (So my use of the contraction of Holoman was a very subtle thumbing of my nose at the IMSLP style guide, but I imagine it’s now partially tolerated – at least until someone else comes along to move every single page.)

Beyond a certain point though, insisting on moving a page to use fewer or more capital letters simply becomes bloody-minded, and my current practice now is to only move a title when there is an actual factual error involved in it, or a glaring omission of detail, rather than moving it for "cosmetic" reasons. (Even so, I couldn’t prevent myself from moving the almost completely over-capitalised Missa Pro Defunctis of Cristóbal Morales; it just looked wrong beside the others that downplayed the p.d. I also moved one of the Berlioz pages since it was the sole example of an abbreviation - H. - rather than a contraction.)

So what’s next? Shall we have a discussion on the complete and utter wrongness that is the hyphenation of names for notes, such as C-sharp or E-flat? If the view is that the terms “sharp” and “flat” are modifiers applied to the note, then this is treated quite inconsistently, since the modifiers “major” and “minor” (being the two surviving modes in common Western usage, compared to earlier times) aren’t handled the same way, in English usage at least... perhaps the German Cis-moll und Es-Dur would be a better system? ;-)

My manifesto on the topic will be forthcoming, naturally, but for the moment, you may simply take it as read that under no circumstances should I ever have to see a page title again like the following: Random Capitalised S**t In F-Sharp Minor

Regards, Philip

(PS post was not entirely serious, believe it or not)

pml wrote: Anyway, I suspect I know where you’re coming from, since earlier, I noticed this page move from the curly right-hand quote mark version, http://imslp.org/wiki/Les_nuits_d%E2%80 ... _Hector%29
to the plain old straight dash apostrophe version, http://imslp.org/wiki/Les_Nuits_d%27%C3 ... _Hector%29
so I have to say, it’s not really that much neater with the plain apostrophe, as it has to be mapped to %27 anyway, and the curly quote is %E2%80%99.

Well, I must be lucky: my Firefox displays http://imslp.org/wiki/Les Nuits d'été, Op.7, H 81 - but I had to type it again here, because when copy-pasting it gave me http://imslp.org/wiki/Les_Nuits_d%27%C3 ... _Hector%29

pml wrote:We suffer these indignities anyway by virtue of all of the Romanic languages with accents that aren't in the ASCII layout (hello Dvo?ák!), so I would suggest use the curly quote – it not only looks nicer, it is the right character, typographically.

I am not far from fully agreeing with you! The point is, should the computer standard or the typographic one being chosen. But, for that specific question, couldn't there be a wiki bot, automatically replacing quotes by the right (I mean, the curly) one?
BTW, I just saw in a work page title, another quote: ´

pml wrote:As for capitalisation, I noticed this is one where you reversed the trend, and added a capital that wasn't there from the page’s beginning. Now, this is where I suspect (possibly mistakenly) some national habits of mind come into play. David Kern Holoman’s webpage capitalises Les Nuits d’été; however, the webpage is a poor substitute for volume 25 of the New Berlioz Edition, which I don’t have a personal copy of, so usually for titles of works I defer to Hugh Macdonald’s Berlioz (Dent, 1982), where there is usually very much less capitalisation (Les nuits d’été). More exempli, gratiæ:
Les Francs-Juges [DKH] — Les francs-juges [HM]
[...]
Shall I make a gross generalisation by suggesting the US habit is to over-capitalise the first letter of every word and then think about removing the ones that are obviously mistaken, whereas the more European habit is to grudgingly add them aside from the first word of a title, and excepting proper nouns? (Like all generalisations, throw a bucket of salt over your shoulder.)

You shall! For details about the French usage, see the article on fr.wikipedia. Holoman's usage is the traditional one. So:
Les Nuits d'été — correct
Les Nuits D'Eté — for a French reader: awful
Les Nuits d'Eté — incorrect (unless Summer is a person/allegory)
Les Nuits d'Été — same, but with the (alas rare, but far more modern) respect of the acute on the capital.
LES NUITS D'ETE — virtually all French scores would only display this, while
LES NUITS D'ÉTÉ — is more correct, and could be found in old or recent scores, but very rare in 20th c. ones.
Les nuits d'été — lesser sin; this under-capitalization seems to be more common in recent French usage (opposite to the US one!).
les nuits d'ete — by e.e.cummings!

pml wrote:For example, the Holoman catalogue numbers could be represented in exactly the same way as the Deutsch or Köchel-Verzeichnis numbers currently are, which is to use an abbreviation [H.] rather than a contraction [H]. However, as I was brought up on the style that enforces a space after a full stop before the following number (e.g., Op. 1), I find this aspect of the IMSLP style guide damned ugly, which would make a capital letter followed by a space the more attractive option. (So my use of the contraction of Holoman was a very subtle thumbing of my nose at the IMSLP style guide, but I imagine it’s now partially tolerated – at least until someone else comes along to move every single page.)

I share your point of view! It has been very difficult for me to see, understand, and finally type those damned "Op.1" instead of my regular "op. 1" (yes, I know, no capital).

pml wrote:So what’s next? Shall we have a discussion on the complete and utter wrongness that is the hyphenation of names for notes, such as C-sharp or E-flat? If the view is that the terms “sharp” and “flat” are modifiers applied to the note, then this is treated quite inconsistently, since the modifiers “major” and “minor” (being the two surviving modes in common Western usage, compared to earlier times) aren’t handled the same way, in English usage at least... perhaps the German Cis-moll und Es-Dur would be a better system?

I'm afraid that, as futile as it can be seen, this discussion will be necessary, and as we wait on such issues, each week there are thousands of new work pages to correct...
Personally I write C{{sharp}} Major or minor.


OK, now I promise I will slow down on quotes, and try to on capitals... but It Will Be Hard For Me!
Regards, Pierre

Dear Pierre,

thanks especially for the link on the French wikipedia, that’s very informative.

I think the typographically correct quote marks should be used for titles (but best if they are not used for file names); the use of grave and acute accents as quote marks ` and ´are not actually the correct symbols, compared to the repertoire of Unicode punctuation marks, which includes the prime and reversed prime marks, e.g. ‘ ’ “ ” «» »« ‚ ? „ ? ? ?

I can see the raison d’être behind the capitalisation of Major versus minor, but my own personal practice is to assume major (or you could call it the Ionian mode) by default, thus, Mahler’s Eighth Symphony in E{{flat}} doesn’t require further qualification, whereas Beethoven’s Symphony in C minor has the modifier of “minor” (for extreme shorthand where needed, a lower-case character for the key qualifies it as minor, e.g. c for C minor); a very unscientific statistical breakdown of compositions where the key is mentioned (outside of early music!) in my possession seems to break down as follows:

Major keys: ~75%
Minor keys: ~25%
Other modalities: 1%<< (e.g. Dorian mode, Lydian mode etc)

I would suggest this result would very probably generalise to the entire corpus of music on IMSLP, whereby the major key music that is explicitly cited by key would very likely form the majority, of something over 50%, the minor key music something under 50%, and the number of works citing a different modality would be very close to 0%: for example, Bach’s so-called Dorian mode Toccata and Fugue – which is based only on the work having a key signature of D without sharps or flats! – is (correctly) listed as being in D minor; only one piece on IMSLP lists "Lydian mode" in its title; none for the Phrygian mode, etc. (Obviously going before 1700, or far past 1900 this tendancy would break down; in early music there are clearly many more modal pieces than those tonally major or minor despite resembling the equivalents; and some 19th century works presage the 20th century abandonment of tonality, or where a lot of works mention neither keys, modes, or use open key rather than giving explicit key signatures.)

In practice for multi-movement works it is uncommon for all movements to share both the same key and modality, so describing Beethoven’s Symphony in C minor glosses over the fact one movement is in A flat, and another in C [major]; the citing of a key usually refers to just the first movement, which for some works is actually quite uncharacteristic; e.g. Bach’s Mass in B minor (arguably more of it is in the relative D major); Mozart’s Mass in C minor (arguably most of it is in C [major], or else in a variety of minor keys, not just C minor: c, d, e, g, a).

As to whether it would be good to implement this throughout the Wiki – I think it would require some major forethought (please excuse the pun) before implementing it for specific composers; we recently had a disagreeable situation owing to a user’s unilateral imposition of such a policy, and it is best for all concerned if these issues are argued at length before changes are made.

For example, looking at the list of symphonies by Haydn, I feel we should have omitted the “major”, which would have given page titles such as the following: e.g.
Symphony Hob.I:34 in D minor (Haydn, Joseph)
Symphony Hob.I:45 in F sharp minor (Haydn, Joseph)
whereby the minor key works at least stand out a little bit from the pack of major key works. A similar situation would hold for the Mozart works, many of which lack information on keys in the title, and most of which are major key works; I would also prefer to use KV (followed by space to the work number) rather than the ugly current usage of K. without a space between the full stop and the number – and this would mirror the Neue Mozart-Ausgabe’s usage. Another time...

Regards, PML (IMSLP resident grouch)

For what it's worth, this is the instruction given in the international standards used by libraries (AACR2 and the forthcoming RDA):

Key is required when needed to differentiate a musical work from another work with the same title.

6.18.1 Basic Instructions on Recording Key

6.18.1.1 Scope
Key is the set of pitch relationships that establishes a single pitch class as a tonal centre for a musical work.

6.18.1.2 Sources of Information
Take information on key from any source.

6.18.1.3 Recording Key
Record the key as instructed under 6.18.1.3.1 or 6.18.1.3.2 below, as applicable.

6.18.1.3.1 Pre-Twentieth-Century Works
For pre-twentieth-century works, record the key. If the mode is major or minor, add the appropriate word.

6.18.1.3.2 Post-Nineteenth-Century Works
For post-nineteenth-century works, record the key if it is stated prominently in the resource being catalogued. If the mode is clearly major or minor, add the appropriate word.

In short, their convention is to only include the key in the work title to distinguish between works with similar titles; and then always to include the qualifiers "major" and "minor" (both in lower case), unless the mode is ambiguous.

While we might not always slavishly follow international library standards on IMSLP, it might be helpful to see how others have approached the same problem

I also tend to add keys to distinguish between works with the same title, or in some cases with several Fauré songs with the same name, a date of composition in parenthesis.