History talk:Instrument Tree/Requests

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With regards to "generic" stuff, I just noticed there's no way for ARs that use the tree, like "arranged", to identify simply "arranged orchestral parts" or "arranged vocals", or similar arrangement roles. They're not instruments, but if we're going to reuse the tree for those types of ARs as well, perhaps those types of "super-generics" also ought to have a place in the revised tree? -- BrianSchweitzer 06:44, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

"Mbira (Mbira, (sansa, kalimba, luvale, karimba, marimbula, matape)) (7)" - I would suggest that this one is named such that it's unclear; the kalimba can be either the modern thumb piano, or the entire family, but the mbira is specifically the traditional thumb piano used within Zimbabwe. "Kalimba (Mbira, (sansa, kalimba, luvale, karimba, marimbula, matape)) (7)" would make much more sense. -- BrianSchweitzer 02:52, 09 March 2008 (UTC)

Would be nice if the entry for "Jew's Harp" was changed into "Jew's Harp / Trump". Unless you know the instrument, it's easy to assume that "trump" is a kind of trumpet. -- TimVanHolder 21:00, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

  • According to Wikipedia, "trump" can mean either a Jew's harp or a trumpet (or a blow in a trumpet). -- FrederikSOlesen 08:26, 01 May 2008 (UTC)

Synths

Why shouldn't particular types of synth be added? They're frequently listed on CDs and some people care what type of synth was played. Why not make them subtypes of 'Synthesizer'. PaulSharpe

  • Because it's impossible to keep up with them all, especially considering the protracted process by which new instruments need to go through before they are added. I've said time and time again that this is all NUTS - what we need are a few (50 tops) instrument/role macro-categories, and then a free text field by which users can input qualifiers. Eg: "Synthesizer [MiniMoog]". --Gecks
    • Free text fields are not possible in the current Advanced Relationships implementation. (And also I think a mixture of a list and free text is counter productive, but well..) You guys are just too impatient. :) Let mo finish his job of restructuring the tree and after that he will create a wiki page to make the process of adding instruments much faster. Noone will die inbetween. And it will prevent total chaos to do it structured and in this order. --Shepard
  • The number of different synths produced numbers in the several hundreds. Roland alone has made well over 100 different synths and tone generators. Do you want to start listing all of those? That's a slipperly slope to be on. Besides, they are just models and brands. In the end the artist is still playing a synthesizer. If we start listing those then to be consistent we'd have to list the brand and model of all of the other instruments. Does it matter that Jaco Pastorius played a Fender Precision Bass on most of his albums or can we be content to know that he played electric bass guitar? Likewise, does it really matter that Lyle Mays played a Korg Triton and a Steinway Grand on the last Pat Metheny album or is knowing that he played synthesizer and piano enough? MattPerry

Dancing

  • Dancing - Occasionally, I stumble upon releases and tracks which have someone credited as "dancer" or with "dancing"
    • Stepdancing - I also see step dancing every now and then (actually, probably more often than simply dancing). --FrederikSOlesen 2007-04-17T07:52:33CEST (I will provide links to releases with these credits as soon as I get around making that Wiki Page I talked about yesterday in IRC.)
    • maybe Tapdancing, which is apparently a subtype of stepdancing - on Who Used to Dance (actually represented as "percussion instruments performed by Savion Glover"), and probably a lot more releases (Musicals' stuff).
  • I'm not really sure there is a point in crediting things that don't have a relation with the recorded sound (eg: "My mother made the cookies"), and possibly we may define this "instrument" only when it actually has a "part"? -- dmppanda 09:09, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
    • Well, all the dancing credits I thought of in my above proposal actually have a "part" in the sound picture. Step dance in particular is used in "Celtic" music for percussion, in line with bodhrán, bones, and spoons. -- FrederikSOlesen 13:02, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
      • krazykiwi says there's a band called 'Tilly and the Wall' who make a feature out of having a tap dancer instead of a drummer (both live and on recordings). -- mikemorr

Singular or Plural (parent) instruments

Parent instruments are named with inconsistent singular and plural form at the moment (e.g. 'Horn', 'Valved brass instruments', 'Flute' and 'Drums'). Some of the parent intruments are instruments of them selfves (e.g. 'Horn'), some are just a group indication (e.g. 'Valved brass instruments'). Both types can, and should be allowed to, be used in AR's depending on how someone is credited. I think this should be done in a more consitent manner. Away From Here is one example where one is credited arranging 'Horns' instead of just 'Horn'. There is, however, no plural form of 'Horn' available while the group 'Violins' does have 'Violin' in singular form included.

In the most accurate situation we should do the same for every group indication as we do for 'Violins' and 'Violin' thus e.g. changing 'Horn' to 'Horns' and adding 'Horn' as a sub instrument. This might, however, result in a drastic increase of the instrument list (not that it isn't already way too big but stil ;-)). Another option would be to change at least all of the parent intruments to use the 'Horn(s)' form and thus removing the singular forms like 'Violin' from the list. The downside would be that the AR's won't be as accurate as can be. Of course, we could simply make everything singular or plural but somehow this doesn't really appeal to me ;-) -- Prodoc 14:43, 08 March 2008 (UTC)