Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Composers

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Refine and discuss guidelines for composer pages. Establish an example of an article that meets the goal of the project.

Archives /Archive 1

Contents 1 Template for Articles on (Classical) Symphonies 2 Stablepedia 3 Gregorian vs. Julian Dates 4 Composer's interpreters 5 Fair use with permission 6 List of compositions by (composer) 7 Sudden deletion of fair-use sound images without discussion: major implications for music-related articles 8 Wikipedia Day Awards 9 A Composer's works 10 Dominick Argento on peer review 11 Igor Stravinsky 12 Tenacious D 13 Conflict of interest: backup requested 14 External Links to Sheet Music

[edit] Template for Articles on (Classical) Symphonies

DavidRF has recently cleaned up a spate of Haydn symphonies using a very simple standardised format that I developed for the half dozen or so articles on the Haydn symphonies that I have gotten around to writing so far. This excellent effort reminds me that this template could probably be felicitously applied to our other articles on symphonies so we have a standard structure across the body of articles on individual symphonies (easily extendable, of course, to other pieces). My template consists of:

1. Overview of the work
2. Date of Composition & Scoring (includes history & first performance information)
3. Nickname (where applicable)
4. Movements

I think templates have been proposed in the past (as with naming conventions), but I am not sure of their fate. Any thoughts? Eusebeus 13:15, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

That template seems to cover all essential information. I'll use it myself...when ever I find myself first editing the article of an individual work. Chris 04:03, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

My personal opinion is that the movements should be moved up higher on the page. I always have to scroll down on the Beethoven Symphonies for the movements, whereas in his sonatas, the movements are at the top. It would seem that the movements of a piece are the most basic information about it as they are what little objective information about the piece that the composer actually supplies. At any rate, I think that pages of the same type such as symphonies should be uniform across all composers, not just by each composer. Asmeurer (talk ♬ contribs) 05:34, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Stablepedia

Beginning cross-post.

See Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team#Stablepedia. If you wish to comment, please comment there. ★MESSEDROCKER★ 23:45, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

End cross-post. Please do not comment more in this section.

[edit] Gregorian vs. Julian Dates

I'd be interested in hearing project members' perspectives on a matter of style - the use of Gregorian vs. Julian dates. I'll present as a case study the particular item that I'm interested in, but I bring the discussion here to the project page to obtain a wider response as to whether we'd have general guidelines when such things are in question. Here's the specific instance that I'm considering: Italian early Baroque composer Giulio Caccini published a collection of madrigals and songs called Le nuove musiche. The publication date is 1601 or 1602 depending on the reference source. The print sources that I have available at this moment (15th edition Britannica, New Oxford History of Music, and Grout's History of Western Music) all give 1602 as the publication date. The Caccini article, and some web pages which I located by Google search on "Giulio Caccini" and "Le nuove musiche" give 1601 as the publication date. I do not have access to a copy of Grove at the time of this writing. The Here of a Sunday Morning web article on Caccini [1] was helpful in explaining the apparent discrepancy - it gives the date of Le nuove musiche as 1602 (1601 old style) (i.e. Julian). So, given the different usage in reference sources, which do we use in Wikipedia? Apparently there has been some discussion of this topic in WikiProject Years, see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Years#Julian, Gregorian and other calendars. If we go by which calendar was in usage in the applicable country, "most of" Italy was using the Gregorian calendar from 1582 on, per Gregorian calendar#Adoption of the Gregorian calendar, which would probably mean we use 1602 for publication of "Le nuove musiche".

Thanks in advance for your consideration on this question. This topic is of particular interest to me because I've been adding musical publications to the Year in music pages, want to add them to the appropriate year, and would like some more guidance other than just my own opinion. Cheers, Lini 12:56, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Composer's interpreters

I believe every composer page should have his/her most important interpreters shown in some standard way. I think this can be NPOV (you don't have to say they're the best, only that they are remarkable).

I don't see why we should mention Bach in Glenn Gould's article and not Glenn Gould in Bach's, as that's what I'd be searching for if I didn't know the composer and wanted to listen to his works.

Please, I want to know your thougts on this idea. Sdistefano 01:40, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Fair use with permission

I have removed the guidelines on "fair use with permission" from the project page. While it is nice that the copyright holders do not object to their works being used on Wikipedia, and indeed, we would like them not to object to our use, it grants the use of the work no special status on Wikipedia unless it is released under a free content license, and should be treated as any other "fair use" media. This composers project, much as I like its subject matter, may not set special guidelines for this use that differ from the global project guidelines. Kat Walsh (spill your mind?) 21:44, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Kat's right. Wikipedia is not just about Free as in beer, which these fair use things sort of are, but free as in free content, which can be used in other ways, including commercially, or in a non-educational context. Mak (talk) 21:51, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

And as an aside, there is nothing about our educational use that gives us a free pass on copyright. I wish there were.. I pay a lot of taxes to support the local school district buying books. :) As you can see, our use of such recordings is bound to leave us in ugly legal positions even were it permitted by our policy. --Gmaxwell 22:27, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] List of compositions by (composer)

Greetings,

There has been some discussion of list of compositions formatting, but I would like to address an more fundamental issue: the placement of such lists. Should they be in a separate article, or incorporated within the article itself? See Category:Compositions by composer for a list of all such lists. I would prefer to standardize this across all composers' articles. For example, Jeanne Demessieux suffers from a double list of compositions, and a user has questioned the separation of Leo Sowerby's works list. To contrast these, I like the approach taken by Johann Pachelbel and List of compositions by Johann Pachelbel. I personally am in support of separate articles for works lists, but I am open to the other approach as well; it's just that I think we need to set a standard for this. Thanks, —Sesquialtera II (talk) 00:01, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

I just recalled a previous discussion regarding a specific instance of this matter: Talk:George Frideric Handel#List of Pieces by Handel. This may prove helpful in this discussion. —Sesquialtera II (talk) 23:34, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

My opinion is that any list more than a reletively small amount should get its own article -- it's needless whitespace for the main article space otherwise. Importent pieces should get mentioned in the text somewhere, idealy, anyway. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 01:26, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

I see this is not exactly a hot-button issue, so I'm going to edit the project page to make a recommendation to create a separate compositions list article whenever the composer has written more than, say, 12-15 pieces, unless there is a sufficient objection soon. —Sesquialtera II (talk) 06:13, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sudden deletion of fair-use sound images without discussion: major implications for music-related articles

Dear fellow contributors

User:Gmaxwell, a player at Wikipedia talk:Fair use, conducted a rampage two days ago through Johann Sebastian Bach that has led to the destruction of all of the fair-use audio excerpts. These excerpts were prepared in accordance with the WP policy on the fair use of commercial recordings (< 30 secs, educational value, no impingement on commercial market, etc) and include two whole-track excerpts for which written permission was given by the copyright owner to include in the article.

The action, by Maxwell and someone else who, strangely, doesn't appear in the edit history pages of the files in question, has been sudden, unilateral, and without so much as a mention on the talk page of the article. This has started a controversy at Wikipedia:Fair use#taking things way too far.

Our ability to illustrate music-related articles with the short, justified, fair use of excerpts from commercial recordings is now seriously threatened. I believe that these people are acting on their own particular interpreation of WP's fair-use policy. I urge you to voice your opinion in this debate.

Tony 02:32, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

Your characterization of this as a "rampage" is unproductive and unhelpful. The use was not in accordance with policy; please see Talk:Johann_Sebastian_Bach to see what I have said in the specific case that has prompted this discussion. I do support using fair use where the use is truly fair—for example, for modern composers where there can be no free recording—but fair use is more limited under our policies than has often been observed. Kat Walsh (spill your mind?) 03:13, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

Odd, User:Danny says that he's the one who did it. Interesting. Kim Bruning 20:05, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

Gmaxwell originally placed tags on the sound files. Danny then deleted them. Then Gmaxwell removed the redlinks from the article. Tony's conclusion does not fit the facts as given in the deletion log. See first, second, third, fourth, fifth, all deleted by Danny. Mak (talk) 04:39, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

I was unable to recover that information at the time from the info pages; I have no idea why. Spillage, I'd rather have no recordings at all than poor ones. Show me a good one and we're flying, but I see none on the Commons. Quite the reverse: they're generally appallingly bad. I don't agree that the usage was not in accordance with policy. The deletion was clearly a breach of policy, and prevented debate on the former issue. Modern composers where there can be no free recordings? Hello? Tony 12:32, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

As stated earlier: Danny is policy, he cannot breach it. (This would be a bad time to explain how this also applies to other people, due the mechanics of how wikipedia policy really works. Just keep in mind that there's more to it, and that it can be fun and useful to know:-)

What you *can* do is try to explain why it's a bad idea to delete these recordings. Maybe people will simply agree. One admin offered you the opportunity to undelete the files, should you have provided a good rationale. It's unfortunate that you didn't take that opportunity at the time, but I think the offer still stands. At worst, he would give you several new ideas as to how to approach the problem.

Alternately, you could try to get the recordings under GFDL or CC(-BY)(-SA).

As yet another means, there are several musicians and technicians on wikipedia who might even be able to help record very specific parts for us (yet another solution). Unfortunately, you've already done your best to alienate at least one such person, but much can still be recovered even there.

Commons has already been mentioned. I hear that they didn't have anything yet? Mores the pity. Maybe we can remedy that situation somehow.

In short, there are many ways to go about getting a decent recording for the article. The trick is not to stand on policy, but rather to just ask for help. You will get it. :-)

Kim Bruning 19:16, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia Day Awards

Hello, all. It was initially my hope to try to have this done as part of Esperanza's proposal for an appreciation week to end on Wikipedia Day, January 15. However, several people have once again proposed the entirety of Esperanza for deletion, so that might not work. It was the intention of the Appreciation Week proposal to set aside a given time when the various individuals who have made significant, valuable contributions to the encyclopedia would be recognized and honored. I believe that, with some effort, this could still be done. My proposal is to, with luck, try to organize the various WikiProjects and other entities of wikipedia to take part in a larger celebrartion of its contributors to take place in January, probably beginning January 15, 2007. I have created yet another new subpage for myself (a weakness of mine, I'm afraid) at User talk:Badbilltucker/Appreciation Week where I would greatly appreciate any indications from the members of this project as to whether and how they might be willing and/or able to assist in recognizing the contributions of our editors. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 17:53, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] A Composer's works

Is there a policy or guide line concerning how a composer's works should be listed in an article? For instance on the John Coolidge Adams page the works are listed by form and then by date of composition with the date first. However on the Steve Reich page they are listed only by date but with the date at the end of the entry. If there is no guide line about this could one be made to help standardize things? S.dedalus 02:26, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Ups, just noticed this was already discussed above, sorry about that. S.dedalus 02:14, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Dominick Argento on peer review

I have submitted numerous articles for peer review and never get more than a bot's suggestions. I am determined to get an actual peer review for this article, so I figured I would post it here. If anyone wants to contribute, feel free! --Dmz5*Edits**Talk* 07:50, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

A picture of the guy would be nice. Also a more complete works listing. Asmeurer (talk ♬ contribs) 05:27, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Igor Stravinsky

This article has been selected for Feature Article Review. Please see the talk page and discussion at FAR for improvements you can make to retain its FA status. Jeffpw 10:12, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Tenacious D

Would Tenacious D come under the umbrella of this WikiProject. I know they compose their own stuff but I am not sure if they should be here.

Tenacious D Fans (talk) 16:55, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Conflict of interest: backup requested

I could use some help, potentially, here: User_talk:Antandrus#Unwarranted_deletions. Composer Lera Auerbach's husband has written her article (probably) and is inserting her name into many, many articles, in an aggressively promotional manner. Any help/suggestions appreciated. I think she's notable enough for an article on Wikipedia, but should she be in short lists with Bach and Britten? She's neither in the New Grove nor in the New Grove Dictionary of Women Composers, which is quite exhaustive. If anyone's watching this, feel free to drop me a line. Antandrus (talk) 02:19, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] External Links to Sheet Music

It has just occured to me that linking to sheetmusicarchive [2] as an external link is inappropriate since only two downloads per day are allowed, when the alternative IMSLP [3] is available giving unlimited public domain files. It is much more comprehensive and the content from SMA seems to be entirely available there. I'm not saying we should replace every link to SMA in every composer's article, but I think we should bear it in mind when working on the pages. Any thoughts? M A Mason 20:44, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree, especially as the IMSLP seems to be similar in spirit to WP. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 20:58, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

I have already replaced SMA links with IMSLP links on some occasions, when all content of SMA was available on IMSLP, too. For the links, one can use the template {{IMSLP}}. --Leonard Vertighel 22:31, 28 March 2007 (UTC)