New! Version 1.15 recompiled to work on 64 bit processors!

Old!! Version 1.14 recompiled to work with Windows XP!

Older! Version 1.13 produces mandolin tab, as well!

Oldest! m2g for beginners

The abc system of music notation was introduced by Chris Walshaw in 1993. In essence, the notes of the scale are denoted by the upper and lower case letters a-g.. Middle C is denoted C. The C above middle C is denoted c. A trailing apostrophe raises the pitch one octave; a trailing comma lowers it one octave. A note is represented in a manner similar to the C below it. For example, the notes on the lines and spaces of the treble clef are EFGABcde while the notes on the open strings of a guitar in standard tuning are E,A,DGBe where the commas are not separators but indicate the octave below middle C. The courses of the mandolin are G,DAe. Naturals, sharps, and flats are denoted by placing a =, ^, or _ before a note. Thus, =D is D natural, ^f is f sharp, and _E, is E, flat. However, sharps and flats are also implied by key signatures. In the key of G, for example, f denotes f sharp.

A wide range of music in abc notation--public domain fiddle tunes, in particular--is available on the World Wide Web. See, for example, http://www.gre.ac.uk/~c.walshaw/abc/#collections. John Chambers has established a highly effective index and engine for finding particular tunes. Elizabeth Scarlett's ABCTools can be used to change a tune's key or default note length.

In the mid-1990s Michael Methfessel wrote the program abc2ps to create PostScript files from abc files so that tunes notated in the abc system could be printed in standard musical notation. PostScript files can be printed not only on PostScript-capable printers, but also on a wide variety of non-PostScript printers by using freeware versions of GhostScript and GhostView. Aladdin Enterprises offers an easy-to-use Windows version of GhostScript with a Free Public License that can be downloaded from the GhostScript freeware site. (The current version of GhostView explicitly states it may be used without charge for noncommercial purposes. However, every time an unregistered copy starts, it displays a panel urging registration for those who might wish to offer financial support. The panel cannot be bypassed without registrating no matter how many times it is viewed. The user must interact with the program by clicking on the panel to proceed. Earlier versions of GhostView, such as 2.9, have no nag. They may be found through a web search for gsv29w32. [Version 7 of GhostScript has now been released. It is not compatible with versions of GhostView earlier than 4.0. If you wish to use an earlier version of GhostView, you will have to use version 6.x of GhostScript, as well.]

In 1999, Christoph Dalitz released the program abctab2ps. It extended the abc system of notation and the abc2ps program to offer support for guitar and lute tablature. It is an extension of abc2ps that should behave just like abc2ps when no tablature is is present. The current abctab2ps version 0.7 is built on abc2ps version 1.3.3. While abctab2ps provides support for tablature, it does not generate tablature notation from standard abc music notation.

m2g is a freeware DOS utility for IBM-compatible computers that adds abc guitar tablature notation to a file of abc music notation. The results are automatically fed to abctab2ps to generate a PostScript file of standard music and tab. m2g assumes abctab2ps has been installed in a directory that appears in the computer's path statement. If this is unclear or you do not wish to change your path statement, you may instead place m2g in the same directory as abctab2ps and run m2g from there. m2g can be run in a DOS window under Windows.

The syntax is

The qualifier .abc is automatically added to the input filename if no qualifier is given. The output filename is given the basename of the input file and the qualifier .PS.

Options must be separated by one or more spaces. There are no tags such as -t or -s. They are identified from content since they have no values in common.

• 'm' without quotation marks produces mandolin tab. The default is guitar tab.
• the number of half-steps to transpose music (integer, may be negative).
• a scale factor for shrinking output (postive value containing decimal point; default is 1.0). With letter paper, a scale factor of 0.6 seems to do a good job of fitting 5 lines onto a page and of clearing up files where a final measure has spilled over onto a new line.
• bottom margin in inches (negative value containing decimal point; default is 0.0). Useful for some printers that, with the default, print only the top half of the letters in a line of lyrics at the bottom of a page.
• 'debug' (without quotation marks) causes the intermediate file TEMP.ABC to be left in the directory from which m2g was executed. The PostScript file is created when m2g calls abctab2ps by issuing the command
abctab2ps temp.abc -1 -O basename -t # -s #
• 'a4' without quotation marks for A4 paper (default is letter size)
• 'c<#>' without quotation marks to print instruction 'Capo <#>'
• 'f' without quotation marks has m2g make its best guess at the duration of the first note of each line (if it is not included in the abc file) and insert the the appropriate rhythm flag. This feature was added because of concerns that the duration may be forgotten if it doesn't change for an extending period before the start of the new line. Version 1.12 reverses the use of the 'f' option. In version 1.11, 'f' suppressed the addition of the duration symbol. In version 1.12, 'f' triggers the addition of the duration symbol.
• 'r' without quotation marks suppresses the printing of rhythm flags in the guitar/mandolin tab

Missing or limited features:

• m2g knows only standard tuning, E,A,DGBe
• m2g knows only the first position. To get guitar tablature outside of the first position, use the debug option to save the file TEMP.ABC and edit it manually.
• m2g recognizes only major and minor keys. The names of major keys should not include the word 'major'. Minor keys should be written with a trailing m, as in Am. The abc system allows accidentals from outside the key to be specified for the entire piece. m2g does not recognize this.
• m2g was written with an older compiler that is being tricked into recognizing long file names. The method is not foolproof. To be on the safe side, basenames should contain only letters, numbers, and underscores. It should not contain spaces or special characters.
• Individual tunes cannot be extracted from a larger file. m2g will process them all. A text editor may be used to extract particular tunes of interest before processing.
• m2g cannot handle tunes that contain more than one voice.

This is a work in progress. At the moment, m2g handles a single melody line well and I've had some luck with chords. I'm hoping Christoph Dalitz will build the functionality directly into abctab2ps and make m2g obsolete. However, I've seen other areas where small programs continue to be useful for much longer than anyone would expect. In the meantime, it seems silly for me to combine the two programs. I'd rather take advantage of Christoph's continuing development of abctab2ps by keeping m2g as an addon.

• Version 1.01--fixes duration in tab of single notes following chords
• Version 1.02--bottom margin option added
• Version 1.03--positive number of transposition half-steps no longer needs leading plus sign
• Version 1.04--handles minor keys properly
• Version 1.05--accidentals persist through entire measure in tab; capo placement specified in command line
• Version 1.06--change location of capo placement instruction in temp file
• Version 1.07--now recognizes '#' & 'b' in key specification K:
• Version 1.08--repeat indicators printed properly
• Version 1.09--correctly handles notes higher than c' and key changes within a song
• Version 1.10--no longer hangs when an f: line is encountered
• Version 1.11--places duration symbol at the start of every line
• Version 1.12--placing the initial duration symbol is no longer the default. (See the 'f' option.)
• Version 1.13--mandolin tab added; the 'r' option suppresses printing of rhythm flags in tab.
• Version 1.14--recompiled to run properly under Windows XP.

• m2ghas some difficulty with abc's angle-bracket shorthand length abbreviation. Placing an angle bracket between two notes takes half of the length of one note and gives it to the other. > denotes long, then short while < denotes short, then long.

  This is illustrated by an example in 3/4 time, using a quarter note as the basic unit. The notation e>fg denotes a dotted quarter note (the e) followed by an eighth note (the f) followed by a quarter note (the g). It is equivalent to e3/2 f1/2 g1. abctab2ps demands that a length indicator follow the abbreviation in the tab lines of input. At the moment, the tab input created by m2g does not place the proper length marker over the note following the length abbreviation. In the example, a quarter note length mark will not be placed over the g.

  For the moment, there are two ways to work around it. The first, and easier, is to place a length indicator in the original abc file, for example, e>fg1. The other is to use m2g's debug option to save the intermediate abctab2ps input file, TEMP.ABC. The length indicator can be added to TEMP.ABC and the altered file can be fed directly into abctab2ps.

• m2g does not always choose the proper duration symbol for the start of a line. Angle-bracket shorthand, triplets, chords at the start of a line or the end of the previous line, and any duration indicator other than a single number may cause problems. If I receive lots of reports of this type of problem, I'll try to code around them.