Use of capitals

[Hector Pascal]

Hi everyone,

I use capital M and lower case r for "Molto rallentando", which makes sense to me as sentence case.

Though, if sentence case makes sense, when I write "Da Capo", I wonder why the C is a capital... page 238 of Gould recommends "Da Capo".

My score uses "Da Capo (con ripetizione)" so I am wondering about the best way to use capitals....

Cheerio and hope you are all going well.
Hector.

[John Ruggero]

I think its just convention, Hector, although one can see why Da Capo might be capitalized to make it stand out. It is often abbreviated as D.C. so that might be another influence. The parentheses in Da Capo (con ripetizione) could be omitted if you want to.

[benwiggy]

In the 18th-century, proper nouns were always capitalized. Capo is a proper noun.

I 'reckon' that most scores I've seen use an initial capital for 'absolute' Tempi, e.g. Allegro, Tempo 1°, etc; also for Repeat indications like Da Capo, Fine; and lower case for most other things, including 'relative' tempi e.g. un poco più mosso, allargando, più f, molto cresc., etc.

But of course these things are very often just a question of 'house style', and as long as you're consistent, all is well.

[Fred G. Unn]

Capo is a proper noun.

It's not actually a proper noun, but a common noun, right? I thought Da Capo literally meant "from the head." In any event, it's always capitalized in music.

I completely agree with the distinction between absolute and relative tempi too and that's how I do it. Both Schirmer and B&H point out that certain modifiers can mean either a new tempo or an alteration so "poco" could be capitalized in "Poco allegro" but lowercase for "poco più mosso." Schirmer says, "ultimately, the editor must examine the context to make a final determination." Their house styles differ in that Schirmer uses italics for a tempo alteration while B&H does not.

[John Ruggero]

While nouns were freely capitalized in English-speaking countries in the 18th century and earlier, and are always capitalized in German, I am not sure this was the case in Italy. At least, I don't see that practice in first edition of Don Giovanni circa 1800 or a MS copy of The Marriage of Figaro 1786. Perhaps this was an early style in Italy that just lingered on in markings like Da Capo?

[Hector Pascal]

Thanks, everyone, for the input.

Apropos of capitals, I note the following In the Schirmer style manual (p.12):

Da Capo al Fine
Da Capo al Segno
Da Capo senza replica or Da Capo senza Ripetizione

In a similar vein, I like the look of "Da Capo con Ripetizione" for my score. Anyways, I'll keep it consistent, as Benwiggy suggested.

Cheerio & thanks again
Hector.

[benwiggy]

It's not actually a proper noun, but a common noun, right?

You know -- a namey thing!

While nouns were freely capitalized in English-speaking countries in the 18th century and earlier, and are always capitalized in German, I am not sure this was the case in Italy.

Perhaps an overly-broad generalization, I admit. The Venetian opera libretti from the early 18th-century that I consult frequently cap-up nouns; it's certainly a practice that explains why Capo ended up with a C.

[Fred G. Unn]

Apropos of capitals, I note the following In the Schirmer style manual (p.12):

Oh, you have that book, great! I was looking at their comments on page 81 too.