NOTATIO

Knut wrote:There is also an argument to be made that the flatter, Henle style beams are more appropriate for the music the above mentioned 'german' publishers, arguably, are best known for, namely urtext editions of polyphonic baroque music. While steeper beam angles can give a positive reflection of the melodic contours in a monophonic context, in polyphonic music, with two or more rather busy voices sharing a staff throughout an entire piece, steep beam angles can render a much more chaotic impression.

Knut wrote:I don't find Henle's editions particularly cold either, just very different from everything else (in a good way). Their music font has less contrast and gives a cleaner (i.e., less inky) impression with somewhat sharper edges than many others. Combined with the exceptional precision of the engraving, this might come across as cold to some, especially in their computer engraved editions.

Their beaming style matches their font style perfectly, although I find the plate engraved editions to be somewhat more dynamic than the computer set ones in this regard. Wiener Urtext and Bärenreiter's beams seem more or less just as flat to me, and I think one could argue that these relatively modern 'german' publishers have developed a similar style of beaming.

In contrast, Durand's beams are very steep, even exceeding the recommendations of Ted Ross in many cases (which of course is on the steeper side as well). Personally, I prefer this style, but it requires a lot more manual work in a computer based setting, for the reasons mentioned already.

There is also an argument to be made that the flatter, Henle style beams are more appropriate for the music the above mentioned 'german' publishers, arguably, are best known for, namely urtext editions of polyphonic baroque music. While steeper beam angles can give a positive reflection of the melodic contours in a monophonic context, in polyphonic music, with two or more rather busy voices sharing a staff throughout an entire piece, steep beam angles can render a much more chaotic impression.