Errors in Music Copying: A Synchronic Examination

The proliferation of choral groups and the growth of choral musical performances in Ghana have resulted in many gathering of repertoire among the groups, thereby, encouraging music copying practice to create such archives. This practice has exposed the far-reaching effects of errors made in the attempt to write a new musical piece, re-write an existing musical score or score an unwritten tune using either pencil and manuscript or computer technologies. Using exploratory bibliographic research design, 4 musical pieces were purposively and randomly sampled and analyzed for wrong placement of pitches on the musical staff, omission of important indications for performance, misleading performance directions or indications and wrong rhythm notation. This phenomenon was examined by using score study in printed sheets and published music books. There is usually direct substitution effect as much as the intention of the composer and performance of the music are concerned. It is therefore recommended that copyists of musical scores take time to verify the originality of the scores in order to reduce errors considerably for distribution, sharing and storage.

Key words: music copying, musical score, transcription.