There is a variety of lute tablature editing and formatting software available, with a corresponding variety of file formats used to store the lute tablature. Luteconv is a Linux command line utility that converts between some of these different formats.
The original motivation for this project was so that pieces from the vast library of lute tablature available in Fronimo .ft3, Fantango .jtz, Tab .tab and TabCode .tc formats on the net[1,6,7,8] could be imported into MuseScore[11] as MusicXML files. The currently supported file formats are:
Fandango[1] is a commercial Windows lute tablature editor written by Alain Veylit. Its file format, jtxml, is a closed, proprietary XML format; jtz is zip compressed jtxml. Luke Emmet[3] has reverse engineered the format for his program LuteScribe so that some of the data can be extracted. I am grateful for his work on this.
Fronimo[2] is a commercial Windows lute tablature editor written by Francesco Tribioli. Its file format, ft3, is a closed, proprietary binary format. Luke Emmet[3] has reverse engineered the format for his program LuteScribe so that some the data can be extracted. I am grateful for his work on this.
The Music Encoding Initiative (MEI)[12] is a community-driven effort to define a system for encoding musical documents in a machine-readable structure. This is an experimental implementation of some proposals from the Tablature Interest Group.
MusicXML[4] is an music interchange file format and is supported by many music editing programs e.g. MuseScore, Sibelius, Finale etc. Its file format, musicxml, is an open, documented XML format; mxl is a zip compressed musicxml. Although designed primarily for mensural notation MusicXML does support lute (and guitar) tablature. MusicXML is well documented.
Tab[5] is a lute tablature type setting program written by Wayne Cripps. Its file format, tab, is a text file designed for user input. Tab is the lingua franca of tablature file formats and is often supported as an import format by other lute tablature editing software. Tab is well documented and its source code is published.
TabCode[6] devised by Tim Crawford. Used by ECOLM - An Electronic Corpus of Lute Music, Goldsmith's University of London. Where there is a large searchable database of lute pieces. TabCode is well documented.
ft3, jtxml, jtz, mei, musicxml, mxl, tab and tc.
mei, musicxml, mxl, tab and tc.
Supporting proprietary destination formats (jtxml, jtz, ft3) is not possible as this would require complete knowledge of their structure and semantics, which is not available. Whereas they can be used as source formats as enough information has been gleaned by reverse engineering to give at least the notes, rhythm and bars.
Converting a file to its own format is supported, although some information may be lost. However, it can be useful for converting between different tablature types: french, italian, spanish.
luteconv is implemented for Linux (openSUSE) and although it should work on other Linux distributions or possibly the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) it has not been tested on other platforms.
Usage: luteconv [options ...] source-file [destination-file]
| option | function |
| ------ | -------- |
| -h --help | Show help |
| -v --version | Show version |
| -o --output <destination-file> | Set destination-file |
| -S --Srctabtype <tabtype> | Set source tablature type |
| -D --Dsttabtype <tabtype> | Set destination tablature type |
| -s --srcformat <format> | Set source format |
| -d --dstformat <format> | Set destination format |
| -t --tuning <tuning> | Set tuning for all courses |
| -7 --7tuning <tuning> | Set tuning from 7th course |
| -i --index <index> | Set section index |
| -f --flags <num> | Add flags to destination rhythm |
| -V --Verbose | Set verbose output |
| -w --wrap | Set the stave wrap threshold |Options may use long or short syntax: --7tuning=D2 or -7D2
The destination-file can be specified either using the --output option or as the 2nd positional parameter, this conforms to the GNU Standards for Command Line Interfaces[9].
format = "ft3" | "jtxml" | "jtz" | "mei" | "musicxml" | "mxl" | "tab" | "tc"if a file format is not specified then the filetype is used.
tabtype = "french" | "german" | "italian" | "spanish"The source tablature type is usually deduced from the source-file. However, for tab files it is sometimes necessary to distinguish between italian and spanish tablatures. The default destination tablature type is french.
tuning = Courses in scientific pitch notation[10], in increasing course number.Luteconv uses the tuning specifed by option --tuning, if given; otherwise the tuning specified in the source file, if any; otherwise the tuning is based on the number of courses used in the piece as follows:
= 8 "G4 D4 A3 F3 C3 G2 F2 D2"
<= 10 "G4 D4 A3 F3 C3 G2 F2 Eb2 D2 C2"
>= 11 "F4 D4 A3 F3 D3 A2 G2 F2 E2 D2 C2 B1 A1" Option --7tuning, if given, will then modify the tuning of the 7th, 8th, ... courses.
Where the source format allows more than one piece per file the --index option selects the desired piece, counting from 0. Default 0.
Some lute software encodes rhythm as the number of lute tablature flags, others encode the mensural note value (whole, half, quarter etc) unfortunately there is no fixed mapping between the two. The --flags option adds (or subtracts) flags from the destination rhythm to adjust this mapping. Default 0.
Option --wrap, default 25. Some formats require explicit stave line endings. Luteconv uses a herustic: count chords, when the threshold is reached end the stave at the end of the current bar.
Convert tab to musicxml
luteconv Kapsberger-Gagliarda5a.tab Kapsberger-Gagliarda5a.musicxmlConvert Luis de Milan (spanish tablature) tab to mxl
luteconv --Srctabtype=spanish Milan_Fantasia_10.tab Milan_Fantasia_10.mxlConvert 7 course piece with 7th course tuned to D
luteconv --7tuning=D2 Loath.tab Loath.mxlConvert 2nd piece from a Fandango collection to tab (index counts from 0)
luteconv --index=1 Willoughby.jtz Fantacy.tabVersion: 1.0.0, tag: release-1.0.0
luteconv has runtime dependencies: libz, libpugixml and libzip.
The implementation is for Linux using cmake tested on openSUSE 15.2, but I expect any modern Linux or BSD distribution could be used. In a suitable workspace directory:
git clone https://bayleaf@bitbucket.org/bayleaf/luteconv.git
mkdir build
cd build
cmake ../luteconv
make
make test
make packageThe master branch is use for development. Releases are tagged release-x.y.z
luteconv has build dependencies: zlib-devel, pugixml-devel, libzip-devel and gtest.
The executable will be in build/bin. The .rpm, .deb and .tar.gz packages will be in the build directory.
1 Other lute tablature file formats to consider:
2 More research into Fronimo ft3 format.
3 More research into Fandango jtxml format.