Re: Style for Editorial Rests

Thanks, Colin, for your input!

On Mon, 22 Jun 2026, Colin Campbell wrote:

> I see you've found the Wikipedia article I was going to cite; as a singer
> and former instrumentalist (woodwinds and cello), I would strongly suggest
> the caesura rather than a comma. Singers and wind players breathe when they
> see commas; a comma over a rest would give rise to much head scratching.
>
You and Mark have inspired me to experiment with a bunch of different
options for symbols.

I looked at the Feta glyphs on B.8 The Emmentaler font (LilyPond Notation
Reference)
<https://lilypond.org/doc/v2.27/Documentation/notation/the-emmentaler-font>.
I also thought about Unicode characters to invoke with \markup \char.

Here are ten options (attached).

Some context before I give my thoughts:


   1. Most of the professional singers reading my scores do not care which
   rests are editorial and which are original to the 16th-century source.
   2. But the choirmaster and maybe three of the choristers do care.
   3. I want a symbol that is visible enough for those who care to find it
   and unobtrusive enough for those who “just want to sing whatever rhythm
   Maestro wants executed” to ignore.

With those points in mind, I’m currently thinking that I like the ictus
best.

The semicirculus is probably too tiny, but all the other options except
ictus are too big.

Of course, if I really liked the particular shape of, say, the dagger, I
could scale it down. But the ictus is good not just in size but also in
shape; it’s a very simple shape, which is the point.