Talk:Canon on a Russian Popular Tune

Italic title

I removed the italics for the composition's title because it is a very short work. I was guided by MOS:ITALICTITLE and MOS:MINORWORK. User:Ron Oliver has now re-instated italics and I would like to know why. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 13:14, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

I'm sorry. I checked the talk page and I assumed nobody would have a problem with that. My opinion about MOS:MINORWORK is that it does not offer a good enough explanation: quotation marks are typically used for parts of a larger composition of whatever sort. MOS:MINORWORK says: "Songs, instrumentals, arias, numbers in a musical, movements of longer musical piece, album tracks, singles, and other short musical compositions". That "other short musical compositions" is an exception to what comes before, and I do have a problem with it because, however short the composition is, it is treated as a stand-alone work and not as a part of something larger. If we wanted to debate this, we would have to define how short a short composition must be, and that would get really confusing and would cause many articles to have to be needlessly fixed (I would argue that Fanfare for a New Theatre should be written in italics no matter how short the composition is). That being said, I'm on vacation and I hadn't spent more than 5 minutes on the article, so I won't oppose if you want to revert my changes. Ron Oliver (talk) 14:23, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

The edit history mentions my earlier removal of italics, although User:Jerome Kohl might have a different opinion. A similar problem arises theoretically with poems – short ones in quotation marks, long epics in italics. 'Theoretically', because I'm not aware of any disputes in this regard. Short orchestral works are rare, so this question doesn't come up often, but I think a composition that is described as short falls well into the intent of MOS:MINORWORK. I don't see "other short musical compositions" as an exception to the preceding list there, but an extension, covering exactly this canon, and things like "Rage Over a Lost Penny", "Frog Legs Rag", or "Do They Know It's Christmas?" which was not part of an album. IMO Stravinky's "Fanfare" falls of course in the same class, and I'm aware that this guideline, like many others, is not universally followed. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 01:21, 28 July 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the ping, Michael. I suppose I do have a different opinion, since I was the one who first added the "italic title" tag to the article (though USER:Curry Time had already presented the title that way in the opening sentence). I do understand both sides of the argument, but I am inclined to agree with Ron Oliver's comparison to Fanfare for a New Theatre, cited it its article as "one of Stravinsky's major miniatures". Sooner or later, somebody is going to create an article for the Greeting Prelude, which is going to face the same issue, so we might as well settle things now. Certainly if the Fanfare merits italics, then so does this Canon. After all the former is for just two trumpets, and lasts about 40 seconds. The Canon is only a little longer, but if you are going to hoist an orchestra of 60 or so players onto the stage in order to perform it, it seems to me that the bulk alone merits italcs for the title.

I do wonder about a related issue: Song titles (such as "Frog Legs Rag" and "Do They Know Its Christmas") are conventionally enclosed in quotation marks. This is also true of things like Sousa marches. No doubt this falls under the category of "short" compositions. Although these are all longer in performance than Stravinsky's Canon, that is not my concern here. My question is why are the quotation marks not included in article titles for such songs. After all, the format contrasts with so-called generic composition titles (e.g., Piano Concerto in G (Ravel), Symphony No. 16 (Myaskovsky), or Divertimento for String Trio (Mozart)), which are given in Roman type and are not enclosed in quotation marks. If title formatting of musical works is such an issue, then why are italicized titles being treated differently from ones that are enclosed in quotation marks? And heaven help when somebody gets around to writing an article on Gerald Barry's 1979 composition '_____' (or is that ' _____ ' ?)—Jerome Kohl (talk) 02:49, 28 July 2020 (UTC)

As I wrote above, IMO Stravinky's "Fanfare" should not be in italics either according to the cited MOS sections. Regarding your question about quotation marks for concertos, symphonies and other long instrumental works with generic titles: I don't know. I suspect it has to do with their common usage outside Wikipedia, or with clutter. This discussion should probably be conducted, or noted, at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Titles, but I don't have the energy for that, or to continue this discussion here. This talk page is already much longer than the article, and soon it might have more edits, too. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 05:41, 28 July 2020 (UTC)

I think you misunderstand me. The question was not about compositions with generic titles, which are neither italicized nor enclosed in quotation marks. It has to do with why songs and other "short" compositions that are enclosed in quotation marks are not required to display these quotation marks in the titles of articles about them.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 06:18, 28 July 2020 (UTC)

I misunderstood indeed. I tried once or twice to display quotation marks for short works – it's not difficult: see Special:Permalink/725383570, but it was removed after about 1 1/2 years: Special:Diff/867247060. For fun, let's do it here: {{DISPLAYTITLE:Talk:<q>Canon on a Russian Popular Tune</q>}}. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 10:31, 28 July 2020 (UTC)

I agree that that is what MOS:MINORWORK says, so I wouldn't complain if you chose to change it back to how it was before I edited it. As Jerome mentioned, I just feel it is wrong to assess a composition (so vaguely) in terms of duration instead of notoriety, for instance. I meant "short compositions" were an exception to the rule inasmuch as the other items refer to pieces that are or could be part of a larger work (using the title of a chapter from a book would be a great analogy). If a short composition is a stand-alone work, we could construe it to be an extension, but I feel it is rather a departure from the norm. I believe this discussion should be noted at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Titles, but since I seem to be in the wrong and it is July, I am not going to contest this. :) Ron Oliver (talk) 15:26, 28 July 2020 (UTC)

I heartily agree that this should be brought up at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Titles, and probably also at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Music. In the real outside world, the guideline I am used to seeing is that titles of short songs are enclosed in quotation marks. I cannot help but suspect that the word "song" has been interpreted on the Wikipedia Manual of Style in the colloquial sense of "any piece of music", "CD track", instead of the formal sense of "vocal composition, usually with instrumental accompaniment".—Jerome Kohl (talk) 18:07, 28 July 2020 (UTC)