Thanks Daniel,
You actually may see fingerings on (almost) every note of a guitar score, and they do vary greatly from edition to edition. Certainly, if a theme is stated and fingered and later repeated it is rare to see the following instances fingered at all. With many early or original scores for the guitar as a six stringed single course instrument from the 18th Century, say from Giuliani or Sor etc, there may be little to no fingering.
You see more and more fingering instances when the music is transcribed from piano or other instruments, like much of the repertoire from the Spanish Romantic Composers (Albeniz, Granados, de Falla etc), editions of Renaissance and Baroque lute music have many and quite varied fingering options, or editions of existing music that have been fingered or edited by guitarists from more modern times, at least since Segovia.
The real problem that we are faced by (and that I am sure that you guys are aware of) is that many pitches exist on multiple strings. Many times, a position marker i.e. VII for the seventh fret/position may imply a sensible fingering choice and therefor be enough but it is not as clear cut as that. The open first string (E4) can and is also played at the 5th fret 2nd string, 9th fret 3rd string or 14th fret 4th string (it would be unlikely to be played at the 19th fret 5th string on classical guitar but is certainly an option for the electric). Fingering decisions can be made for musical reasons but many times they are simply functional and ease of playing decisions.
As you are also aware, we use a combination of left hand, right hand, string, position, barré and length of barré (eg hinge barré or barré to 4th string, whether the barré is indicated with a ‘B’ or a ‘C’), lines and brackets (I am sure there are more…) to notate our fingerings so when all put together it can be rather laborious. Having mentioned the first string E, it would not be uncommon for a passage in the 7th position to have that E4 note (or other open string pitches) played as an open string. We therefor need ‘0’ as a fingering option. I have already used 0 in Dorico…
Regardless of what happens, I can’t wait to see what you provide for the guitar. I love Dorico so far and like many have been watching and waiting over the past few years.
Just for fun, I have attached photos of the first two pages of Franz Burkhart’s Passacaglia, edited by Karl Scheit (Universal Edition 1949). This particular score is only six pages and the piece is approximately 8 minutes long. There are fingering indications on almost every single note! lol
Thanks again for your time.
Regards,
Warwick