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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Gerda Arendt (talk | contribs) at 13:23, 2 April 2013 (→Instruments in Infobox: new section). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Classical music

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Classical music, which aims to improve, expand, copy edit, and maintain all articles related to classical music, that are not covered by other classical music related projects. Please read the guidelines for writing and maintaining articles. To participate, you can edit this article or visit the project page for more details.Classical musicWikipedia:WikiProject Classical musicTemplate:WikiProject Classical musicClassical music

This article was edited to contain a total or partial translation of Matthäus-Passion (J. S. Bach) from the German Misplaced Pages. Consult the history of the original page to see a list of its authors.

A fact from St Matthew Passion structure appeared on Misplaced Pages's Main Page in the Did you know column on 6 April 2012 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows: Did you know... that Bach's St Matthew Passion is structured in 67 movements, according to the NBA, and tells the Passion (pictured) based on the Gospel of Matthew, Picander's contemporary poetry, and chorales? A record of the entry may be seen at Misplaced Pages:Recent additions/2012/April. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/St Matthew Passion structure.

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Author de

The main author of the FA (de equivalent) is Wikiwal who did an outstanding job, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:35, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

What does "FA" mean? Basemetal (talk) 21:08, 13 November 2012 (UTC)

Featured article. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 06:23, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Decorative images?

Should Misplaced Pages follow the tradition of purely decorative images in articles? At the beginning of the article there's a photograph of a painting by Cranach the Elder. A decorative purpose seems to be the only purpose for the presence of that photograph in the article. What do Cranach the Elder or his painting (of more then two hundred years before Bach's St Matthew Passion) really, specifically, have to do with the structure of Bach's work? The German version gives a justification of sorts ("Lucas Cranach d. Ä. deutet in seinem Bild Christus als Schmerzensmann (1515) das Leiden Jesu ebenso wie Bach realistisch und zugleich mystisch"). But seriously! This sort of speculation about vague connections between works of art, without any positive evidence that Bach ever even saw or knew of that painting, let alone that it had anything to do with the creative process that led to the St Matthew Passion (a fortiori its structure!) belongs in an essay, not in a factual source of information such as an encyclopedia. You might as well put a picture of Martin Luther with the "justification" that Bach's Lutheran faith "informed his life and music" or that Martin Luther must be "connected" to the St Matthew Passion because after all Bach used the text of his translation of the Gospel. Consider that a textual digression about Cranach the Elder's painting (or on Martin Luther) in the body of the article would never be considered justified. Images are documents and data just as much as the text. They should therefore be directly connected with and relevant to the subject matter of the article. When they're there just to prettify they're just clutter. The fact that almost all dictionaries and encyclopedias do it is not a good reason to also do it in Misplaced Pages. Basemetal (talk) 12:37, 13 November 2012 (UTC)

That image is not decorative; it illustrates the subject of the article, the St Mattew Passion. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 06:23, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

You must be someone who believes confident reiteration can turn nonsense into sense. "A Cranach the Elder painting (ca. 1515) illustrates Bach's Matthäus-Passion (1727)". And, you don't see any problem with this statement, logicwise? Wow. Signed: Basemetal (write to me here) 19:00, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

Do you read German? Four good reasons to have this image were given on the talk of the German article, including that Bach may have know this image. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:04, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. German discussion here for those interested. Signed: Basemetal (write to me here) 05:24, 29 November 2012 (UTC)

Referencing images?

One annoying problem with images (or other non-text documents: video, audio) throughout Misplaced Pages is: they don't carry fig numbers. Why don't they? Is this a Misplaced Pages bug or a "feature"? Was this done on purpose or was it just overlooked? It certainly makes referencing an image more awkward than it ought to be ("the photograph of blah blah blah in the third section of the article blah blah blah to the left, below the table of blah blah blah"). Is there no way to fix that? Basemetal (talk) 12:48, 13 November 2012 (UTC)

Normal practice is to position non-text documents next to the text that deals with them, thus no explicit referencing is needed. If such referencing should be needed, it can be achieved as described at Help:Anchor. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 06:23, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Instruments in Infobox

As discussed on Classical music (when the template was designed and again now), each individual instrument is important, for example no trumpets here, but oboe d'amore, speaking of love. "Instruments" appear at the very end of the box. Clicking on Scoring opens a table of the abbreviations, which are standard for publishing, well known, each with a link to what it stands for. Why should knowledge be limited to the level of those who wouldn't bother to look up what an abbr means? Please consider restoring the information. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 13:15, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

• WikiProject Classical music articles
• Pages translated from German Misplaced Pages
• Misplaced Pages Did you know articles