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{{short description|Notation used to identify a piece of music}}
{{quote box|title=Parsons Code of [[Ode to Joy]]
|quote=<pre>
* R U U R D D D D R U U R D R
*-*
The book was also published in Germany in 2002 and reprinted by Piatkus as ''The Directory of Classical Themes'' in 2008.▼
/ \
* *
/ \
*-* * *-*
\ / \
* * *-*
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*-*
</pre>}}
The '''Parsons code''', formally named the '''Parsons code for melodic contours''', is a simple notation used to identify a piece of music through [[melodic motion]] – movements of the [[pitch (music)|pitch]] up and down.<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Parsons Code for Melodic Contours |url=http://www.musipedia.org/pcnop.0.html |url-status=dead |website=Musipedia |access-date=2005-05-08 |archive-date=2005-05-22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050522000653/http://www.musipedia.org/pcnop.0.html }}</ref><ref>{{cite book | title=Instinctive Computing | last=Cai | first=Yang | date=9 January 2017 |page=177 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2-PeDQAAQBAJ&dq=Instinctive+Computing+Parsons+code&pg=PA177 | publisher=Springer London | isbn=9781447172789}}</ref> [[Denys Parsons]] (father of [[Alan Parsons]]<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://alanparsons.com/artists-posts/alanparsons/|title=Alan Parsons biography|website=Alanparsons.com|access-date=21 September 2022|archive-date=18 September 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190918093350/http://alanparsons.com/artists-posts/alanparsons/|url-status=dead}}</ref>) developed this system for his 1975 book ''The Directory of Tunes and Musical Themes''. Representing a melody in this manner makes it easier to index or search for pieces, particularly when the notes' values are unknown. Parsons covered around 15,000 classical, popular and folk pieces in his dictionary. In the process he found out that *UU is the most popular opening contour, used in 23% of all the themes, something that applies to all the genres.<ref>{{Cite conference |last1=Uitdenbogerd |first1=Alexandra L. |last2=Yap |first2=Yaw Wah |date=January 2003 |title=Was Parsons right? An experiment in usability of music |url=http://ismir2003.ismir.net/papers/Uitdenbogerd.pdf |conference=ISMIR 2003 |publisher=Johns Hopkins University}}</ref>
▲The book was also published in Germany in 2002 and
An earlier method of classifying and indexing melody was devised by [[Harold Barlow (songwriter)|Harold Barlow]] and Sam Morgenstern in ''[[A Dictionary of Musical Themes]]'' (1950).<ref>{{Cite web |last=Abbott |first=John |date=11 June 2014 |title=A Dictionary of Musical Themes: Morgenstern and Barlow (1950) |url=https://atuneadayblogdotcom.wordpress.com/2014/06/11/a-dictionary-of-musical-themes-morgenstern-and-barlow-1950/ |website=A Tune a Day}}</ref>
==The code==
The first note of a melody is denoted with an [[asterisk]] (*), although some Parsons code users omit the first note. All succeeding notes are denoted with one of three letters to indicate the relationship of its pitch to the previous note:
*u = "up," if the note is higher than the previous note▼
*
*
▲*<nowiki>*</nowiki> = first tone as reference
=== Some examples ===
{{Listen|filename = Twinkle Twinkle Little Star plain.ogg|title = Twinkle Twinkle Little Star|description
*"[[Twinkle Twinkle Little Star]]": *
*"[[Silent Night (song)|Silent Night]]": *{{Not a typo|udduuddurdurdurudddudduruddduddurudduuddduddd}}
*"[[Aura Lea]]" ("[[Love Me Tender (song)|Love Me Tender]]"): *{{Not a typo|uduududdduu}}
*"[[White Christmas (song)|White Christmas]]": *{{Not a typo|udduuuu}}
*First verse in [[Madonna (entertainer)|Madonna]]'s "[[Like a Virgin (song)|Like a Virgin]]": *{{Not a typo|rrurddrdrrurdudurrrrddrduuddrdu}}
==See also==
* [[List of music software]]
==References==
{{reflist}}
*{{cite book | last = Parsons | first = Denys | year = 1975 | title = The Directory of Tunes and Musical Themes | publisher = S. Brown | isbn = 0-904747-00-X}}▼
*{{cite book | last = Parsons | first = Denys | year = 2002 | title = The Directory of Tunes and Musical Themes | publisher = Bohmeier | isbn = 3-89094-370-5}}▼
*{{cite book | last = Parsons | first = Denys | year = 2008 | title = The Directory of Classical Themes | publisher = Piatkus | isbn = 978-0-7499-5178-8}}[http://www.littlebrown.co.uk/Title/9780749951788]▼
==Editions==
▲*{{
▲*{{
▲*{{
==External links==
*[http://www.themefinder.org Themefinder] allows searching musical themes by Parsons Code (called "Gross Contour" on the search page).
*[http://www.musipedia.org/about.html "The Open Music Encyclopedia" uses Parsons code for encoding songs in their database]
*[http://www.folktunefinder.com/ FolkTuneFinder.com] uses Parsons code (amongst other methods) to search a database of folk tunes.
{{Musical notation}}
[[Category:Musical notation]]
[[Category:Melody]]
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