What is that gesture called?

[James A. Landau]

In a message dated  Wed, 3 Nov 2004 12:34:11 -0500,  "Mark A. Mandel"
<mamandel at LDC.UPENN.EDU> and his pet dragon wrote:

>>   The whistle [horn] signal for a train approaching a grade crossing is
long
> > long short sustained long ending when the locomotive reaches the crossing.
>
>  I tried to remember what that means in International Morse Code, but before
>  my mind popped up with the answer ("Q") I got a musical hit*: the theme
from
>  what I think of as the Death March, which I remember singing as a child to
>  the words "Where will we be in a hundred years from now?"

In railway Morse (which oddly enough never seems to be called "railroad
Morse") the Q is short short long short, so it's doubtful that whoever invented the
long-long-short-sustained long whistle for a grade crossing was thinking of
the letter Q.
(ref: http://www.trainweb.org/railwayop/Codes/codes.html}

Two suggested reasons for long-long-short-sustained long:
1) anyone randomly blowing a whistle would probably generate either a series
of shorts or a series of longs, so long-long-short-sustained long wouldn't be
mistaken for somebody casually doing something with a whistle
2) it is rather dramatic (and therefore attention-getting, which is highly
desirable), the two longs introducing the signal, then the short providing a
buildup to the dramatic sustained long.  Compare the limerick, which is long long
short short long (with punch line)

Actually long-long-short-sustained long goes way back, long before railroads,
to the Renaissance at least.  In Renaissance music a common ornament, used so
often that it is a musical cliche, i is long note, same long note, short note
one half tone lower in pitch, then the original note either long or sustained
long.  I don't know if there is a name for this particular ornament, but it
is an example of a mordent which is the opposite of a trill, that is rapid
alternating of a note with the note below it.

     - Jim Landau