One annoyance with music theory

[weaktwos]

While I enjoy synonyms in the english language, I'm am not currently finding joy in different ways to express music notation.

For example, the dotted quarter note is equivalent to a tied quarter and eighth note.

is equal to

Why exactly would one be better than the other?

Sure, sure. There's a few ways to represent mulitplication, etc. But is there some nuance I am missing? I suppose if you're changing pitch, a slur would be a better representation than a dotted quarter, but otherwise, I don't get it.

Comments

[brittadotcom.livejournal.com]

Not only across the bar lines, but across beats, depending on the musical style. Jazz/pop/rock will usually use dotted rhythms, but if the syncopation is held over a beat, for classical & choral I've seen a lot of the tied notation, so it's clear where the beat is. I've seen measures that have the dotted quarter on beat 1, then the eighth-pickup tied to beat 3, etc. Of course since I've sightread jazz so many years just fine, the tied notation throws me sometimes... ;)