I was sitting in music theory class and was trying and come up with a "definition" of what a diddle was, and came up with this.

"When you take a note with a diddle placed on it, regardless of the original note value, the diddle make you subdivide the diddled note and play two of the 1st level subdivision of the diddled note in it's place (with one hand)."

Using this line of thinking then would a diddled whole note= two half notes? It seems right to me, just uncommon. What are your thoughts?

Is this complete/right? This is what a high schooler came up with, but I'm very interested in what others think.

Thanks!

Diddle: a slash notation that divides the note in half.
Example if you have an eighth note diddle, that note is played as two sixteenth notes.


As to your whole note question, yes. Although it is uncommon, some old pieces use that notation.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tremolo

You'll find it used in a lot of old timpani literature, which shows up frequently in auditions in the excerpts that are usually pulled to use.

To answer your question, no. A whole note with one slash would not be two half notes, but eight eighths.

http://www.vicfirth.com/education/features/webrhythms/19.php

This explains rhythmic abbreviations much more in depth.

If you don't want to read it all, I'll explain the basics. A slash is an abbreviated beam, which means that a half note with one slash would be a half note worth of eighth notes (which have one beam). On that same thread, a half note with two slashes would be a half note worth of sixteenths.

Notes already containing beams (or flags) would simply add beams for every slash, therefor an eighth note with a slash would be two sixteenths. An eighth with two slashes would be four thirty-seconds, and so on.

"Diddle: a slash notation that divides the note in half. "

"When you take a note with a diddle placed on it, regardless of the original note value, the diddle make you subdivide the diddled note and play two of the 1st level subdivision of the diddled note in it's place (with one hand)."

This line of thinking only works when the longest note value is a quarter note.

a "diddle" is a slang term for two notes in succession played on the same hand. That's all, rhythm and time duration are technically unimportant.
the single tremolo is the marking we use in rudimental music to denote a "diddle". In concert music if you see this, you can play it any sticking you like. so no the single tremolo =/= "diddle"

so in concert music if you see (4/4) quarter notes with a single tremolo, play eighths, double is 16ths, and a triple it is acceptable to play a single stroke roll.sticking of the first two is largely unimportant as long as the rhythms are clear.99% of the time its alternating.

In rudimental music the rhythms remain the same, though it is inferred to be played as a "diddle" RR,LL.