Stem (pica)

• Oct 28, 2019 - 05:38

It’s posible change the inclination of a stem (plica)?
I want oblique stem for indicate the second voice in piano music.
In right hand: up stem 1st voice, oblique stem 2nd voice, and down stem 3rd voice.
Thank you,
Cristina

Comments

• Oct 29, 2019 - 23:46

See the Handbook section about Voices:
https://musescore.org/en/handbook/3/voices
Be aware that the convention used here is:
Voice 1 and 3 = stem up
Voice 2 and 4 = stem down

Other useful info:
a) if you select a note and press X, this flips the stem direction (can be reset to Auto position in Inspector)
https://musescore.org/en/handbook/3/note-input#keyboard-shortcuts
b) if you select an entire measure, menu path Tools > Voices > Exchange Voice n - m allows you to swap voice numbers
https://musescore.org/en/handbook/3/voices#exchange-voices

About oblique stems I can't offer any advice. Can you post an image of a score which shows this technique? If you mean an offset (used when chords in Voice 1 and Voice 3 collide), you can shift one chord sideways using the Inspector:
Chord_offset.png

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• Nov 1, 2019 - 01:32

I now understand that you really do want oblique stems. But this is so unusual that I can't find any mention of this approach in Elaine Gould's textbook of music notation "Behind Bars".

So I think it is unlikely that an "oblique stem" feature will be added to MuseScore in the near future. Sorry...

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• Nov 1, 2019 - 06:50

It’s very unusual, but when we transpose organ or harpsichord music from the Baroque or Renaissance that is written to 4 voices and 4 staves (1 for each voice), it’s necessary to differenciate the first, second and third voice in systems of two staves, if both coincide in the same hand.
Thank you very much.

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