multiple voices, note alignment

• Jan 2, 2015 - 22:43

hi all

I am having some troubles with notation:
see attached file "example".

example.mscz

In Measure 1, voice 2 has a quarter note, voice one has sixteenths. This is notated as expected, with the first note head in each beat group being shared between voices.

Problem #1: in measure 2, the top voice and bottom voice do not share the first note head. I realize that this could be because of the dotted note value in voice 1, but would there be a way to manually align both voices so that they share the first note head?

Problem #2: in measure 3, If it is not possible to align voice 1 & 2 note heads, I have a problem with notating accidentals which are manually added (i.e. E sharp, C flat, B sharp, etc). In this example, the first 2 beats should start with E sharp, last 2 beats should be e natural in both voices.

In measure 4, both voices should be playing C flat for the first note, not c double-flat.

In measure 5, again, both voices should be C flat, but this time, since noteheads align, it looks like c double-flat.

Any ideas for work-arounds? I know i can hide accidentals, but is there a way to manually adjust horizontal positioning of noteheads?

Ideally, I'd like to be able to notate this: (see attachment "ideally")

ideally.png

thanks for your help

dirck

Attachment Size
example.mscz 1.93 KB
ideally.png 390.71 KB

Comments

The usual rules of music notation say that you should not combine noteheads of different rhythmic values, and that includes dotted versus not dotted notes. However, it is common enough to want to do this anyhow to save space where the meaning is clear as it is here, so MuseScore provides multiple ways of doing this. The easiest in 2.0 beta & nightly builds is to manually change the type of one of the noteheads (using the Inspector) from "Auto" to the actual type - "Quarter" in this case. Marking one of the notes invisible has the same effect, although depending on the context and which one you mark invisible, this can have the effect of making them both look invisible on screen, as the greyed out note might the one drawn on top.

Regarding #2, the problem is that by entering an accidentally "manually" (using the toolbar or palette), you are in effect telling MuseScore you want that accidental to appear no matter way. So the trick is to enter an E# or Cb without making MuseScore think you want the accidentals to show up even when unnecessary. The way to do that in this case - because E# and Cb are not the "normal" spellings in this key - is to go ahead and enter as an F or B, but then use the new "J" command to change the enharmonic spelling.

[Edit: sorry, I had content blockers on and didn't see that there was already a reply to this question.]

Look in the handbook under the advanced section "Noteheads" and read what it says about shared noteheads. Basically, the trick is to alter the shorter duration notehead either by making it invisible, or changing its head type.

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