Small notes and Small beams

• Oct 20, 2020 - 22:16

When I have a situation where I wanna put small notes in a measure, I am noticing that it doesn't also make the beams smaller. When I look at printed music that has small notes, the beams are also smaller (thinner actually). I don't see a feature to do that in MS, except globally.


Comments

In reply to by jeetee

Yay, that works. Thanks a lot. I noticed that if the small note option is checked, checking the chord option makes it even smaller. Also, if the note is attached to a beam, you have to click the small option in the chord section for ALL notes on the beam in order to get the beam to become thinner. No big deal, but a quirk in how it works.

In reply to by odelphi231

These are both deliberate. The small checkbox in the Notes section applies to literally just that note, not other notes that may share the same stem, not to the stem, hook, or beam, etc. It makes the note small relative to the full chord. So yes, combining both settings is a thing - one makes the full chord smaller, one makes one individual notes within the chord smaller relative to everything else in the chord (other notes, the stem, hook, beam). As for multiple notes on one beam, if there are a mixture of small and not-small chords on the same beam, it looks better to have the beam be full size. This would be pretty rare in real world usage, though.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

I think the inspector could help with this. Currently there is the Chord and Note section which is confusing if you don't know a single note is considered a chord by MuseScore. I think calling the Note section Notehead would clarify this. Down to the Fix to line options is all notehead options. The last 4 are actually Playback and should probably have it's own section so named. I don't know how version 4 will look so this may be a moot point.

In reply to by mike320

Mike, I like your suggestion. I was going to make the same suggestion that using a chord option to make two notes with the beam smaller is not labeled intuitively on the inspector. I would have never fig'rd it out without help. BTW: When does it make sense to make just the note small but not the stem/beam? I don't think I have ever seen that in printed music. I realize having the option to make one or the other or both small is a nice option; just don't understand the usefulness.

In reply to by odelphi231

In the chords I'm describing there will be a regular sized A on the regular sized stem and flag with a small note on the C or D above it on the same stem to let the singer know that if they want to show off their voice they can sing the higher note.

To make this, create an 8th note on A, press shift+C to add a C to the chord. Select the C by clicking it then in the inspector make it small in the note section. I wish I could remember a score I saw this in off the top of my head. Perhaps Jojo can point you to a link that shows this.

In reply to by mike320

OK, so for chords you may want a small note, but large flag/beam. I can accept that. I think I may have seen what you are describing also, not just in choral music but in piano music where the small notes will signify you can play the chord (if you want) or you can just play the single note.

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