What's the music term for canceling pedal?

• Dec 5, 2017 - 09:46

Seriously, I have no idea...

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• Dec 5, 2017 - 17:32

If you mean to tell the performer to play without using the piano's sustaining pedal ([edit: sostenuto pedal is something different] right pedal) at all for a part of the piece, you could write "senza pedale" or "senza ped." on the score at the start of that section. I hope I understood you correctly!

Louis

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• Dec 6, 2017 - 03:07

I had a similar question (or maybe the same?) a while ago. In a manuscript I transcribed there was a "Ped." marking but no star symbol anywhere. I had to guess how long the pedal line had to be and wanted to put that information into the foreword. What is the technical term to describe this? I ended up calling it "end pedal" but it somehow sounds amateurish.

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• Dec 6, 2017 - 11:25

That case you describe is actually fairly common and the performer should use his discretion on where to lift the pedal (usually at the change of harmony or early enough that the notes don't become "muddy" because of lots of non-chordal notes). AFAIK there is no technical term to describe that, only the asterisk. That said though, don't worry about indicating the end except if you want Musescore to play the score back correctly. Just copy it as it is (i.e. with Ped. without an asterisk) and most pianists would know what to do.

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• Oct 10, 2020 - 09:53

Is there any way to define an alternate Ped marking on the palette that doesn't have the continue/end text. I spend a lot of time removing these, and would like to have the option of placing the default Ped (with terminating asterisk) or one without.

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• Oct 10, 2020 - 14:16

There are a variety of pedals already defined in the master palette. Press shift+F9 (I think it's fn+shift+F9 on Mac) and look in the lines section. If none of these meet your need, add the one that's closest to what you want and modify it as you have mentioned. If this modified pedal is one you will reuse, you can press ctrl+shift then drag it to a palette and it will be added to the palette for reuse like anything that came to the program.

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• Oct 11, 2020 - 07:42

Thanks for the suggestions, but I can't see a way to implement them. I can't inspect/edit elements in the master palette. The palette reference says I should be able to Ctl+Shift-drag my edited Pedal marking from the score to the palette, but I have not been able to do that.

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• Oct 11, 2020 - 13:43

The master palette has several categories starting with ones named for each palette in the advanced workspace and then a symbols category. Those in the symbols category cannot be edited except to move them after they have been added to a score. Those in the other categories for the most part can be edited except the bagpipe embellishments, clefs and grace notes. There may be one more category that you can't much edit an individual element and make it work like an original palette item but lines absolutely can be edited. To edit a line you need to apply it to your score. Use the inspector to make your edits then

press ctrl+shift
click and drag the item from the score to a palette
release the mouse
release the keys

Do it in the order and it will always work.

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• Oct 11, 2020 - 23:51

Thanks. I finally got it "mostly" working. I found I still have to use the Inspector as the customised elements do not retain the unchecking of the "Automatic Placement" attribute. I would like to be able to use such elements without having to fiddle with parameters each time, especially where the element appears dozens of times through the score.

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• Oct 21, 2020 - 08:48

Positioning pedal marks within measures is highly frustrating because of the way the anchor points jump around. If you need to pedal four quarter notes in the treble staff, and there are not four intervals of corresponding length in the bass staff, it's really tricky to place them all below the bass staff.

It's easier to select the treble note range, apply the pedal line, and then move it down below the stave. In order to do that you have to turn off automatic placement as the lower staff will move away.

Some of the Godowsky arrangements I've set exhibit the problem e.g. bar 93 of https://musescore.com/user/4151271/scores/6387080

Attachment Size
musescore - pedal line.png 13.22 KB

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• Oct 21, 2020 - 14:41

Both methods work, it's a matter of taste. I look at the measure(s) involved and decide on a case by case basis which I think will be easier and use that method. In your m93 I would never put the first 2 in the bottom staff then the 3rd in the top. I would either do what you did or put them all in the top staff and move them all at once with the inspector with auto placement turned off. I almost exclusively use the mouse wheel to change the x or y offset and the 1/2 space adjustment per spin usually aligns what I'm moving well.

I think it's as easy as possible to turn off auto placement. Having auto placement turned off in the palette doesn't make sense to me since you don't know which you will want in the future and there is no way of knowing if it's turned on or not without applying the item.

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• Oct 21, 2020 - 15:33

OK, yes, that one specific case - pedal marking that need to change based on notes in the top staff - is indeed awkward. But in most music, this would not be majority of the time. So the benefits of autoplace should still outweigh that one disadvantage enough that it would normally be more efficient just to press "=" to disable in those few specific cases.

Not sure what you mean about anchor points jumping, unless maybe you mean you are trying to drag rather than use the keyboard or Inspector for your adjustments. Dragging will not only be slower, but it will also be less precise, making it virtually impossible to align things nearly as well as autoplace does right of the box.

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• Oct 22, 2020 - 02:18

If I'm creating a custom palette item then turning off autoplace for that item does not seem any more of an issue than any of the other dozen or more customizations that I carry out for a Pedal mark.

In terms of using the inspector to make amendments, that is OK for occasional usage, but I've had one or two scores with dozens of pedal markings per page. Minimising the number of keyboard operations for a single placement translations to a huge number of operations across the score.

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• Oct 23, 2020 - 03:33

The point is, with autoplace off, you will have to manually position almost every single pedal marking - it's far more work than only disabling it for those few where it is needed. In general, you shouldn't need to adjusted pedal lines at all - not with dragging, or the Inspector. but again, in the few cases where it is necessary, the Inspector will be more precise.

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• Oct 23, 2020 - 03:45

I'm not asking to change the default behaviour, just the flexibility to set ALL parameters in a custom palette item. I still have the default item there, which is used alongside the custom palette entries.

"In general" one shouldn't need to, but I am working through quite a stack of old classical piano scores where the need to pedal the treble line is very common and there are markings for every quarter note for pages.

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