How do I apply capo only to tabulature?

• Jul 28, 2024 - 22:01

I would like to produce a sheet with two linked staves: standard notation and tabs.

The capo feature seems to transpose without affecting notation, which is great for the tab - but I still want the standard stave to show the played pitch.

I've tried applying the capo, then transposing the standard stave down the same number of semitones, however even when "Don't reflect transposition in linked tabulature staves" is enabled, the tabs in fact reflect the transposition that is applied.

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• Jul 31, 2024 - 10:30

Hey @scorster, apologies for tagging you irrelevantly but you are perhaps the only person I’ve seen on the internet who cares about my most recently posted topic as much as I do. I was wondering if you’ve found a system workaround with renaming font files for the tabs.

Many thanks if you can help.

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• Aug 1, 2024 - 00:19

I've not been able to think of a way to have a transpositional offset between a 8vb treble staff and a linked tablature staff.

But that's really great idea. I'd use it!!

And I should inquire, you're working in MS4?

I supposed the workaround for now would be: Finish you score with a linked staff, then add an unlinked TAB staff, copy/past from the linked TAB to the unlinked TAB staff. Transpose. Hide the linked TAB Staff.

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• Aug 9, 2024 - 16:12

Thanks for the info and answers! Sorry it's taken a while to reply. To answer your earlier question, yes I'm using MS4.

I've tried using it exactly as described in that link. It's essentially what I attempted to do already, save for custom tuning on the strings. If anything, changing string tunings seems to be more what I'm after, as:

> The notation on any linked standard stave remains unaffected by the presence of alternate string tunings. This allows the player to continue reading the sounding pitches of each string.

whereas, for capos:

> This automatically transposes playback to the desired pitch while keeping the notes, or fretmarks, unchanged.

Seemingly this is the notes AND fretmarks that don't change.

So I've been investigating.

The alternate tuning feature seems inoperative when added from the palette.
No change to any notation, nor any change to playback. Boo.

That manual page also seems to imply that the "don't affect linked tabulature" button works and, just to check, I tried applying it to a part that had had an alternate tuning specified. The transposition was applied to the standard notation, and the tabs. Yes, I double checked that I had selected the option 😆For the sake of being thorough, it also doesn't seem to work when there is an alternative tuning specified, so it's not just a case of rtfm 😅.

When in that menu, though, I saw that although I had applied a nonstandard tuning, the tuning listen in the string data was unchanged. I edited the string tuning data and the tabs changed, but the standard notation stayed the same. Even when tagged as the "linked" stave, it seems that standard notation is treated as the source of truth - so changes such as string tunings update the tabs to play as notated, rather than update the notation to reflect the tabs when settings change. Annoying, but workable (part of why a reply has taken a while is I can't just try things out by copy / pasting tabs).

So changing the tuning up - rather than down, as the "typical" case from the manual has the desired effect. But applying a capo - which pitches up the effective tuning of the instrument, does not. Go figure 😅 It's not exactly hard to write the capo on manually, it just feels so sloppy 😆. Hope the information is also some interest / help to you

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