Beam sizes inconsistent causing a lot of work to adjust, results in articulations showing like valleys
Reported version
3.0
Type
Graphical (UI)
Frequency
Once
Severity
S3 - Major
Reproducibility
Always
Status
active
Regression
No
Workaround
No
Project
Beam sizes are inconsistent. If you create an eight note and then a sixteenth note and then add articulations, the beam height of the eighth notes are smaller than the other notes. Therefore, the articulations look like they are going up and down across the notes. This occurs when articulations are above the notes. I don't know why the default is below the notes in the first place. Not an issue with lower version.
Comments
Could you please attach a score demonstrating the issue? It's certainly normal that stem lengths can differ for beamed versus unbeamed notes as per standard rules of engraving. But the rules are extremely complex, and subjective to boot. No doubt there are some particular cases we could improve on, so that is why we would need to see examples. Also not clear what you mean about articulations.
I have included four files - two for Muse Version 2 and two for Muse Version 3. I also made them PDF. In version 3, the beams and stem sizes are inconsistent between eighth notes and sixteenth or seven stroke roll. Because the beams are at different heights, if you try to add an articulation (e.g., accent), the articulations are at different heights giving an up and down motion. If you look at version 2, they are at the same height, so they are consistent across the score. This new version 3 is "very painful" a lot of simple things look like they didn't carry over to Version 3. It is a pain to manually adjust every articulation and I certainly don't want to adjust every beam height that is different. Another item I noticed is that the articulation is really not centered over the note, so that requires another adjustment.
OK, I see now that you are specifically talking about the special case of beaming a whole bunch of the same note together. That's not the norm, which is why I wasn't understanding at all at first. But of course, it's fairly common in drum music.
Anyhow, when I load your sample 2 into MuseScore 3, I see the beams are all the same height there as well. So, no difference between 2 & 3 here.
Your sample 3 is a totally different thing - it's using notes on a space, not a line. And if I create that example in MuseScore 2, I also get the same slight difference in beam heights. So again, no difference betwene 2 & 3, but it is true that the sixteenths have longer stems.. And that's perfectly normal/correct according to rules of music engraving - notes with more beams will often require longer stems, depending on a variety of factors.
As for the height of the accents in your sample 3, yes, they are strange, but that's because you changed the defaults settings on them. I reset them to the defaults, or delete them and add them back then flip them above the staff, they are as expected - closer to the beams, and only slightly different in height in the same way the beams are slightly different in height - again, precisely the same as 2.3.2, and totally correct. Not sure why you're going out of your way to make all accents the same vertical position, no rule of music engraving I am aware of requires or suggests that.
it's more of a visual thing for me. Interesting how the behavior changes when on the line vs in a space. I did not notice that before. Most drum books I have used, the notes are in the space. The Tenor and Bass drums are defaulted to be in the space (C and E), so their behavior creates this inconsistency. I had thought I reset the accents, but I guess I did not. At least in version 2, the style was driven out of the Format --> Style sheet and not individually. Is there plans to change it back or is this a lost cause? It just adds extra work to change every item as opposed to an overall default change. Thanks
In reply to it's more of a visual thing… by bdrum
Again, as far as I can tell there is no change whatsoever in these two scores - they both behave precisely the same when entered into in 2.3.2 or 3.0. If you are seeing some sort of difference in some score other than these two, please post it so we can investigate.