Key Signatures with Coda

• Jan 9, 2020 - 15:48

Forgive e if this has been asked before, but forums aren't the easiest of places to find exactly what you're looking for.
I have a piece with a Coda and the command is 2nd time Go To Coda. The main piece is in F Major at the point of return to the sign (D S al Coda), where the piece is in C Major. There is therefore a set of natural signs at the end of the main piece. The Coda is in F Major. However, when I put the F Major key signature into the Coda, the naturals disappear from the end of the main piece, as it is already in F Major at that point,
How can I make the Coda F Major and retain the F to C naturals at the end of the main part?


Comments

The main piece is in F Major at the point of return to the sign (D S al Coda), where the piece is in C Major.

It's probably best to attach the score, explaining at what measure number you wish to see the (disappearing) naturals.

In reply to by mgough

I don't think we have a good way to support that, and we should. Same with a key change on an ordinary end repeat. Perhaps someone knows of a trick way to do the job (maybe something involving an invisible measure somehow), but I'd worry it will break in some future version. So I'd probably not try to rely on tricks but would just add the key signature as an image or as symbols (press "Z" to display the symbols palette). I've created fake key signatures that way before, it's fiddly but if you don't need to do it every time, it's alright as workarounds go.

In reply to by mgough

There was some discussion on implementing courtesy key signatures at repeat barlines:
https://musescore.org/en/node/58716
but I haven't found anything about courtesy signatures at jumps, like D.S. or D.C.

You wrote earlier that:
The main piece is in F Major at the point of return to the sign (D S al Coda), where the piece is in C Major. There is therefore a set of natural signs at the end of the main piece. The Coda is in F Major. However, when I put the F Major key signature into the Coda, the naturals disappear from the end of the main piece...

Are you saying that you saw a natural sign in each staff at the end of bar 56 - "ready for the return to bar 9" - that disappeared when you entered the F major key signature into bar 57 (i.e., the Coda)?

I deleted the entire coda section and did not see any natural sign re-appear at the end of bar 56.

I had to use multiple tricks to arrive at this:
Lullaby_Of_Broadway2.mscz

In reply to by Jm6stringer

No, you wouldn't see the naturals appear when you deleted the Coda. They were the legacy of my originally writing the Coda in C after bar 56 that later got changed to F. They happened to fit in with the DS al Coda by chance, but I changed the Coda to F in order to make it the same as bars 47 - 56.
I even tried putting a false bar in C at the start of the Coda, but I couldn't make it disappear in the PDF, I made the whole bar rests invisible, but that left the staves. I even tried moving the open repeat bar lines to the left by reducing the X parameter in the Inspector, but all that did was leave the bar lines where they were and moved the notes further to the right. I also tried reducing the length of the false bar using { command, but it only reduced so far.
I suppose I could put the false C major bar in the main part (bar 57) and hide it in the PDF by putting a white rectangle in front of it. I'd also put a new line command in that bar so the Coda started on a new line.
I could also put the Coda back to C Major and put in loads of accidentals. But Mark is right. There needs something changing in the code so that the end of the bar where the DS al Coda is picks up the key signature of the music where the sign is (ie where it's returning to).

I think I've cracked it - or, at least, got good enough!
I created a "false" bar 57 in C Major, made the rests invisible in it and made the bar as short as possible, not by using { on the bar, but by highlighting the preceding bars on the same line and increasing them by using }. I also messed about with the scaling and got the mscz file attached to this comment. I then exported the file as a pdf and put a white rectangle over the part of bar 57 that was surplus to requirements and got the final result that is the attached pdf.
OK, so that line is a bit shorter on the right hand side, but I can live with that.

Attachment Size
Lullaby_Of_Broadway.mscz 40.98 KB
Lullaby_Of_Broadway.pdf 290.33 KB

In reply to by mgough

Compare bar 56 courtesy key signature of my attachment "Lullaby_of_Broadway2 from my post above.
The "false" bar 57 is virtually undetectable and not counted in the measure numbering.

If you take that file and change the scaling like yours you get:
Lullaby_Of_Broadway2a.mscz
Lullaby_Of_Broadway2a.pdf
No need for a white rectangle. Compare the .pdf file with yours.

Also you should exclude the "fake" bar from being counted. See this image from your pdf:

Bar_numbers.png

In reply to by Jm6stringer

That does seem a better solution, but please excuse my lack of knowledge in being unable to see how you did it, despite looking at your previous posts.
I don't understand the following:
1) How you added the courtesy key change
2) Where the line breaks have gone
3) Why the stretching/ex[anding { and } commands do no longer work.
Please explain, as to a simpleton!
I also note that you altered the setting in Style->Accidentals to show the old key signature being cancelled by naturals.

In reply to by mgough

I also note that you altered the setting in Style->Accidentals to show the old key signature being cancelled by naturals.
You can change it back if you prefer.

Now, to answer your questions...
First, go to the View menu and place a check in 'Status Bar', 'Show Invisible' and 'Show Unprintable'. This will expose hidden (invisible) score elements in a lighter shade of gray. It will also answer your #2 question about the line (system) breaks.
As you can see, not every system has (nor needs) an explicit line (system) break after it.

Regarding question #3, shrinking/expanding { and } commands should work, but are dependent upon where they are applied, over how many bars, whether or not there are explicit system breaks in the selection to be shrinked/expanded and whether shrinkage is maxxed out, so no longer responsive.

Regarding question #1, I inserted a 'false' bar after bar 56 (as you did) but I excluded it from the measure count, so the bar numbers appear consecutive. If you click on bar '57' in my score (where the coda begins) it actually shows '58' in the Status Bar (seen at the very bottom left of the screen).

The 'falsel' bar 57 is hidden within the space immediately before the Coda's start repeat. This hidden bar 57 is an irregular measure comprised of a single 64th rest (i.e., hemidemisemiquaver). It requires a C major key signature to enable the courtesy natural at the end of the previous system. (This is the natural sign that 'disappeared' for you when you enterd the coda in key of F instead of C.)

If you look carefully at any of the clefs there, you will see the hidden 64th rest.
To select the 'false' bar, carefully right click on the treble clef staff space immediately below the flat sign in the key signature. Open 'Measure Properties' to see the actual duration and 'Exclude from measure count'.
See image:
False_bar.png

Other adjustments were done using offsets in the Inspector to make the bar as short as possible.

N.B. These are "tricks" and do not play well with MuseScore. For example, generate parts and these "tricks" reveal their ugly heads.

In reply to by Jm6stringer

Very clever! But indeed very "tricky", and quite fragile. This is one of the reasons I previously wrote, "Perhaps someone knows of a trick way to do the job (maybe something involving an invisible measure somehow), but I'd worry it will break in some future version. So I'd probably not try to rely on tricks but would just add the key signature as an image or as symbols (press "Z" to display the symbols palette)."

The symbol approach take probably less time than all this, and is much more likely to continue to work in parts, look the same in future versions of MuseScore, etc. So until we implement direct support for this notation, I still would advise people to just use symbols. Another advantage: less hassle to undo if/when the real things comes along.

In reply to by Jm6stringer

I managed to work out what you had done by playing about, and managed to duplicate it. It was a great learning process and I thoroughly support your "trickery", although I sort of agree with Marc (sorry to spell it Mark before) in that it's probably not universally applicable and should be avoided in general.

In reply to by mgough

It was a great learning process.
That's the point...!
...to gain insight into the mechanics and behavior of the software.

Sometimes a feature is not 'natively supported' by MuseScore because it is not applicable to most users (and so doesn't get implemented).
Sometimes there arise brave and inspired individuals who create solutions (or workarounds or even hacks or 'kludges').

For example (ahem) see:
https://musescore.org/en/node/176256#comment-661056

Some solutions are easier than others. It depends on how important it is to have an 'unsupported' feature and how far one is willing to go to produce it.
;-)

In reply to by Jm6stringer

I see that's one of yours - of course!. Lovely, but surely far easier for each user to use ordinary highlighter on the pdf score, and totally useless if the score has two voices on one stave. I do a lot of closed scored choral scores.
Do you have any more wangles up your sleeve?
I guess from your spelling of behaviour that you're from the other side of the pond. In which case I must be careful in the use of quaver, crotchet, minim, semi-breve, bar etc.. I still haven't got to grips with who uses staff and who uses stave.

In reply to by Jm6stringer

This message was actually written after my reply to jm6.
I also managed to implement Marc's solution by moving the double bar lines at the end of bar 56 (using the inspector) to create some overlapping stave lines. I then inserted the natural symbol into a stave text box, increased the size from 10 to 16 pts and placed it after the double bar line. It is probably easier and avoids the need to have a false bar and to discount it from bar numbering.

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