Odd bar lengths and time signatures
This is an English folk song which doesn't have an exact number of beats in every bar.
I started off with 12/8, which is sort of OK for the first few lines - I had to reduce the number of beats per bar to make everything fit.
But as there are not actually 12 beats in any but two bars, I'd like to remove the time signature from the beginning of the stave.
Is there a way to do this? Simply deleting it makes the score default to 4/4, which knocks it all into a cocked hat :-(
Also, the latter part (actually the verses) is mostly (but not entirely) eight beats in a bar in a 3:3:2 pattern.
I tried to copy the first verse and paste it into the second etc., but the bars all defaulted to 12/8.
Is there a way of copying and pasting sections to include special bar lengths?
Regards,
David
Comments
You can suppress the display of the time signasture by right clicking an empty area in a staff, Staff Properties, and unchecking "Show time signature".
Copy and paste does not currently preserve custom measure lengths. It has been requested we add a feature to allow this, so hoepfully some day that will be implemented.
In reply to You can suppress the display by Marc Sabatella
Thanks, I've got rid of that pesky time signature now :-)
I'm used to using "paste formats" in Excel and more particularly "match properties" in AutoCAD.
It would be very good to be able to do the same thing here.
If all else fails...
For music without meter you might refer to:
https://musescore.org/en/handbook/early-music-features
However, I did have a look at your attachment.
Looking at only the lyrics, it seems to me that the rhyming structure should be able to fit into a musical meter. I admit that I have never heard this folk song, but after all, poetry does have rhythm - think of 'limmerick', or even 'iambic pentameter'. As a result, in music, melismas are often used for long syllables, while shortened note durations are often used to fit multi-syllabic words into a beat. (An easy song like 'Mary Had a Little Lamb' has nearly every syllable on a single beat.) Also, if you can clap your hands while singing 'Dogs and Ferrets', such would provide a clue as to the beats.
Well, with this in mind... I turned on the metronome for playback and YIKES!! Playing it through, it sounded calypso-ish! Then, looking more closely, I saw that measure 1 is 12/8; measure 2 is 10/8; measure 3 is 7/8; measure 9 is 8/8; etc. -- so there really isn't a 'meter' in your score. The metronome playback actually sounds like added percussion!
You wrote: I started off with 12/8, which is sort of OK for the first few lines...
Because time signatures are rigorous, 'sort of OK' doesn't work, since you immediately change the meter in measure properties of the second measure (and beyond). Even the metronome protests! :-)
So, if you can clap your hands and sing the melody, you should be able to assign beats - ala 'Mary Had a Little Lamb' - where you pin down the location of the notes and syllables that occur on the beat, and possibly discover a 'true' meter. Then you can go back and fill in the remaining notes/syllables. If that doesn't work - see above.
Regards.