crochet (whole note) triplets
I'm new to this progam but can work things out, however I've spent about an hour searching the forums and help manuals for how to type in crochet triplets. I can get the first of the three to be a crochet, but the prgram won't let me make a triplet out of three crochets.
Comments
Did you read the specific Handbook section on Tuplets?
http://musescore.org/en/handbook/tuplet
As explained there, You don't do it by first entering notes then turning them into a triplet; you do it by first selecting the length of the whole tuplet, then hitting Ctrl-3 to divide it into three equal parts, then entering the notes.
BTW, "crotchet" translates into American English as "quarter note", not "whole note". A whole note takes a whole measure (in 4/4 time); a half note takes half a measure, a quarter note a quarter of a measure, etc.
In reply to Did you read the specific by Marc Sabatella
thans for the whole note explanation. I know that it was just 3am!
I was slecting with ctrl 3, MS kept assuming I wanted 16th notes, it would not let me enter crochet triplets. I got it to do it eventaullay by using reload and doing the t3 on crochets quarter notes until it did. I realised there is either a bug or my download was slightly wrong.
In reply to Did you read the specific by timddeb
I ran into this issue recently and the trick is to pay attention to the note type selected *after* you make a triplet. MS changes the note duration from quarter/crochet to eigth/quaver (or whatever the note duration is for the first note of the triplet). Before you make the next triplet, make sure you select the quarter/crochet duration again.
In reply to I ran into this issue by mtherieau
As I commented in another thread an in depth look at tuplets will be the subject of an upcoming tutorial vid I'm working on.
Will post in General Discussion when it's available.
In reply to Did you read the specific by timddeb
I'm guessing you first selected crotchet, then hit ctrl 3, which created three quavers, and when that didn't do what you wanted, you hit ctrl 3 again, which turned the quaver into a semi quaver. The way out isto leave note entry, hit 6 to start over by turning that first note/rest back to a minim, then hit ctrl 3.
In reply to I'm guessing you first by Marc Sabatella
not quite in my case. Not sure about the OP, but when I ran into this, I started with 4 quarter notes in the measure, and entered ctrl-3 which converted the first quarter into a triplet of eighths. I then arrowed right to select the next quarter note, and hit ctrl-3 again which ended up in a triplet of sixteenths followed by an eigth. That wasn't was I expecting to happen, but then I realized that after the first ctrl-3, the note duration selected had changed from quarter to eigth, and eigth remained selected, even after I had arrowed over to the next quarter. I don't think MS is doing something wrong here--just explaining how something "surprising" might happen if you're not paying attention to how the duration changes after creating a triplet. As you mention, the "fix" here is to enter "5" to switch back to quarter note before creating that next triplet.
In reply to not quite in my case. Not by mtherieau
"I then arrowed right to select the next quarter note, and hit ctrl-3 again which ended up in a triplet of sixteenths followed by an eigth."
I found this, and understood it to do this because it was anticipating entry into the 1st triplet. Being in 8ths, you would be able to enter the notes without messing up the triplet.
I find this a feature, which you do not object to,
Regards,
.
In reply to I then arrowed right to select the next quarter note, and hit ct by xavierjazz
agreed...no objection. Changing to eigths has got to be MS just "doing the right thing", as the most logical next step would be to edit within the newly created triplet. For MS to change from eigths back quarter after I arrowed over to the quarter note would require....mind reading? or at least some very subtle anticipation on what my real intention was. I was just commenting that it did confuse me when I first ran into it (and it may have similarly confused the OP?)
In reply to agreed...no objection. by mtherieau
I added my comment to try and make the idea as clear as possible to future readers.
Regards,
In reply to agreed...no objection. by mtherieau
Good points! I would add that the surprise *begins* with the fact that you need to start with selecting a quarter if your goal is to create eighth note triplets. I'm guessing this came from Sibelius? But that already creates a case of you selecting one thing (quarter) and MuseScore then "automatically" changing the currently selected note value to something else (eighth). Automatically switching back from eighth to quarter when you finish entering the triplet wouldn't necessarily be more "mind reading" than having had switched from quarter to eighth in the first place.
But it's probably close to 50/50 which you'd actually *want* more often. If you've got a whole bunch of triplets to enter in a row, then obviously, you'd want to stay in that mode. And frankly, maybe it should do exactly that - a case could be made that you shouldn't even have to hit ctrl-3 again if you want to keep entering notes of that value. After all, the other durations are all "sticky", including the tie, which like, the tuplet can be thought of as a modifier to the basic selected duration. In fact, now that I think about it, I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if this inconsistency doesn't turn out to be related to the bug that causes certain triplet manipulations to add extra beats to the measure. The cursor is on a note whose duration is 1/12th of the measure, but the note entry panel represents that duration as an eighth note. I can easily imagine some part of the code checking the wrong duration. Hmm. But I digress.
Anyhow, for me, while I do sometimes have long strings of similar triplets, and it's a pain to have to remember to keep remembering to reset the duration before hitting ctrl-3 (and also to avoid the temptation to use copy&paste!), it's probably more common that I'd have one triplet and then go right into regular eighth notes. So as it happens, the current behavior is kind of perfect for that.
In reply to Good points! I would add by Marc Sabatella
" I would add that the surprise *begins* with the fact that you need to start with selecting a quarter if your goal is to create eighth note triplets. I'm guessing this came from Sibelius?"
I think it makes sense in the context of the underlying MuseScore mindset. The highest priority the developers have is to always keep the durations adding up correctly. That realization helps a lot in understanding how it works. That's why it recalculates all the durations the instant you do anything. So, in thinking about tuplets, the first and most important question is, how long will the whole group be? That's the first information the program wants to know.
-- J.S.
In reply to not quite in my case. Not by mtherieau
sorry to belabor this, but there is another possibly easier way to avoid this "surprise" -- namely, after typing ctrl-3 to create the triplet, hit escape to exit note entry mode. Then arrow over to the next quarter note and notice that MS will change the selected duration automatically to be quarter and a simple ctrl-3 will create the "expected" triplets out of the quarter note.