System Divider Related Question

• Jan 23, 2017 - 03:27

Hello I am a new user to using Musescore and I must say I really like it! As to my question relates to inputting System dividers into my score I am working on at the moment. Right now I am typesetting a 16 wind instrument piece and part way through the score I need to input a system divider on one page (in the middle of the page between two systems). The score takes up 3-4 measures per page. I want the page to display two big systems locally onto one page and then the following pages to display as normal showing all instruments. It seems to be really difficult to do to implement. The systems I want to hide are 7 instruments that are resting for 8 measures (keep in mind all instruments are on separate staves) and their are 9 other instruments playing in these measures that I want to show.

I have read up on locally changing globally the page scaling, but I only want it for one page, not the entire work. I have tried changing the measures properties to uncheck the visibility of specific measures but this still shows the bar lines as well as the grand staff part with the instrumental abbreviations. Keep in mind I have my page scale set to A3 size. Let me know if you need the file to look at. The measures are 61-68.


Comments

In reply to by Isaac Weiss

OK here is the file, find rehearsal marking's 9-10, this is the section I am talking about (I want to hide the 4 horns along with the bassoons and contrabassoon).

I give some more detail as to why I need this divider in the score. I am working on a large project in which I am doing a exact (or as close to) a typeset copy of a scanned score (page by page) that I digitized some time ago, in which I wish to typeset the score into Musescore. There are some pages throughout the entire scan that have this divider on specific pages is why I would like to input this. Since there is no local scaling option, I guess I can let it go but it would mess up my placement where I am page wise with the scanned score. If you want I can attach a copy of the scan score if you want to reference it.

I also have another technical question, if you look at measure 63 of the Oboe 1 part, I wish to hide the 6/4 time signature (because its already on measure 60). the issue is I can hide, once again, all the time signature for one stave in the entire score but not locally. How do I do locally? In the 3.0 update that you guys are working on, you really should add in more local options for editing, such as local page scaling on a specific page, adjusting local system measures on a page vertically, etc. to give more space between parts, instead of being all global. Because the collisions between the characters having it all global options is really difficult to adjust for every measure locally.

Attachment Size
Sonatine für Bläser, new version.mscz 95.86 KB

In reply to by jeetee

So even when exporting to a PDF it will be invisible?

Also another question I have. When testing the playback, I hear this "clicking" sound from the MIDI while its playing, like the clicking is almost in time with the music. Its happening on some parts that does this "clicking" sound. Its kind of annoying to listen to. I don't have the metronome on, its off.

The short answer here is: There is no local scaling option.

But there is another consideration: You are already squeezing 16 staves onto one page, requiring you to scale down a lot. Do you really want to make your notes even tinier in order do do what? Save one sheet of paper?

However, it is your score and your decision. The only way I see for you to get your page with two systems is to scale down the entire score to the point where 18 staves fit the page. Then you choose the option "hide empty staves" (style menu). Now you have to arrange the page turns in such a way that measure 61 appears at the beginning of a page (using page breaks from the palette--plus maybe changing the stretch of some measures) and if necessary force measure 69 to the following page. Remember that by scaling down you'll get more pages with 4 measures and fewer with 3 and maybe some with 5 so the page turns will shift from the begining of the score

The problem is that in this case all the other pages don't have "enough" on them and you'll likely be forced to use spacers (manually for each stave separately on each page) to get a presentable look. This gets even more complicated because you are hiding empty staves, so quite a few pages will not show the full sixteen staves.

Personally I don't really see an important use case for local scaling. Are there are a lot of people who wish it? What I think might be useful would be a local "hide staves" option for cases like this one (or is there a way to do that already?). This would allow us to avoid having scores with the number of staves differing from page to page--along with the vertical placement of the instruments.

One trick you can give a shot at is the Hide Empty Staves option from the style | General... menu. Start at the front of the score and decide which pages need additional lines staves on them. Select a measure that is on that page in the instrument you want displayed and insert a note in an unused voice. Silence the note (uncheck play in the inspector) and hide everything in the voice for that measure. Only the full measure rest will show up on your score. If the anything is grayed out it is hidden and will not show up on the printed or PDF copy of the score.

If you are going to extract the parts then you have 2 options since you won't want spurious measure rests interrupting the multi-measure rests. Either extract the parts before finishing the score, or save one copy for the score, and one copy for parts. If you extract the parts first, then if you change a note later you will have to go back and undo all the score changes and start over to get that part to look right.

In reply to by mike320

This is a very good trick, I'll have to remember that!

As to wether you extract the parts first or later: The key is to proofread the score as thoroughly as possible before going on to formatting. All errors already corrected will then be corrected in both score and parts. At some points you'll have to "divorce" the parts from the score; I do it by extracting the parts as mscz. files so they can be formatted individually (for readability and page turns; if you want to enter e.g. fingerings into parts this would be the time to do it; in general they do not belong into the score). But at the very latest the separation happens when you go to print.

From that point forward one has to maintain discipline and correct any mistakes--which one will discover almost inevitably--in both score and the part{s} concerned immediately after the discovery in order to keep parts and score perfectly compatible. This is a pain in the backside but I find careful proofreading keeps down the number of these pains.

In reply to by azumbrunn

Extracting each part to it's own .mscz is unnecessary unless you want to distribute only that part as an .mscz to someone for some reason. Once you extract parts you can change each part's layout and it will stay that way unless the underlying score is changed or the part itself. If you change notes or rhythms in the parts, it may change the score and make you need to once again layout the score, that is why I suggest you work with one file for score and one file for parts. There is no formatting reason to save each part individually. Of course you are going to make the same note and rhythm etc. changes in both files, so you will have to confirm the layout of both in any case. Your comment about certain things not belonging on the score but only in parts is an excellent point. A very good reason to work on parts in one file and main score in the other. Just don't look at the score in the file with the parts.

In reply to by mike320

As soon as you split the score in two (the one to be printed and the one with parts included) you have the same situation you have if you extracted the parts: you have to correct any errors you find after the separation in two places.

Here is where I ran into trouble trying to format parts in the complete file:

When formatting parts a big concern are always page turns. Sometimes they fall better when the music starts on page 1 and sometimes on page 2. In the second case you needed a title page (which I generate separately and join to the part at the Pdf stage). In the first case however you needed to enter a frame into the part for the title, including the instrument name. This frame plus the text in it then showed up in the score (where I don't want it; I prefer a full title page) and--if I remember correctly--in the parts as well (where I want it in some instruments but not others).

Since that happened I have been happy with extracting the parts as .mscz and formatting from there.

A few different issues here, let me try to address what I can:

1) FYI, system dividers will be supported in "native" fashion for MuseScore 3 - no need to add them manually. A simple style option will cause them to be generated at the start and/or end of each system as needed, with full control over the position.

2) It sounds like you want "Hide empty staves" but only for certain systems. Since "system" is a floating concept - consider, any edit you make might move a measure from one system to the next - it makes more sense to think in terms of measures. The current method of achieving hide empty staves "per system" would be to enable it globally then put invisible content in the measures you *don't* want hidden. For MuseScore 3 I would very much like to see a simpler method of doing essentially the same thing - marking a range of measure where you want to allow hiding when empty versus not. It's still a bit of a moving target, but it *does* seem like the framework to support this is coming into place.

3) Not really sure what you mean about "adjusting local system measures on a page vertically, etc. to give more space between parts, instead of being all global." If I understand correctly, that's already possible, through use of things like spacers, etc. Could you be more specific?

4) Local time signatures - what you have going on in the Oboe part - are still an experimental feature with some bugs and limitations. Ideally, you'd be able to *delete* the unnecessary 6/4 in measure 63. But right now, we don't allow that if the affected measures are non-empty (in *any* staff). So the way around this would be to delete the contents of the affected measures, then remove the time signature, then re-enter the content. Would be easier if copy and paste worked correctly in the presence of local time signatures but unfortunately it definitely doesn't right now. Luckily, there isn't *that* much music to need to re-enter manually. I tried it, and if you delete the content of those measures (63-68), you can successfully remove the time signature. You might even be able to copy/paste the *other* staves to preserve their content, although do be careful. Seemed to work for the flute staves though.

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