?Changing notes without changing lyrics - Is this possible?
Hi all,
I'm trying to change the notes (treble to bass clef) without changing the lyrics I've typed in. Is there a way to do this?
After change the clef and click on the first note and enter a new pitch, the lyrics disappear.
Thanks,
Sandy T.
Comments
If all you are doing is changing clef, why do need to re-enter the note? Perhaps you also want to change octave? The way to do that - independently of whether you also have changed clefs - is to select the notes you want shifted and hit ctrl-up or ctrl-down as appropriate. You can also transpose a semitone at a time with up and down by themselves, or use Notes->Transpose. None of these methods will mess up existing lyrics or other markings.
In reply to If all you are doing is by Marc Sabatella
Moving an existing note retains the lyrics sylable attached to it, but selecting a note and then entering the new pitch via the keyboard loses the lyrics. Did bite me at occasions (I usually enter with mouse, but when told 'that note there should be an a' I use the keyboard and lose the lyrics).
You can change clef, change octave (as stated above), move the note up and down in pitch with the arrow keys and you can also add notes (e.g. you have a D and you want to add an F to the chord then press [Shift]-F). You can also change instrument (from Stave Properties) and can add a note up a fifth ([Alt]-5) or down a fifth ([Shift]-5) and can even change the duration of a note, all without deleting the lyric, just don't enter the note via the keyboard.
In reply to Changing notes, retaining lyrics by underquark
I think it is a bug that the lyrics disappear, when a note's pitch is changed via the keyboard (key a-g rather than arrow keys)
It is also a bug that the lyrics does not disappear, when you replace a note with a rest via keyboard (key 0) or mouse
If someone confirms this to still be the case in the trunk (the upcoming version 2.0), I guess it'd be worth reporting.
In reply to I think it is a bug that the by Jojo-Schmitz
I don't think of it as a bug, because you aren't just changing pitch - you are entering a totally new note. It's not just the pitch that will be different, but *everything* about it. Could be a different duation than whatever was there before, and if you had attached any other markings to the note, those will be different as well. You might have changed some note properties - flipping stem directipn, adjusting playback qualities like velocity, maybe you set the note to be small, or invisible, or maybe you overrode the beaming properties of the note. None of that should be expeced to be preserved. As soon as you press a letter key to enter a.note, that's a ew note, and nothing you did to the old note should be expected to carry oer.
Now, as an *enhancement request*, I could see someone wanting certain things to nonetheless be copied from the old note to the new one, and.yrics might be on that list. But really, that adds no real value, since you can already change pitch quite effectively without requiring some awkward kludge of copying certain attributes from deleted notes to newly entered ones, and then trying to figure out which atrributes make sense to copy over, and how to handle cases where the newly entered note doesn't even have that type of attribue (eg, should information about flipped stems be preserved if you reenter the note as a whole note?)
In reply to I don't think of it as a bug, by Marc Sabatella
If I select a note and then hit key a-g, nothing but the pitch changes. So it is basically the same as if I use the arrow keys, so the lyrics should be kept.
And if I hit 0 or replace with a rest via mouse, the lyrics should go
In reply to If I select a note and then by Jojo-Schmitz
I guess I didn't explain clearly enough. It is *not* true that nothing else changes. To see this, create a quarter note on middle C (treble clef), then flip the stem down, then right click and go to note properties and make it small, right click again and color it red, then add a staccato. Now click the note and press "D". Note *everything* just changed. It's a totally new note - it isn't just a pitch change. And had you pressed "2" after clicking the note and before pressing "D", you'd have seen it "change" into a half note.
Bottom line pressing a letter key does *not* simply change pitch - it enters a *completely new note* at the cursor position, *replacing* whatever was there before.
In reply to I guess I didn't explain by Marc Sabatella
Ah, I see. But I still don't see a reason to delete the lyrics, as long as the new nots ist still a note rather than a rest. It'd be sensible if the lenght increases and so deletes or overwrites adjacent notes, to delete their lyrics though.
In reply to Ah, I see. But I still don't by Jojo-Schmitz
Right, like I said, as an enhancement request, this makes sense. I'm just observing why it seems to be as it is. MuseScore is not going out of itsway to delete the existing lyric, it is completely deleting the existing note, along with all attributes and marking attached to that note. So if wanted to preserve the lyric, that would require a totally separate operation of saving the old lyric before deleting the note, then reattaching that saved lyric to the new note. And then, one mght also ask what other attributes might also be saved and copied to the new note - maybe the old articulations should also be applied to the new note? Maybe some of the MIDI properties? I suspect sometimes that would be what you wanted, other times not. It could be tricky deciding what to copy and what not to.
Anyhow, I have no reason to suspect this would be difficult to implement, But the point is, it isn't a matter of just not "deleting" lyrics - it is adding a whole new automatic copy and paste operation that would be doing a special case for lyrics (and perhaps articulations or certain other properties). And hence, failure to perform this extra automatic partial copy/paste can't be considered a "bug". MuseScore does exactly what it is designed to do: pressing a letter key enters a brand new note, completely replacing whatever was there previously. Often, that is exactly what you want, as it saves the step of deleting the old notes first if you don't want the new notes to accidentally inherit attributes of the old. But a special case for preserving lyrics is definitely worth considering, I would say.
The idea of treating lyrics more like chord symbols could also be considered. Chords can be attached to notes, but if you then delete the notes, the chords remain behind and are attached to time positions instead. I think the new figured bass symbols in 2.0 may work similarly? This too is sometimes not good - it means an extra step if you do actually want to delete the chords - but it would give you a new way of entering lyrics over rests: enter the notes, attach lyrics, then delete the notes, leaving the lyrics. That is what at fist appears to happen, except as noted, it won't survive a reload.