Two staves for specific measures in a one-staff piece

• Oct 20, 2013 - 15:07

I am entering a piece for solo cello that requires two staves for about 18 measures in the middle. Is it possible to have just those measures with two staffs?

I've added a staff (which automatically starts at the beginning) below and entered the two parts only for the necessary measures, leaving the rest empty. Making each measure invisible leaves the grand-staff connecting line at the start of each line and does not adjust for space. Style > Edit General Style > Hide empty staves doesn't seem to work. Any suggestions?


Comments

Most likely you added a 2nd staff to an existing Instrument, rather than adding an additional instriment with one staff. In 1.x 'hide empty staved' realls is ' hide unsused/empty instruments'

2.0 has that fixed, but till then just add another instrument rather than an additional staff to an existing one.

In reply to by Jojo-Schmitz

Thank you for your reply. I was unclear - what I did was to add another instrument (create > instruments > strings > cello). But it added that instrument to the entire piece. I need it for just a few measures. I tried selecting those measures and then doing the above, but it still added the staff to the whole piece. Any further suggestions?

In reply to by Guy Fishman

To be absolutely clear:
1. Create another instrument (as you said you have). This new instrument is added 'to the entire piece' as you mention.
2. Enter your notes for the entire score (as if you had two parts). The new 2nd instrument will have only those 18 measures filled, with full measure rests on empty staves.
3. Try to use line breaks to keep those 18 measures together - for example, 6 measures by 3 lines.
4. When finished with the entire score, go to menu item: Style / Edit General Style / Score, and check the box 'Hide Empty Staves'.
If this does not help, please feel free to attach the MuseScore .mscz file.

You do *not* want to 'make each measure invisible', as you first wrote.

Regards.

In reply to by Jm6stringer

I'm afraid going the Style / Edit General Style / Score / Hide empty staves route did not work. I've attached the file to this message. As you can see, the 18 measures that require two staves begin at 139. Everything before has two staves, the lower of which is empty, and which I would like to remove. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

In reply to by Jm6stringer

Thank you so much for taking the time to look at my questions and especially to provide a fixed version. You attachment is what I would like to be able to create, but I'm not clear on how you achieved it. If you don't mind and have the time, could you provide me with a step-by-step of how you did it? That is, once everything had already been entered, as with the attachment I sent you. And again, thanks so much. (By the way, the repeat sign is there because these are two separate movements of a Vivaldi concerto and the section at 139 is in fact the second movement. The repeat is to the beginning of that movement. I hadn't finished editing the layout when I sent you my sample)

In reply to by Guy Fishman

OK... starting with your attachment: Concerto_for_Violoncello_in_F_major_RV_410_Basso.mscz

1. Very important!! Go to menu item Style / Edit General Style / Score and be certain 'Hide empty staves is unchecked. People in these forums have been known to create 'invisible' instruments for which they can't see the staves because they are hidden. (You can omit this step to see for yourself...) :-)

2. Go to Create / Instruments expand 'Strings', click on Violincello (or whatever), click on 'Add', and a new instrument is created. Click 'OK' to return to score.

3. In the score, you'll see the time signature(s) honored in the new part, but the key signature(s) will have to be added from the pallette.

4. Proceed to measure 139 and copy/paste from 139 to the end from the 'old' instrument into the 'new' instrument. Copy is performed by clicking on a blank area of measure 139 (to see a blue rectangle) then, using the navigator at the bottom of the page, go to the last measure and 'Shift' + 'right click' to copy all the intervening measures (measures in the blue rectangle are copied to the clipboard).
Paste the copied measures by 'right click' on the rest in measure 139 of the 'new' instrument.
(Of course, you don't have to copy/paste, you can cut/paste; but I like to double check one staff to the other. You can even use keyboard shortcuts like 'Ctrl + V'. MuseScore has alternate ways to accomplish the same thing.)

5. Go back to Create / Instruments and remove Staff 2 of the top Violincello - the 'old' instrument.

6. Finally, go to Style / Edit General Style / Score and check 'Hide empty staves'.

Regards.

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