Getting Rid of Rests

• Jan 14, 2018 - 01:55

So I have a lovely piece that I wrote in 4/4 and I ended up getting rid of the 4th beats in one (large) section. So I just changed it to 3/4 and now I have a massive problem- There are quarter note rests that I cannot get rid of and It would take hours to push all the notes into the place of the rests. Is there a convenient way to just remove the rests and move the beginning of the next measure in (how I want it to be)?


Comments

I hope someone else has a better way.

In my not so easy and convenient way, I think I'd try to

1) revert back to the version that had your section in 4/4
2) save your file to MusicXML format
3) edit the .xml file with a "text editor" program
4) see if you can figure out how to change all those measures to 3/4, andremove the extra rests on the 4th beat.

That could turn out to be the fastest way to do it. In particular if your text editor has a record and playback macro feature.

Also, I'd probably study how MusicXML stores the 3/4 vs 4/4 measures by creating a small test.xml MusicXML file with just a few measures in it, some in 4/4, some in 3/4. And then look at that file with a text editor.

  1. Set those measures back to 4/4 so that each first beat is the first in a measure and each measure has one quarter rest as the last beat.
  2. Open up the measure properties by right-clicking the first measure of that passage and picking that option from the popup menu
  3. Change the actual duration of the measure to 3/4 and hit apply.
  4. Use the right arrow button at the bottom of this window to move to the next measure
  5. Repeat steps 3 & 4 until you've reached the end of the section you wish to change.

  6. Make sure to add an extra 4/4 time signature to the first measure after the section you wish to affect, ensuring the remaining measure won't be affected.

  7. Now apply the 3/4 time change to the first measure of your section

In reply to by jeetee

That's pretty clever! Still a bit painful, but I can't think of a better solution right now. It's kind of an unusual problem to need to solve - basically, you want to remove the last beat of each measure. Not the sort of the thing that there would normally be a one-button solution for, any more than there is a one-button solution for "write out Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata" :-)

BTW, when following the above procedure, be absolutely sure to hit Apply after each change, otherwise it will be for naught!

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