Appearance of Bar (Measure) Numbers

Automatically, MuseScore wil show bar (measure) numbers at the start of each system on a masterscore and at the start of each stave in a part.

It’s often the case when a conductor is rehearsing with an ensemble, that they will say “let’s go from bar ‘x’”, where bar ‘x’ is in the middle of a multi-measure rest for many players. Players then have to count quickly to calculate where they are.

MuseScore could save players from having to count every time, by adding a function to its ‘Edit Style’ window: for users to be able to choose whether they want to have measure numbers showing:

• at the start of each system /line
• Ever ‘x’ bars (measure) (e.g. every 5 bars)
• At every rehearsal mark
• any combination of the above

NB Into this function needs to be built a layout principle to prevent bar numbers from colliding with rehearsal marks. Users’ lives are too short to spend time repositioning each and every rehearsal mark to move it out of the way of the new measure number, particularly when this action would be multiplied by the number of parts in the score!