Lyric entry from text file

• Jul 18, 2014 - 16:08

Using ordinary lyric entry, it is possible to copy a whole line of text from a text file (txt, doc, odt, pdf, etc) and paste it starting at a selected note. Repeated pastes jump to successive notes if the syllables are separated by spaces. However, ties between notes are ignored, so that the next syllable appears under the tied note. Also, it would be sensible if a hyphen in the text had the same effect as a space - i.e. jump to the next note. This would make text entry a whole lot easier, especially for people repeating lyric lines in different choral parts.


Comments

In reply to by Shoichi

Nice job on the example - my *doing* the lyric entry using your example is more fun than *reading* about it!

Following dontango's observation (and out of curiosity), I did tie the D in the third measure across the bar line. Holding Ctrl and pressing V repeatedly did paste a syllable to the second note of the tie.
All was not lost, as the unused syllables remained in the clipboard (at least in Windows) and were able to be applied correctly by skipping over the note where that errant syllable should have been placed. That syllable can be corrected afterwards.

As an instrumentalist (poor singing voice), I normally don't use lyrics in the scores I produce with MuseScore. However, while playing, if the lyrics are present I often do follow them in my head, especially for a popular tune - it's better than using rehearsal/section marks. :-)

Ciao...

In reply to by Jm6stringer

Sorry for the delay (I've just finished cutting the grass).
;-) is now more than a year that you bear me, so you still have a little patience:
If I type Doc then I hold down AltGr and hit the dash it remains adherent to Doc
The space bar each time, it sends the cursor to the next note.

If you use Ctrl + V, you can suspend, use the space bar to go to the following notes, and still use Ctrl + V (I guess that I have not explained well enough but I trust in your intuition).
Regards...

Thank you - both of these comments are very helpful. However, I still think that it would be worth identifying tied notes and causing lyric entry to skip past them. I find that with some imports into MS what should be written as a dotted crotchet appears as a crotchet tied to a quaver, which looks to the lyric editor like two syllables.

Regarding hyphens, obviously imported text needs to be hyphenated: i.e. "doctor of divinity" must become "doc-tor of di-vin-i-ty" if it is to fit the music - but MS requires it to be edited to
"doc- tor of di- vin- i- ty". All I'm suggesting is that a syllable like "doc-" should shift the entry point to the next note without needing an extra space. But perhaps I'm being too picky!

In reply to by [DELETED] 5

I'm much happier now using MS for lyric entry. I had been enquiring on Harmony Central about what to use for line-entry lyrics, and someone rightly suggested MS. My only remaining problem is re-exporting to midi format - which (seems to?) leave the lyrics behind. However, if I export to MusicXML, I can then convert this to midi elsewhere, and keep the lyrics. "Elsewhere" at the moment is Melody Assistant, which is a bit of a clunky workaround. If I had an easy conversion app from xml to midi I would be an even happier bunny.

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