Guitar TAB problem needing a solution

• Jun 7, 2020 - 01:20

Before we get to the problem I have, bit of background to shed some light.

  1. Last time i touched an actual Instrument was about 8 years ago.
  2. I had 2 years of Basic Piano Lessons.
  3. I played Rhythm Guitar in a "Garage Band" for about 5 years.

So with that in mind I am no Musical Expert but have decided to use my limited knowledge and play around on Musescore.

I find it easier to use Tabs to do what needs to be done. Problem is if i switch to Notes and later back to tabs it changes the original notes I've added.
Example: Start a new score, guitar tabs only. Add notes. Save the score. Go back to instruments, change the staff from tabs to standard. Now on my side if I change back to Tabs, the original notes I've added changed. This is not minor changes like a A becoming and Am. This is where a PIMA Pluck sequence is all suddenly on the 1st string.
It's not a save problem and i have repaired Musescore. Any advice as to how to fix this (Please no bashing the older musicians, back then we played by ear and not by paper)


Comments

That's not the way to do it. See the manual: https://musescore.org/en/handbook/tablature

When you set up a new score, opt for guitar tabs with a linked standard staff. As you enter the tab the notes will appear simultaneously in standard notation. When you've finished you can delete the tab stave and save as a new file.

Alternatively copy the tabs on your current tabs only score (Ctrl+A, Ctrl+C), then create a new standard treble clef score, and paste the tabs in with Ctrl+V. I don't know if this is kosher but worked for me when I tried it!

In reply to by Brer Fox

Actually, don't try my second method of pasting into a plain treble clef score - it only worked once and I can't repeat it! So create a new linked score and paste your tab into the tab staff.

Sorry for any confusion - I'm not an expert by any means but have been creating tabs successfully for some months, after an initial learning curve :)

In reply to by Brer Fox

Hi Brer, thankyou for the response. Honestly i downloaded version 3.5 alpha and all the problems even with midi "drop" import got fixed. I must admit that i am able to do more with version 3.5 than 3.4. Dont know if it is just more user friendly or if its just a better layout. "Touch wood" I havnt gotten a problem on version 3.5 yet. Being a "lower" user than the rest of you guys its not realy my place to say but can say that samro got a donation for introducing me to musescore and musescore also recieved a donation and in specific for version 3.5.b

In reply to by mrkwiggill

There really isn't a huge difference between 3.5 and 3.4 overall, nothing you should be able to notice right away anyhow, but there are a lot of relatively small improvements that do really add up to this being a pretty big release. To be clear, it's still only an Alpha release (plus Nightly development builds), with a beta coming very soon.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

To be honest Marc for a "low end" user like myself I saw several differences which made the world of difference to me. Th8ngs like load time, gp (3 to 7) and midi importing etc are but a few things i have noticed that are different. I must however add that i probably use about 5% of muse score due to my limited musical knowledge but must add to this that i purchased a paid program (dont know if we may give opposing program names here), about 2 months ago, and still have no idea what to do when and where with it. So I would think the differences I've noticed is mainly due to my limited knowledge of not just the program but also of music or I had a corrupted installation on my original 3.4. Anything is possible with a brain like mine (LOL)

In reply to by mrkwiggill

Load time meaning how long for the program to startup? I am not aware of any changes there. Could be that you removed a soundfont that was causing a long delay below. Nor do I know of any appreciable changes in MIDI import - can you explain more detail what you are seeing? Does "go" mean Guitar Pro? Here I do think there were some improvements in the import.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

Apologies, switched from my phone over to the laptop. Old guitar hands battle with the phone typing. I'll give you a list of what I have noticed but need you to bare in mind that I am no expert so my terminology etc might be wrong but will explain as good as possible.

Load screen or start center took ages on 3.4. I don't know what a sound font is, so if it came with the download then it must be that then. 3.4 would give me the splash screen, then it will wait there for about 2 minutes and then Muse score would open up. The load time became longer after i updated the resources in resource manager. 3.5 would give me the splash, open up muse score and the splash will run in the background loading everything. When I just started 3.5 only problem I had was finding the place for it to use my HDMI port for audio cause it defaulted to my laptop speakers. After I figured out how to do that it was sorted.

Ok so the easiest way to do this so hat i don't sound like a complete idiot is to open all the programs and import one song into all of them and give you the differences. That way I will be ale to give the terms.

Midi Import. Sibelius 7, Guitar pro 7, Muse Score 3.4 and muse score 3.5 and tested with Bad Company "Cant get Enough" (No settings changed, direct import and play)

Sibelius: Pitch very high, sounds as if played on a honky-tonk piano.
GP: Imported very well although Guitar sounds like a piano. Measure 23 seems to have had a rest import problem cause sounds as if it has a stutter there
Muse3.4: Drumsett timing is out. Rest seems to be in sync. Lead a tad "clinky"
Muse3.5: All good, nice full all round sound. Timing is good. Drumset split into 3 as opposed to 3.4's combined drumset.

In 3.4 I have minimum import instruments as opposed to 3.5 I am able to switch to synthesizers.

GP Import. Same Programs as above and tested with Spandau Ballet "True" gp3 file.

Sibelius: cant import gp files
GP: Well it was written in a previous version of this program so cant compare apples with pears. Rhythm guitar sounds great.
Muse3.4: Rhythm guitar imported as guitar but has a piano sound to it. Doesn't sound like a strummed instrument but found before that switching it to a harp sorts that problem. Tempo Imported at 120 No indication as to tuning.
Muse3.5 Nice clean sound. Rhythm guitar sounds better (Almost cleaner) than in GP. Tempo imported correctly at 120. Chord diagrams imported but is a bit big so is pushing the measures apart. If i recall this is a setting i need to change somewhere so not a serious thing.

I have noticed yesterday on Metallica "Nothing Else Matters" Solo guitar, that on the hammers and pull off's, 3.5 had a cleaner sound to it. Was almost as if there was a pause on the hammers and pull offs. I didst bother correcting it in 3.4 since it was right in 3.5.

Remember i cant read notes. I played by ear. So most of the changes are audible changes and not easy to explain.

I must apologize for taking so long but 3.4 and 3.5 refuse to work together at the same time so had to open and close between them an the muse score 3.4 splash takes ages every time. Hope this gives you some indication of changes between the two

In reply to by mrkwiggill

The slow startup was almost certainly due to what you installed from the resource manager, I'm guessing you had installed MDL which does indeed come up large soundfonts that make startup very slow.

As I said, import from Guitar Pro may have improved, but MIDI import did not as far as I know. Can you attach the MIDI file you believe sounds better in 3.5? I want to make sure the change isn't actually a bug.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

Yes I have MDL installed. (Still need to go read the manual to know what it does). I have it in 3.5 as well and startup times has a huge difference. Sofar I found 1 problem in 3.5. When you have follow on in continuous view, when you get to a repeat bar it doesn't follow back. It just stands there (Non-movable) until the follow line catches up with the view again. Apart from the follow problem, for what I'm using Muse score for, I couldn't find any other problems with 3.5. The guys did a good job in my opinion.

I think the correct terminology is grace notes. I had a look at the ants (notes) and from the blue follow line its from about page 2 just before the 3/8 time signature and then after that there is a few hammers and pull offs (Grace notes).

Attachment Size
Nothing-Else-Matters-1.mid 36.27 KB

In reply to by mrkwiggill

If you have MDL installed, that explains the slow startup in 3,4. It's normal if you are using MDL, which is an extension specifically for writing drumline music. If you aren't using it, you should remove it - it changes a number of things on your system that you won't want and will make things work differently from how they are documented to work.

MDL really is just as slow to load in 3.5, but due to changes in how the initial splash screen works, you might see the main window earlier than you did before.

Regarding the MIDI, I don't see any grace notes on page 2. The only staff that has notes is the second - the guitar - and it looks like this in both 3.4 and 3.5:

Nothing-Else-Matters-1.png

Again, if you are seeing a difference, it's most likely a bug, and we'd want to fix it.

Anyhow, we appreciate the feedback and I'm glad you are enjoying 3.5 alpha. I just want to make sure that the changes you are seeing don't indicate problems, because most people should not be seeing many changes at all, except that there are some nice new features and lots of bugs fixed.

In reply to by Marc Sabatella

Thank you Marc. Took some searching on the net to find out i just have to delete the mdl folder under my documents, but got it right.

Read several threats regarding hammer on's and pull off's. But all dating back to 2014/2015. Also went thru the manal but cannot find anywhere where ir explains how to add a hammer or pull or maybe an up bend for a hammer on or a down vend for a pull off. If you could point me in the right direction it would be greatly appreciated. Country music has alot of bends in it and struggling to get it right.

Else would it be better to create the score and then take it over to gp and then create the hammer and pulls?

In reply to by mrkwiggill

FWIW, removing the MDL extension would have been better done from the same resource manager where you added it, but removing the folder should do the trick as well, especially if you then restart MuseScore.

Hammer on and pull off notations vary. MuseScore provides many of the symbols that are typically used. For instance, you can add a slur from the Lines palette (shortcut "S").

In reply to by cadiz1

Much appreciated Marx and Cadiz. So this will probably be a dumb question but here goes. If i import a gp5 file. Then save lines or arpeggios under a custom pallette, it will stay there, but will it reproduce the same effect or will it just become a visual representation? Sorry if its been asked before. Also assuming when i create a new palette it will automatically display under my master pallette?

In reply to by mrkwiggill

Anything you add from a score to a palette can be added to other scores - or elsewhere in the original score and will behave the same way as the original did. So if you liked the playback effect originally, you'll still like it.

New palettes don't appear in the Master Palette (under the View menu) but in the regular normal palettes at the left of your window.

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