Add half accent and normal accent
Currently, the accenting ability of MuseScore is limited. You either place a Marcato and go up on the volume one dynamic step or you put on an accent and you go up two dynamic steps. This is really not enough dynamic range as far as accents go.
So here is my proposed solution to this problem.
Make a half accent (or just make an accent icon that is smaller than the one we have) which only goes up HALF a dynamic step so it would be possible to bring out chords subtly. This is commonly seen in Duo-Art recordings for player piano. Those rolls have theme holes which raise the note volume a very small increment.
Reduce the volume of the accent we have so that it only raises the volume the same amount as the marcato.
Make a heavy accent (just bold the icon of the current accent) that does what the normal accent does currently, bring up the volume by two dynamic steps.
This would make adding dynamics much easier and make it possible for adding very subtle dynamics which just isn't possible right now.
Comments
If this is for a non-SND instrument I believe you can still just use the velocity offset to provide small accents to notes; without the need to change standard notation conventions.
In reply to If this is for a non-SND… by jeetee
If you mean using the inspector, I've tried that many times before, I usually got the velocities stuck at 127.
In reply to If you mean using the… by Piotr Barcz
127 is the max, so that makes sense.
Is the proposed "half accent" symbol something already accepted by the SMuFL folks as part of the music notation standard? If so, we can definitely support it in a future release. Otherwise, the first step would be to petition the SMuFML folks to get that added.
But meanwhile, as notated, the "velocity" setting in the Inspector already allows for tweaking of volume as you see fit, for instruments like piano that work on that principle of velocity = volume.
In reply to Is the proposed "half accent… by Marc Sabatella
I'm not sure if it's part of the SmuFL project, I just think it would be a good addition to the program. Either that or make a setting for accent volume instead of having to go into the inspector every time to make a change.
In reply to I'm not sure if it's part of… by Piotr Barcz
It’s a good addition to the program if it’s something that is actually known to musicians because it appears in published music. If it’s a symbol of your own invention, then that’s not likely to be accepted into the international standards for music notation. Your first step then would be to convince muaici publishers and educators to start using the symbols. Then it will become common enough to be included j t he international standards. I would say this is not very likely, but you never know. Anyhow, that’s wheee you’d need to start. Once thousands of people are using the symbol, then it would be considered for standards.
So instead, I’d focus on using the Inspector.
If you’re already setting your note velocities to 127, you can’t go any further - that’s the maximum in the MIDI standard. So you can’t make notes louder than that - only less loud, by setting their velocities to something less than 127.
Note that normally this offset would be 0, meaning the velocity is as specified by the dynamic markings
In reply to It’s a good addition to the… by Marc Sabatella
That's the thing, I don't know how to use the inspector. The alternative would just be to make the soft accent do the half dynamic step up. Currently, the soft accent doesn't have any noticeable effect on the note it's applied to.
In reply to That's the thing, I don't… by Piotr Barcz
Using the Inspector is simple. Select the note or notes you want to affect, then where it says “Velocity offset”, enter a number telling MuseScore how much louder or softer than the default you want it. Positive numbers = louder, negative = softer. The default velocity is whatever the dynamic you’ve added to the score says. So you can also simply add dynamics if you want to affect all notes. The Inspector is more for tweaking individual notes, and is way more powerful than just having two different accents - you can enter any value you want so each note has different velocity etc.
Not to say a way of customizing articulations might not be added some day, but that could never be as effective as giving you directly control over each note, which is what the Inspector does. The articulation customization would be for getting a rough approximation of what you want, but the Inspector (renamed Properties in MuseScore 4) is the way to get more control for more realism.
In reply to Using the Inspector is… by Marc Sabatella
Ok thank you!