four measures per line/system

• Jul 28, 2022 - 20:30

On the parts for the sketch score, both trumpet and piano, at Letter B, I can't seem to get the last 4 measures to move to the same line.
I can get the first four measures of letter B to move onto one line by adjusting the measure stretch, but with the last four I don't seem to have any luck, and the measures are basically populated with the same number of notes.
We sight read this stuff, so I always try to get four bars per line... if you get lost, you can catch up and find your place pretty quickly with that as a standard. If I have to go, 3, 3, 2, for an 8 bar section... that is ....not as easy to read...

Any ideas?
Jeff
Springfield MO


Comments

At Letter B, you have used a horizontal frame to provide an indent - and that is taking up extra space.

Also I noticed that in Format > Page Settings... > Scaling you are using a Stave Space of 2.000 mm. If you reduce the Stave Space to 1.600 mm, you can then reduce the stretch to get four measures in that system - without having to remove that horizontal frame.

In reply to by DanielR

Thanks Daniel!
Yes, the spacer I used is before letter B.
My problem is the last four bars of letter B on the Trumpet and Piano parts won't jump up on the same line. I have changed the measure layout stretch to reduce the size of the first three measures, but they don't seem to want to shrink down like the ones above them... the first four measures of Letter B.

Good comment about the scaling... but once you get below 2.0 it is REALLY hard to read in low light and most of us are in our 60's and wear contacts or glasses to read, so I don't want to go below that... Actually prefer 2.3 scale when I can use it...
I pulled in the margins, but that doesn't seem to get that last bar to hop up and join the other three...

Thanks for your input.

Jeff
Springfield, MO

In reply to by bluewisp1955

There's no getting around the laws of physics - if you have extra-large notes, and extra0large space between them (as per your style settings), you can only fit so many of them on a page of a certain size. But, I see you are in the US, so no reason to be using A4 page size, unless you're having your paper imported from Europe. Better to use Letter, the default in the US. That buys you a little width. But more importantly, it seems you've gone out of your way to tell MuseScore to add more than default space between notes, thus making it even more physically impossible to fit more measures. In Format / Style / Measure, reset the Spacing and Minimum note distance back to the default, or even make them smaller than the default. Definitely not larger as you have them now. And of course, you'll need to delete some of the system breaks you currently have in place - those are preventing MuseScore from fitting more measures even if you do lower these settings as described.

When I do these things, the four bars at B just fit. But also, having lyrics on all the instrument parts is taking space unnecessarily. Consider removing them, or at least, making the font smaller. Unless the whole band is going to be actually singing in unison, of course.

Do you still have an unanswered question? Please log in first to post your question.