changing note duration causes notes to get deleted or replaced by rests
I've looked online and in the handbook, but I don't seem to see any way to
easily change note durations. Currently, when I change a note duration, I
end up with an unwelcome rest and/or deleted notes. I'd prefer the "excess" notes get
pushed into a new measure, with the extra rests coming after the notes. What
is the best way to modify note durations without incurring a ton of work to save the notes I don't want deleted?
Comments
Note entry in MuseScore works by replacing existing note or rests (see note entry in the handbook for details). Sometimes you may need to rewrite a couple notes if you want to change a rhythm. If you need to move many notes to a different beat, use copy and paste
In reply to Note entry in MuseScore works by David Bolton
yes, I figured out how to insert a measure and insert copy and paste. I find this a very inefficient and time consuming process.
I had hoped for a better duration editing option than copy and paste. For example, in Music Time deluxe (I'm playing with various trial versions of notation software) when I play in notes from my midi key board, I'll have to go and edit many notes and their durations manually. While I'm composing a song (using my right brain, creative process), I don't want to have to worry about the rhythm and notation syntax (left brain organizing, logic and sorting) intiially . I want to stay in the creative process and capture the meolody and then clean up the notation later. This means many of my notes have to be fixed after the fact. The sheer volume notes that need fixing is severly hampered by musescore inserting unwanted rests and deleting notes. Music time doesn't add unwanted rests nor does it delete notes while I'm in the process of editing individual note durations. It waits until I click a fix/alignment option.
I also would like to have an option where you can add or change notes without the program changing everything to keep the rhythm correct. The best thing I have found is to keep in mind that you need to work from left to right. That is, start at the beginning of a measure and make successive changes. This may take having to change more notes but will keep evrerything in order.
If you want to Delete the unwanted rests then you must change the time signature. because the way musescore works with note entry is that when you create a measure there will only be rests because you have not entered any notes(the time signature is already complete with rests so you have to enter notes so that you will get the melody you want. but you must enter the time signature correct). so when you change the duration .unwanted rests will appear because the time signature says so.if you want to delete the rests then you must recreate the time signature and the measure. i hope this helped
In reply to Musescore Duration by RedMetalSonicMusic
Using a keyboard to enter notes is an efficient way to enter pitch, but note duration won't vary unless you use the mouse all the time which then makes it very inefficient. The simplest answer would seem to be to enter the correct number of notes with the keyboard and then enter duration. But then this problem. Whatever you do seems to result in unwanted rests and the bar line moves to the right. And there seems no way to get the unwanted rests deleted and the bar line moving left again; once the bar line moves right, there seems no way to get it back where it should be.
Is there a solution to this? What do people who use MIDI keyboard entry tend to do?
It wouldn't be a problem if initial entry without a time signature were possible (adding the timing later), but it doesn't seem to be.
PS I have tried changing the time signatures, but couldn't find a way of using this to correct the problem.
In reply to Editing Note Duration by dormouse_
It is not necessary to use the mouse to change note duration. You can change note duration using the computer keyboard. For details see note entry in the handbook.
In reply to It is not necessary to use by David Bolton
The problem is the inability to edit duration later rather than mouse usage.
Combining MIDI keyboard with mouse is easier than combining it with computer keyboard, but both combinations are less easy than using mouse or computer keyboard alone. AFAICS at the moment, MIDI keyboard entry isn't really functional at all.
In reply to Same problem though by dormouse_
I had the same problem when I first started, but got some help through this forum. The key is to start from the left, as it will make the changes moving to the right. This means you cannot just pick out a note to change if it will cause changes before it, and create rests. So you may have to redo some of the notes if, for example, you start at the beginnng of the measure, but this will work, doing it in proper sequence.
Click on the N to change in and out of editing mode, which if you are in, you can use the mouse to change a note if it is not going to change the timing before it.
Best to use the numeric keypad and computer keyboard to enter the durations and then the pitch (When not in editing mode.) and start from the beginning of the measure.
Hope that helps..........Don
In reply to Note duration editing problems by dscoyne
Thanks. I have tried this without success though.
Enter 4/4 via MIDI keyboard with all crotchets. Edit first note to be a quaver. In comes the rest. And that rest won't ever go.unless I replace it with other notes of the right duration. There seems to be no way of turning it, for example, into a quaver-crotchet-quaver sequence.
I can see what you say about doing all entry with the keypad and computer keyboard - but it does also mean that there is no point in trying to use a MIDI keyboard with MuseScore at all. Which, it seems to me, would be a pretty serious deficiency in a notation program for musicians (at least for those can play & have or can get a MIDI keyboard). I suppose, at the moment, I'm just finding it hard to believe that this can be the way it is, given that the ability to use a MIDI keyboard with the program has been put in as an option.
In reply to Thanks. I have tried this by dormouse_
If you want a quaver-crotchet-quaver sequence, you should enter it right the first time and not crotchets. If not then, you just need to enter it again.
The current MIDI input method can save you time by choosing the right octave and by entering chords (several notes at the same time). If you don't use a midi keyboard, then you need to use Shift + notename to enter the chords, and Ctrl + Up/down to go from one octave to the other.
In one of the next version, you'll be able to program keys of your MIDI keyboard to change the duration directly from the MIDI keyboard without having to go from the computer keyboard to the MIDI keyboard.
In reply to If you want a by [DELETED] 5
dormouse, I have input much music into MuseScore with my Midi keyboard now, and it is very useful if understood and used correctly.
Say for example, I want to input a C scale, alternating quarter notes and eighth notes (crotchets and quavers). What I do is have my right hand at my piano keyboard, my left hand at my computer keyboard, hovering over the '4' and '5' keys. Note entry mode. Left hand presses 5, right hand plays C, left hand presses 4, right hand plays D, left hand presses 5, right hand plays E, left hand presses 4...
You get the idea. Once you start to think about the music as length first, Then pitch, the process actually moves quickly.
The main benefit I find is that I can also input chords super-easy with the midi keyboard, rather than one note at a time, which is what you have to do without it.
And lasconic, that sounds awesome, I'm looking forward to it!
In reply to dormouse, I have input much by ceegers
Thank you lasconic and ceegers for the information on the current limits of MuseScore and the best way of using a MIDI keyboard for inputting.
Getting the duration of each note right first time, is practicable for simple transcription, but not so good for composing or arranging or rearranging where thoughts may be fluid and still in the process of developing. Usability requires that duration be as easily changed as pitch however the original entry was made. One possibility would be to have an option to switch off the function that 'full' for the duration of editing and having it parse the whole score at the end.
To get back to the MIDI keyboard, my ideal would be to use both hands to play and for the program to score both duration and pitch from that. I would note that if my suggestion above were possible, then errors arising from this would not really be problematic since correction would be straightforward. It might also be possible for accuracy in this to be tweaked for each individual, either using a metronome setting or by using a simple training piece.
These are just ideas about what I would like to see for my own usage, but appreciate they may not fit in with the developers' vision. I thank everyone again who answered me as the answers allow me to be clear about what I can, and cannot, use MuseScore for at present and look forward to seeing how it goes in the future.
And, thinking about it, I'm not sure how much of an issue it will be for me personally. After all, I can just play the MIDI keyboard into a DAW and then export the result as a MIDI file into MuseScore. Not the most obvious route, but might work if I get the durations right in the playing.
In reply to Thank you lasconic and by dormouse_
My late wife was a Harpsichord and organ player. You know that for such instruments you have to move the fingers down or up very precisely. I'm also able to do that, but slower than she did.
However there was always (we used a software allowing to size the music this way) some errors which were very boring to correct.
So we stopped using this way, and turned to the dissociated method using both keyboards, the Midi and the computer ones.
In fact I don't know people who use the direct entry of rhythm and notes from a MIDI.
If there are some such people, it would be nice to have their report on how they succeeded to achieve that.
In reply to it's much more difficult than it seems by robert leleu
Thanks for the feedback.
For me, the big issue is the ease of editing rather than the inputting from a MIDI keyboard.
But it would be nice to have the option of trying it out. I'm pretty certain I would find it faster and easier to do the entry from a MIDI keyboard and then go through to the corrections - even if I had to change the duration of every note - than if I have to use the two keyboards for entry. But then, I'm happy to write/dictate and change/correct later and don't find correction per se more boring or difficult than initial inputting.
I'm aware that most of the commercial programs appear to have this facility, so, when I have time, I think I'll try them out and measure the results.
In reply to It is not necessary to use by David Bolton
Re the ease of changing note duration and the reference to note entry in the docs: Bear in mind that keyboard navigation keys behave differently in the different modes....
In note entry mode, pressing a number, e.g., 3, changes the note duration for the next note you enter, e.g., C. But in "not note entry" mode, pressing a number changes the note duration of the existing/highlighted note.
Worse, the latter is destructive, in that if you lengthen a note in a measure, notes will be deleted to "make space" - but if one is adjusting a piece, one may wish to lengthen some and delete others.
Likewise, R and Q are useful in note entry for repeating notes and changing their lengths, but do nothing in not-note-entry mode.
MuseScore needs a "let the user write" mode with a warning flag that indicates that time has been violated - let me violate time all I want, warn me about that, and I will fix it up as I go.
Sorry for this bit of threadnomancy, but I agree with all above who find this tedious and annoying. In fact, I cannot think of a single circumstance where this would be the desired behaviour. It's quite common to accidentally enter a note of the wrong duration and have to go back and fix it; forcing the user to rewrite the entire bar is ridiculous. It makes using this program a frustrating ordeal.
In reply to I think this needs to be fixed by TheBigH
Does anyone know how Sibelius handles this? It is generally considered the leader in ease-of-use among world-class scoring applications, and I know its basic note input method is the similar to MuseScore's. Do they have a mechanism to do this aside from copy & paste, or is it just that this ends up turning into a minor deal once you get used to it? For me, coming to MuseScore from Finale, it's been the latter mostly. It freaked me out for a couple of days, then I got into the flow of it. But I could still imagine a command to change the value of a note, shift everything left, and either extend the last note or add a rest there - basically, exactly what copy/paste already does, but easier to use.
In reply to Does anyone know how Sibelius by Marc Sabatella
Marc, Sibelius works the same way as MuseScore.
In reply to Does anyone know how Sibelius by Marc Sabatella
IIRC, Finale deals with duration changes by adding/removing rests from the end of the measure. If you need to temporarily add more notes than a measure can support (like with making triplets in Finale), you'd uncheck the "ensure bars are the right length" checkbox.
In reply to I think this needs to be fixed by TheBigH
TheBigH, Can you describe a situation when you might make this kind of mistake? Are you composing an original song? Are you copying from a manuscript? When do you notice your mistake? (After you finished the piece? Immediately? Or once you finished a measure?) How often does this happen for you?
In reply to TheBigH, Can you describe a by David Bolton
I am copying from a manuscript, and I usually enter one or two measures at a time. I see things have gone wrong when the first note of the next measure looks like a mass of hemisemiquavers tied across a bar line.
There are two major situations where this happens. The first is when I have a lot of semiquavers with one quaver in the middle, and I simply don't spot the difference. The second is when I put in what I think is a dotted note and it later turns out not to be- sometimes the dotted note toggle "sticks" and other times it doesn't- and sometimes you can't actually tell if a note is dotted because a quaver flag obscures the dot.
In reply to TheBigH, Can you describe a by David Bolton
I'm not TheBigH, but I can tell you how it's happened in my limited use so far. I'm copying from an old printed edition. Due to the unavoidable complexity of entering notes, I'm usually looking at the keyboard and not the screen. Thus if I forget one note, I may enter several before I notice, enough that it would be very useful to be able to just shift them. If the first eighth note is a rest, I'm likely to forget it. I also might forget to shift when entering an additional note.
I could see something like a "shift right" or "shift left" applied to a selection. This would mostly be just a shortcut for cut and paste.
I can see the potential complications of an unrestricted shift left/right, whether by explicit command or by changing the value of a note or inserting or deleting a note. How much do you shift? Only the current measure? The rest of the piece? It may not matter when entering at the end of current data, but if you are entering in the middle of an already-notated piece, shifting all the way to the end could be a terrible choice. Do you shift only the current voice, all voices on the staff or part, or all parts?
That's why I'm thinking the best way might be "shift selection". Select exactly what needs changing and command the shift. For a shift right, the right end of the selection would be lost, the amount lost being the amount of the shift. Similarly for shift left. But if the material being shifted is long or complex, this would be a real gain. It's still probably only a shortcut for cut and paste, but shortcuts have value. And if it's really just such a shortcut, the implementation might be relatively easy.
Edward
In reply to I'm not TheBigH, but I can by paleolith
When I used Finale, one of the features they had was the smart selection. This allowed you to select some notes and then move them around. I don't recall the specifics of it, but I remember it being similar to your shift note idea
This is the number one problem preventing me from using MuseScore. I had a go using it to lay out arrangements a while ago and I found the current behavior extremely unintuitive.
Note entry is quite fiddly and so I attempted a workflow something like this:
- Use a MIDI keyboard to transcribe the melody using quavers.
- Go back through the just entered line assigning the correct duration to the notes.
However because changing the duration of a note does not move subsequent notes step two was impossible. I ended up having to continually swap between 'enter pitch' and 'enter duration' user interactions when building a single line, which was tedious and meant the whole task took longer than it would have otherwise.
I found it incredibly frustrating that making a note longer would delete subsequent notes - in my mind, changing the duration of a note should only affect that single note.
Please consider changing the behavior or adding a 'nondestructive' rhythm editing mode.
In reply to Editing should be nondestructive by edmundm
that one would notate only pitches and not durations. It seems counter intuitive to me, as rhythm is such an important part of music.I find it much easier to take the time to change the durations as I need them. I am sure if you do this you will greatly relieve your frustration.
As to an edit only affecting the duration of that note, the problems that would arise include having an improper number of beats in that bar. How would the program understand want you want kept and what you don't, what "beats" would be in the correct place and which ones wouldn't?
Regards,
In reply to Editing should be nondestructive by edmundm
I would agree it's your choice to enter pitches first and then rhythms that is the source of your frustration. That just isn't how MuseSdore is intended to be used. The note entry actually works extremely well when used as intended. It takes a minute to get used to, especially if you are coming from Finale, which does it differently. But once you get the hang of it, it is very simple. And even though I said Finale is different, it too would not work well the way you are trying to do it. No program I know of works that way. And for good reason - it would actually be quite awkward if editing one note caused the time position of all subseqyent notes to move.
In reply to Editing should be nondestructive by edmundm
As Marc says, that's just not how MuseScore works. I think Xavier partly misunderstands edmundm's comment: the idea isn't to "notate only pitches" but to separate the entry, using a MIDI keyboard to enter pitches (a very good and efficient method) but switching to typing keyboard and/or mouse to enter durations, for which the MIDI keyboard is problematic. This makes sense to me.
In MuseScore's model the core element is the time interval; notes are secondary. But often we think of notes as primary objects that we want to manipulate to fit them to the time intervals. In an earlier post I pointed out some of the pitfalls of asking simply to shift/insert/delete or change the duration of a note. But I think now, as I said then, that applying changes only within a selection could provide most of the desired capability. In the usage approach which edmundm describes, this would work as follows: 1) enter notes from MIDI, 2) select the passage entered, 3) go into "note duration editing" mode, in which changing the duration of a note would shift following notes within the selection. This would include moving notes to another measure, adding rests at the end of the selection, and discarding notes from the end of the selection, depending on how the durations are edited.
This would enable the user to concentrate on establishing the correct note durations before returning to normal edit mode.
Edward
I agree with the original poster, though it's good to know about the ability to insert a measure and copy/paste - I'll have to try that. In my case, it has nothing to do with using a midi keyboard to enter notes. I'm using the mouse and/or the computer keyboard. But what I'm doing is working from several different audio recordings (actually, they are videos - one is on YouTube, and one is a QuickTime .mov file) of a piece of music that I want to sing - the recordings are of a piece of liturgical music that is essentially folk music - the themes are familiar, but everyone who sings it does it slightly differently, with different rhythms and embellishments. I am trying to reconcile several different renditions into one that I can practice and perform. Once I get the elements into the computer, I want to print out sheet music that I can take to the piano and practice with.
I'm not a professional musician. I don't sight read vocal music very well - neither the rhythm nor the pitch - so I make LOTS of mistakes entering the notes, and this is compounded by changing my mind about the embellishments. So I, too, wanted to adopt the strategy of first putting in the pitches, and then applying a suitable rhythm. It's proving difficult, and I keep on accidentally changing things I don't mean to change. The other trial software I've gone through is more cumbersome than musescore, though, so I'm going to stick with it.
Rebeccah
In reply to I second the desire to enter pitch and rhythm separately by Rebeccah
Yes, Rebeccah, I've suggested the same thing with respect to MIDI keyboard entry. With MIDI, it's easy to capture accurate pitch data, but near impossible to get the durations. It would be especially good for chords, play a chord, get all the notes at once.... So, my suggestion was a two step process in a separate program. One pass would capture the pitches, then you'd go back over the "piano roll" type data from beginning to end assigning durations.
Perhaps it would be possible to extend that thinking to a new editing mode. What you'd do is select a few measures, and discard all the pitches, converting back to "piano roll" data. Then re-do the durations only.
-- J.S.
In reply to Yes, Rebeccah, I've suggested by John Sprung
Actually, pitch is tough with MIDI too, because the program has to guess about enharmonics, and is prettymuch guaranteed to guess wrong a lot. Rea time MIDI entry is indeed tough with respect to rhythm, but of course not so for step time, which is all MuseScore supports, anyhow.
FWIW, I normally would expect to want to work out the rhythms with pencil and paper first when transcribing, and not just with MuseScore - that's pretty much true with Finale, Sibelius, and all other programs I've used as well. At least, for anything but very simple rhythms. And that's coming from someone who is pretty experienced at this. That would certainly be my recommendation for anyone less experienced as well.
In reply to Actually, pitch is tough with by Marc Sabatella
pencil and paper. Great.
In reply to Yes, Rebeccah, I've suggested by John Sprung
This was a one-off need. I ended up doing without notation software altogether, because it was just too much of a Pain in the You-Know-What. I learned most of one version of my musical piece from sitting at the piano with a printed score. Then I listened to two other versions (one on YouTube, one on the Dartmouth Jewish Sound Archive) that came closest to how I wanted to perform the piece - over and over and over again I listened to them. Then I just sang along to one of them until I had most of it pretty well down, and then I went to the other one, found the sections that I liked better there, and worked them in. Finally, I went back to the piano to see if I could find a better key to sing it in.
All along, the key point for me in using all these references was to get well-defined relative PITCH for some of the key elements and for many of the embellishments. It would have been nice to have a tool to help me record what I discovered about the pitch from each reference, so that I could combine them into one document to practice from, but it just didn't work out that way. The rhythm was never really an issue - it just kept getting in the way of scoring the music.
Perhaps I was asking too much from a tool of this nature.
Rebeccah
As I describe in http://musescore.org/en/node/13120, I try to convert MIDI files into scores. In this scenario, I have no influence on note duration during input. If I choose quavers beforehand, the MIDI stream will produce all quavers. So I, too, am looking for a method of arbitrarily changing the duration of a note.
I would suggest there to be a special editing mode that allows for this. There seem to be quite a lot of people that want to work this way, for various reasons.
I found it hepful to define a very long measure beforehand. (63/2 seems to be the longest you can achieve.) Thereby you can at least avoid the bars. Changing from left to right helps, as long a you do not shorten a note and pauses get inserted. So you should probably use the shortest possible note in the composition, say semiquavers, to avoid this.