Lyric Alignment Preference

• Oct 12, 2010 - 20:22
Type
Functional
Severity
S5 - Suggestion
Status
closed
Project

Lyrics seem to centre slightly to the left of the note. Mostly that's fine. However, when setting hymns or songs with verses (or more than one language) each syllable may be a different length. In that case I prefer an option to align the first characters of the syllables:

Notre pere
Our Fa - ....... seems to be what we get now

Notre pere
Our Fa - ....... may be preferable

Glyndwr


Comments

Hello,
I would also really need this feature (left aligning). This is far easier for a chore, when for exemple on two staff text are different. So you can better see what is synchronized. The best would be to be able to switch between left aligning and center aligning.

Further this would allow me to solve partially the following kinde of issue with the lyrics I am writing for a chore. Usually, you have serveral verse (with a volta). The text start with the number (like 1. or 2.) and you get an ugly layout if you have center aligned lyrics for the first note.

Here an extrem example:

        9. Ô    no-tre pè-re
10. Prends pi-   ti-  é ......

instead of

9. Ô            no-tre pè-re
10. Prends pi-  ti- é......

Actually, the best would be to have a property (numbering verse), since the numbers (with the dot) should be right aligned and then the lyric itself should be left aligned. And actually, the note should then be aligned with the first syllab, not the number, Something like this:

  9. Ô          no-tre pè-re
10. Prends pi-  ti- é....

But maybe for the second point mentionned here, I should open a new feature request ?
Thanks an best regards

R 3659 has fixed text styles for lyrics. Its now possible to select center & left align.

It should be easy to implement a special right aligned text type for verse numbers but i have no good idea for a possible user interface.

Finale 2011 added a menu Lyrics -> Auto number->Verses, before that you need to enter a number and a space. See the feature announcement.
In Sibelius 5, it's a plugin. You select the measure where the lyrics starts and go to the plugin menu. A new text is added at the right place.
So, no UI here...

The first place to define and impose an overall preference would be under the Style menu.

However, it should also be an option when one has selected text and right clicked to adjust italics/bold and font size.

For example, if my general preference was for centred text, with left-aligned for the first word of each verse, I would define "centred" under the Style menu, and then select the small number of words requiring left-align. (Personally, I would not use this combination, but I can see that some may prefer the option.)

Glyndwr