Cross-staff/multi-voice arpeggios
There has been a lot of discussion about these issues over a couple years ( I did a search) but I don't see anyone actually saying it is going to be fixed. The only discussion seems to focus on workarounds. Everyone seems to agree this would be a great feature (cross-staff/multi-voice arpeggio), but the "powers-that-be" have not said if/when this feature will be implemented. Could someone please update us on if/when this feature will be implemented?
Thank you
Comments
See #312181: Need ability to extend arpeggios to other voices and staves and/or #65806: Allow correct playback of cross-staff/voice arpeggios
In reply to See #312181: Need ability to… by Jojo-Schmitz
Thank you Jojo, but again, there is discussion that this should be fixed, but no discussion on timeline to get it fixed. Also, I followed your hyperlink to the previous discussion that says you can extend arpeggio to the staff below by ctrl-shift-down arrow, but I can't get it to work.
In reply to Thank you Jojo, but again,… by odelphi231
There are the open issues for this, you may ask there.
As far as I can tell there is no timeline though.
In reply to Thank you Jojo, but again,… by odelphi231
If you're on a Mac, it might be Cmd instead of Ctrl. Also should work to simply drag. As mentioned in any recent (last few years) thread on workarounds, you'd have to disable autoplace for the apreggio to avoid it adding space between the staves.
If you continue to have trouble, please attach your score and describe precisely what you are doing, what you expect to see happen, and what happens instead. Then we can understand and assist better.
In reply to If you're on a Mac, it might… by Marc Sabatella
Thanks Marc. Yes, I can drag it to lengthen it, which is what I am doing. Mike's previous post seemed to suggest by doing ctrl-shift-down arrow, you can move the anchors to go cross-staff, which determines how the arpeggio sounds; however, that is not true. You can move the visual arpeggio symbol to be cross-staff but NOT the performance/sound to be cross-staff. You still need to do the ridiculous workaround with invisible notes on one staff. Also, faggetaboutit, when it comes to multi-voice arpeggio.
My post is only asking the timeline when this will be fixed - I am already aware of the workarounds. This issue has been discussed off and on for about 3-4 years but no one has come up with a timeline to fix.
In reply to Thanks Marc. Yes, I can… by odelphi231
If I gave the impression that ctrl+shift+down arrow ever affected playback that is a mistake. It's totally a notation option and only works with the same voice in both staves.
In reply to If I gave the impression… by mike320
Thanks Mike. No, I just put two and two together and got 5. My OP was about timeline to get arpeggio working cross-staff and multi-voice. JoJo responds by cross-referencing your post, so I obviously thought that YOUR post must be about getting arpeggio to work (sound) cross-staff. Your ctrl-shift-down arrow suggestion does not work for me (version 3.5.2) to extend the arpeggio element to cross-staff (I already know it doesn't sound cross-staff). Maybe I have some unique notation glitch, but your suggestion didn't work.
In reply to Thanks Mike. No, I just put… by odelphi231
The notes must be in the same voice (like voice 1 or voice 2) on their respective staves. And the ctrl isn't actually necessary. After I mentioned it I discovered shift down arrow works. Also, it must be a grand staff, it can't be two separate instruments. I didn't customize this shortcut so it is a MuseScore default.
In reply to The notes must be in the… by mike320
Also, you have to have the bottom handle selected when extending down in that way. You can actually see the anchor change. But there doesn't seem to be a corresponding way of extending an arpeggio up.
To be honest, I had no idea this Shift+Down was a thing, and I am not sure I trust it, but if you've tested it and there seem to be no ill effects from using it, great!
In reply to Also, you have to have the… by Marc Sabatella
Thanks. That is why it wasn't working with me. I didn't have bottom handle selected. The anchor does not change. In other words, when you do the Shift+down, it extends the arpeggio visually, but does not extend the anchors to the other staff to get true cross-staff arpeggio.
In reply to Thanks. That is why it wasn… by odelphi231
Actually, it does change the handle as far as I can tell, notice the arpeggio then follows that bottom note if you change its pitch, etc. So it is a "true cross-staff arpeggio" as far as the notation is concerned. The only thing that doesn't happen to work is the playback.
In reply to Actually, it does change the… by Marc Sabatella
OK, I think we are getting mixed up with semantics. In the arpeggio element, there are two "handles" at each end of the arpeggio - a red filled-box handle and a clear unfilled box handle. The unfilled box handle is used to adjust the length of the arpeggio visually. The red handles are used to tell Musescore what actual notes you wanna arpeggio. I am referring to the red handles do NOT move when you do shift+down arrow across a staff. So, yes, you are right moving the arpeggio with shift+down arrow doesn't work with the playback.
In reply to OK, I think we are getting… by odelphi231
It works fine for me.
In reply to It works fine for me. … by mike320
Ok. I followed your video and I was able to do the same thing starting in the treble staff and doing shift+down arrow to extend the arpeggio. However, (as you know) it plays as if the arpeggio didn't exist - all the notes in the bass and treble sound simultaneously, like a chord. However, if I put the arpeggio on the notes in the bass clef and manually drag the handle to the treble staff and do that weird workaround, then I get a true sounding arpeggio. Weird.
In reply to OK, I think we are getting… by odelphi231
See the image above, that is how it works for me too. I'm not sure when this capability was added, but it seems good in 3.5.2. And as mentioned, then if you change the pitch of the lowest note - say, dropping it an octave - the arpeggio definitely extends along with it. So absolutely, the handle definitely moved, the arpeggio definitely has the correct range. Only the playback doesn't work, and reproducing the full chord in another voice and making the full chord invisible provides a workaround.
In reply to Thanks Marc. Yes, I can… by odelphi231
Right, you never mentioned playback so I didn't realize that was a concern for you. You just said what you tried didn't work, so I assumed you meant you couldn't get the notation to display correctly as was simply trying to help you succeed.
As for timeline, we generally don't create timelines for individual features requests, that's just not how open source software works. Once enough people request a feature that one of the (mostly volunteer) developers feels it rises to their own personal threshold of "how hard it would be to implement" versus "how much value would it help", they'll get around to do it. Or, once a person who is personally bothered by the lack of this feature decides to join the development effort specifically to implementing it (which is how the cooler features in MuseScore came about). Either way, it's rare that anyone would announce their intentions more than a day or so before beginning the work, so you shouldn't be expecting to see any published timelines for this.