A few historical questions about Linked staves

• Aug 4, 2021 - 22:01

1) Did Musescore's implementation of Linked staves predate Musescore's implementation of tablature? If so, what was the primary purpose of Linked staves prior to tablature. Linked staves largely mirror each other, except for certain properties like velocity properties which are not synced. This strikes me as quite odd, so there must be some significant purpose that escapes me.

2) Was it always intended that, on playback, the uppermost linked staff—as seen onscreen within an Instrument / or according to an Instrument's staff order in the Instrument panel—is the only linked staff that Musescore sounds?

3) Was there a point in Musescore's history where one could move a linked staff to the uppermost position and then—upon commenting playback—that staff only (along with its velocities and dynamics) would be heard. And was there ever a time that this could be accomplished without first needing to save and reopen the score?

My inquiry is related to a lengthy discussion involving a request for an option to sync velocities between linked staves—in particular, between a tablature staff and it's linked staff. But I launched this separate topic because I didn't want to further burden an already unwieldy discussion.

Please see the second b) comment in that post.

Thanks!

scorster

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• Aug 4, 2021 - 23:58

Hi, scorster,

You said:

"Was it always intended that, on playback, the uppermost linked staff—as seen onscreen within an Instrument / or according to an Instrument's staff order in the Instrument panel—is the only linked staff that Musescore sounds?"

Dunno about "always", or "intended", but that is not so here, today, with a regular notation staff and a linked tab staff (if we rely on the audible result of the velocities to tell one from the other).

We can observe that on the attached test score. There, it is the regular notation staff (here, the lower of the two) that seems to contribute the play velocities. Saving the score and reopening it (at least here) does not change that.

Doug

Attachment Size
Linked_velocities_3010.mscz 5.74 KB

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• Aug 5, 2021 - 03:44

Both linked staves and tablature were developed during the several years between release of MuseScore 1 & 2. Actually, work for both had begun before the release of MuseScore 1. But they both took years to get right, and the work overlapped considerably during those years.

I am not aware of any time in which anyone would have been foolish enough to try to make both linked staves playback. Clearly, one way or another, it's got to be only one. But the specifics of exactly how this was handled has developed over time, especially when one considers that the main purpose of the linked implementation has nothing whatsoever to do with tablature but is all about parts.

I can't recall if the bug causing save/reload to be needed after changing order has always existed or not, feel free to download older versions to test for yourself,

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• Aug 5, 2021 - 05:53

Marc Sabatella wrote >> * ... work for both [linked staves and tablature] had begun before the release of MuseScore 1. But they both took years to get right, and the work overlapped considerably during those years.*

Thanks for providing that history, Marc.

I'm still curious if anyone knows which came first. If it Linked staves existed before tablature what was the original driving impetus? Was it merely a logical and necessary foundation needed before implementing "live" tablature, where the standard staff and tablature update each other? Or was there another compelling for Linked standard staves? If so, can you enumerate any of the compelling reasons for linking standard staves?

Marc Sabatella wrote >> I am not aware of any time in which anyone would have been foolish enough to try to make both linked staves playback.

I'm not aware of anyone being that foolish either. Neither in this topic nor in the linked topic (on synced velocities) I'm sure no one has asked for that. I can see that it would seem preposterous if someone had!

Marc Sabatella wrote >> ... the main purpose of linked implementation has nothing whatsoever to do with tablature but is all about parts.

Ohhh! Thank you for that nugget!! I think you're saying that it was the development of Parts that led to the development of Linked staves. That makes sense!

But with a score format like Guitar + Tablature Musescore indeed relies on Linked staves. Granted, the "live" standardStaff/tabaltureStaff relationship may not have been the main purpose for creating Linked staves, nevertheless Linked staves provide the only way of creating a live configuration like Guitar + Tablature but it's certainly a "has nothing whatsoever to do with" relationship, right?

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• Aug 5, 2021 - 20:14

Again, neither came first, they were developed independently at the same time. The reason for developing the linking feature, as I said, was to support parts. It was presumably only later that someone realized the same facility could be leveraged to the tablature feature that was simultaneously in development. This would have happened at least three or four years before either feature was completed and released.

So again, the reason the linking feature was developed in the first place has literally nothing to do with tablature, But the reason it was gradually extended to also handle linked staves within a single score certainly had everything to do with tablature. if not for tablature, there would have been no reason to consider extending it that that way. maybe at some point years later someone might have proposed other reasons for it, but that's not how it happened.

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• Aug 5, 2021 - 20:56

I would be interested in hearing from any member who:

Working with a regular notation staff linked to a tab staff, "tweaks" the note velocities on the tab staff (only) to develop a version of the work that, if played, would have a "more human" sound than the basic version resulting from the notation (while keeping that basic version safely preserved in the regular notation staff).

When you do that, how do you "audition" what you have done so far in that regard? Or do you not need to hear it - you can just tell from what you did how it will sound?

Then, with your "humanized play" version perfected, and safely nestled in the tab staff, when it is time to have MuseScore play this humanized version, how do you do that?

Have you ever wished that you could do the same (change on the tab staff only) to the note start times and durations as a further "humanizing" enhancement?

Thanks.

Doug

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• Aug 6, 2021 - 03:56

Suppose (just for illustration) we have an instrument part with several linked staves, perhaps two or more regular notation staves and two or more tab staves. On play, which one contributes the note velocities that influence the MIDI velocities of the played notes?

• If there are any regular notation staves in the bunch, it is the uppermost of them.

• If there are only tab staves in the bunch, it it the uppermost of them.

Indeed, as noted recently, if we have rearranged the staves, the new situation per the above only comes into force when the score is saved and then re-loaded.

Doug

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• Aug 7, 2021 - 02:30

I am surprised that those scorists who draw upon MuseScore's "feature" that allows note velocities to be set differently on a linked tab staff from the associated regular notation staff, so as to be able to retain, in a score file, both a "humanized" and "straight" playable version of a score, have not been eager to see this "feature" extended to note play start times and play durations as well, these also being properties often "tweaked" in the interest of "humanization". But perhaps this has in fact been a feature request.

Doug

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• Aug 7, 2021 - 08:17

Jojo wrote >>: Which is not [at]l all about linked staves, but about (linked) parts, an entirely different beast.

Hi Jojo,

I'm unclear as to which comment(s) or post(s) you are referring.

Not surprisingly, with just a year of Musescore use under my belt, I'm not yet fully familiar with Musescore's full feature set, nor its history, or its internal workings. I apologize if I've misrepresented anything. My intent is to help support and improve musescore.

But I think you understand the issues I've commented on.

And regarding the lack of tablature velocity sync, that's a situation pertaining to Linked staves (as opposed to linked Parts.) Right?

scorster

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• Aug 7, 2021 - 08:36

For linked staves the velocity should clearly be synced, as the only purpose of linked staves is the display if the very same notation in a different format, normal staff and tablature.
For (linked) parts (internally called excerpts) it should not, being considered (some form of) layout rather than content. At least as long as there is no way to break or set such a syncing. Until that happenes we should stay on the conservative side.

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• Aug 7, 2021 - 09:13

Jojo wrote >> For linked staves the velocity should clearly be synced, as the only purpose of linked staves is the display [of] the very same notation in a different format, normal staff and tablature.

Ahhhh ...

I know you've touched on this before, but upon hearing your clear declaration here I've begun a sigh of relief that I expect to last the entire weekend!

That said, Musescore also allows linking a standard staff to another standard staff. Aside from providing an option to have a different layout on otherwise identical staves I'm unclear benefits allowed by this sort of linkage. Do you also think that "velocity should clearly be synced" in the all cases of linked standard staves? If not, will you please offer an example of a couple of widely wanted or justifiable exceptions?

Jojo wrote >> For parts [velocity] should not be synced [as it is] considered (some form of) layout rather than content. At least as long as there is no way to break or set such a syncing. Until that happens we should stay on the conservative side.

No one has yet convinced me of any real advantages for having phantom/zombie velocities in Parts. And yet the disadvantages are directly analogous to the unsynced phantom/zombie velocity issues in tablature—the very ones that you just acknowledged should indeed be synced.

Now regarding some semantics afoot in these discussions ...

I understand that Part velocity is not a component of the notation, but that fact does not allow me to conceptualize velcocity as an aspect of layout. So I wonder why you restated that velocity is "sort of" part of the layout. (Just because it doesn't fit under the umbrella of notational content ... it goes in the layout bucket?)

• With respect to audible playback velocity is indeed content.
• With respect to notation velocity is not content.
• With respect to layout velocity is not content ... except perhaps in terms of they way it is coded.

Thanks for your input on this, for your open mindedness, and your dedication to Musescore!!

scorster

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• Aug 7, 2021 - 10:34

Jojo wrote >> Linking two standard staves is IMHO entirely pointless and surely was not the intended use case when this got implemented

That's been my take on the situation, but I remained openminded and kept seeking for reasonable rationales.

It appears that standard-staff to standard-staff linking is configurable only because the Instrument dialog allows it. There would be no issue if the dialog disallowed the option. And I wouldn't think that such a change would be hard to implement.It's just important that it doesn't lock out users from options important to them—I just don't know what those could be.

Lastly, it would be helpful if the Musescore.org forum offered a built in polling feature to help realistically distinguish between common use cases and fringe scenarios. Is there a particular person managing the forum that could look into adding polls to Musescore.org?

I just setup a Google Docs poll for this purpose and may provide a link tomorrow. But I think it might be ideal to have poll setup as a musescore.org option.

Thanks again Jojo. It seems like we're getting somewhere.

scorster

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• Aug 7, 2021 - 16:44

Good "paste" example jm6stringer.

In your test score—post paste—Musescore initially populates both measures with the velocity values of the pasted measure.

Musescore could declare that the only proper paste method requires the selection of the both Linked staves, but such an edict would merely complicate every copy. And it flies in the face of the concept of Linked. (And the the issues would never arise with synced/updated Velocities; or where notes on Linked staves point to a shared velocity value. No problem either way.)

It's important to reiterate here that an uppermost positioning of a tablature staff has no bearing on playback ... that is, as long as a normal staff exists anywhere in the system. These situations can be difficult to understand due to odd underpinnings like that.

Thanks for your example. Here's a more extensive, hurriedly made test. (Hopefully I generated and labeled it correctly!) I'd be curious to see how it plays out when the tab staff is in the uppermost position.

Linked staff copy-paste.mscz

scorster

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• Aug 7, 2021 - 20:21

I had a quick look at your copy-paste example, but am wondering if your comments are instructions to be followed to paste existing measures into the empty ones to duplicate your results? Still trying to follow...

Anyway, here are some thoughts I have gleaned from this thread and your other one (getting hard to follow).
Perfect clarity seems elusive. Read on.

For example, you wrote above:
It's important to reiterate here that an uppermost positioning of a tablature staff has no bearing on playback...

OK, so:
People will edit velocity on the top staff, and get exactly what they want. For these literally does not matter in even the slightest bit if the velocities are linked or not.
(from: https://musescore.org/en/node/323448#comment-1090683)
Well, if the top staff is TAB, velocity adjustments are not honored at all. The bottom (standard) staff velocity must be adjusted to hear it in playback. Linkage is required.

To that I'll add...
...nor does changing the order...
OK, so:
Regarding changing the order of the staves - it is the top staff that controls the playback, but this determination is only made when the score is laoded, apparently. I'd call that a bug. In your example, after switching the order, try saving and reloading. Then you get the correct results.
(from: https://musescore.org/en/node/323448#comment-1090684)
--- nor saving and reloading. Correct results are unattainable.
.

Presently, with MuseScore being adopted by Tabbers, it's likely a user could open a single TAB staff score, enter notes + velocities, and then "link" a standard staff (e.g., to learn/practice reading "notes", or to give to a notation-centric fellow MuseScorer).
So, with TAB as the "top staff", any new, additional velocity tweaks are naively made there by the user, with the implicit trust that the new values will be passed to the "linked" standard staff -- just the way any changes to notes are passed.
If the error is not caught quickly enough, no amount of changing the staff order, saving/reloading will help.
Only removing the standard staff from the score via Instruments, then spawning a new standard staff will fix it. (Well, one could have re-entered all those tweaks on the bottom standard staff.)

So...
What’s lacking in this discussion—and what I’d find helpful—is a hypothetical scenario that illustrates any benefit in having independent velocities between the representation of a note on the regular notation staff and its counterpart on the linked tablature staff.
(from: https://musescore.org/en/node/323448#comment-1090499)

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• Aug 7, 2021 - 20:56

Jm6stringer wrote >>
In reply to Good "paste" example… by scorster

I had a quick look at your copy-paste example, but am wondering if your comments are instructions to be followed to paste existing measures into the empty ones to duplicate your results? Still trying to follow...

Thanks for taking a look a the score I submitted. The measures at the right margin show the results of pastes I performed. The pasted material come of measure one. Sorry if that was unclear.

scorster

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• Aug 7, 2021 - 21:49

Jm6stringer wrote >> Presently, with MuseScore being adopted by Tabbers, it's likely a user could open a single TAB staff score, enter notes + velocities ...

Agreed. I think the use of a solo tablature staff is a perfectly reasonable way of initially creating a tablature score, one clearly supported by Musescore, and the way it was before linked staves existed.

Jm6stringer wrote >> ... and then "link" a standard staff (e.g., to learn/practice reading "notes", or to give to a notation-centric fellow MuseScorer).

Also an entirely reasonable step, with no red flags in sight.

Jm6stringer wrote >> So, with TAB as the "top staff", any new, additional velocity tweaks are naively made there by the user, with the implicit trust that the new values will be passed to the "linked" standard staff -- just the way any changes to notes are passed. If the error is not caught quickly enough, no amount of changing the staff order, saving/reloading will help.

Exactly. When Musescore refers to staves as linked, and they behave as linked in obvious ways, and the documentation states "any change to the content in one will affect the other" the hapless user likely concludes velocities are synced. Why would he or she think otherwise?

Jm6stringer wrote >> Only removing the standard staff from the score via Instruments, then spawning a new standard staff will fix it. (Well, one could have re-entered all those tweaks on the bottom standard staff.)

We're in total agreement. Others think it's more import to allow options like an inaudible "humanizing" fringe use case. Others think it's safer to err (indeed!) on the side of unsynced.

Whereas you've described compelling common use cases which unfortunately lead to complications like the need to extract all standard staff from the score—and sadly, even it one resorted to that, reconstruction is not a s simple as adding a new linked standard staff. Layout matters are permanently lost on due to the staff deletion.

One again I vote for velocity sync—otherwise there are simple too many trip wires. And that means "humanizing" fringe be gone! There are other means for humanizing, and with those approaches one can audition the differences.

My 2,222 cents worth!

scorster

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• Aug 7, 2021 - 22:40

Hi, scorster,

You say:

"There are other means for humanizing, in with those approaches one can audition the differences."

Yes, indeed. If there is only a tab staff you can just do it on that, and audition it. If there is also a regular notation staff, you can do it on that, and audition it.

If you wish to preserve the "original" play version (presumably with the default velocities on all notes) for posterity, when the work is finished you can create a new part for the same instrument (no tab staff), Copy-Paste the notation (which will have the "humanized" velocities on it) onto it, then select that whole part, then use Inspector to set the velocities to the default, then hide that staff until some occasion on which you wish to have MuseScore play the work with the "default" velocities.

Doug

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• Aug 8, 2021 - 00:58

I think the ability to link two regular notation staves in the same part is mostly just "harmless".

And indeed it is always possible that somebody could solve some special problem one day with that. So good for them

There would be little point to blocking it. (We can do many things in MuseScore, or MS Word, or Photoshop, that are pointless.)

I only spoke of that possibility for thoroughness in reporting the findings of my tests on, given multiple linked staves in the same part, with potentially-differing sets of note velocities, which one, upon play, contributes the controlling note velocities.

Doug

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• Aug 8, 2021 - 03:13

Doug Kerr wrote >> *I think the ability to link two regular notation staves in the same part is mostly just "harmless"."

Interestingly "Harmless" is the original entry in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy for the planet Earth. Early in the first of the five book "trilogy", after he had lived on earth for a number of years, and in the face of Author Dent's protest about the brevity of the entry, Ford Prefect decided to double the entry's size to: "Mostly harmless."

If Douglass Adams had lived to write another book for the "trilogy" perhaps he'd have Ford or some other character update The Handbook yet again to Doug Kerr's: "Mostly just harmless."

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• Sep 19, 2021 - 08:43

Jojo wrote >> Linking two standard staves is IMHO entirely pointless and surely was not the intended use case when this got implemented

Glad to hear your opinion on this Jojo.

The linking of two standard staves stuck me as quite peculiar—when I realized it's possible in Musescore. I can't think of a use case for it.

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• Sep 19, 2021 - 08:54

Jojo wrote ..might make sense (but isn't possible currently as far as I can tell) is to have one staff in concert pitch and the other in sounding pitch. So far though this is a score/part wide setting, not a staff setting

That's quite an interesting idea! Particularly since the foundation/connection exists.

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• Sep 19, 2021 - 09:02

Say Jojo,

Regarding my message today 2021-09-17, I pressed reply to your August 7th message, but the forum failed to indent my message there; rather it placed my post at the bottom of the discussion.

I thought perhaps I hit the wrong "reply" button, so I "deleted" the post and tried again. Same result.

The frequently occurs when I reply (but interestingly, not always). Makes me wonder if something got goofy after a forum update.

And the result is likely confusing (particularly when people don't quote the post to which they're responding) because portions of the discussion become incomprehensible for their lack of context.

scorster

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• May 16, 2024 - 07:48

2.5 years later, in MuseScore Studio 4.3, linked staves still do not have linked note Velocity.

https://musescore.com/user/35880724/scores/16865902

In most situations this is of little consequence:

1) as of yet no one has voiced a use case for linking regular staves (the exception is to link a regular staff to a tablature staff)

2) MIDI velocity seems slated for replacement in MuseScore, to facilitate an upcoming playback improvement where individual note expression and dynamic "shelving" with dance better.

So where should velocity be synced between linked staves? Precisely in the case of a linked tablature staff.

As mention in detail above, the user should be able to edit velocity freely, on either the standard staff or its linked tablature staff, without the tablature velocity edits being utterly meaningless to playback and to integrity of the linked staves, which is probably the scorists intent.

Come to think of it, if linked tablature is the only reason for linked staves, then why not replace Add Linked Staff with Add Tablature Staff, which would open a tablature setup wizard that would house the entire score of tablature properties.

scorster

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