Hide staff entirely
Hi,
I used to be make a staff entirely invisible (regardless of empty or not) in MuseScore 3. Is there any way to do this in MuseScore 4?
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Hi,
I used to be make a staff entirely invisible (regardless of empty or not) in MuseScore 3. Is there any way to do this in MuseScore 4?
Do you still have an unanswered question? Please log in first to post your question.
Comments
Yes, in the Instruments panel. In fact it's more powerful than before. You used to only be able to make the whole instrument invisible in MuseScore 3, not its staves individually. No you can do either. Note that hiding the full instrument now also mutes it, but hiding its staves does not.
In reply to Yes, in the Instruments… by Marc Sabatella
I have the same question but don't understand your answer. I am trying to play along by muting the main instrument while showing it's staves, and hiding but playing all other instruments. How do I hide the staves of the other instruments so they don't mute? When I expand the instruments and hide the underlying staves, they still mute.
This was very easy to do in version 3 and all of my music is set up for that. I was hoping that the music would simply open in version 4 the same way but that is not the case. I would love to see a global preference to decouple hiding an instrument from muting it.
Thanks!
--Dave
In reply to I have the same question but… by LeinerD
"How do I hide the staves of the other instruments so they don't mute? When I expand the instruments and hide the underlying staves, they still mute."
See:
https://musescore.org/en/node/338323#comment-1160480
In reply to "How do I hide the staves of… by cadiz1
Thanks for the link. I didn't find it when I searched.
Good to see others use Musescore as I do and have concerns about how the change complicates this use case. I haven't yet determined the final resolution in the long subsequent thread but hopefully an easier workaround will be included in a later version.
In reply to "How do I hide the staves of… by cadiz1
Ha! I finished reading the various threads related to your link and they were mind-numbing! Such a complicated discussion for a simple issue. The developers created the problem by conflating 2 independent attributes: hiding and muting. Apparently this was to solve a use case that didn't need solving since it was so easy to solo an instrument in the mixer. On the other hand, it created huge confusion and difficulties for people who needed the attributes kept separate. Unfortunately, it sounds like the next solution may even get more complicated as the desire to preserve the technical change becomes more entrenched. We'll see...
In the meantime, I'm going to stick with version 3 rather than go through hours of work to hide staves one by one.
Thanks again for pointing me in the right direction, cadiz1.
In reply to Ha! I finished reading the… by LeinerD
To be clear, the reason for connecting visibility and muting has nothing to do with the solo button; I think you are misunderstanding. It is to easily allow people to add and remove instruments from parts - which does generally mean connecting visibility and muting, since normally you expect only the visible instruments in a part to be audible.
Far from "a case that didn't need solving", this was a huge piece of missing functionality in previous versions, ones that caused a considerable amount of hardship for many users. So, it's great this is now possible for the first time - it's a very important step forward for score creation.
But, it is true that the case of people who might actually want to hear other instruments while viewing a part wasn't considered, since it isn't a common part of the score creation process. U gather it is something people do when using MsueScore more as a playalong tool. But it is obviously something that some users do want to do, so hopefully a better solution will be found.
Thus, understanding the actual use case - what you are trying to do for which hearing instruments you can't see makes sense. If it's literally just that you want to hear the entire score for playalong-along purposes, that is probably solved by a single button and is already proposed. but if you want to more independent control of which instruments display and which are are sounding, with some instruments displaying but not sounding and others sounding but not playing etc, best to add a comment to that issue thread and explain your unique use case so it can be considered in the design.
In reply to To be clear, the reason for… by Marc Sabatella
Marc, thanks so much for this clear explanation of the use case. You're right; I didn't understand. You're also right that I primarily use Musescore for playalong purposes and my issue could easily be solved with a single button that would make it even more convenient than version 3. Perhaps the button on the instrument section could both mute the instrument and also hide all others which I guess would link muting and visibility in my favor. :) However, if just hides the other instruments, only one additional task of bringing up the mixer to mute the instrument would be required.
I hesitate to add my comments to the issue thread I was reading since it's become so long and convoluted that I couldn't understand the other use case or current plans for a solution. I would be happy to post a suggestion if you could point me to a place to add it. Or, should I create a new thread?
BTW, another idea that for helping playalong would be to change the page in 2 steps when the music reaches the end of the page. First the top part of the new page would display and then the bottom part would change a measure or two later. In that way, the user can see what's coming next and not get caught by some unexpected sequence. I can create a new suggestion if this has not already been proposed. (I couldn't find it on a search)
Thanks again for your response and a great app!
--Dave
In reply to Marc, thanks so much for… by LeinerD
Great, I'm glad were understand each other better! And indeed, no need to add your comment because the specific use case you mention is one I already discuss in the thread and how a single button can solve it. The complication is solving all the other use cases people might have, and that's why so far there is no specific design agreed upon, but it will happen at some point, I'm sure.
Suggestions for controlling how the score scrolls during playback to facilitate playalong have already been made, so probably no need to open a new issue. But feel free to search the existing issues over on GitHub to see if you can find something similar and comment there if you have anything in particular to add. Just keep in mind, playalong really isn't the main purpose of MuseScore, so normally its features tend to be optimized for for how playback is used when creating scores than for when playing along to them, and things tend to be prioritized accordingly.
In reply to Great, I'm glad were… by Marc Sabatella
Cool! Looking forward to the change so I can start using the new version. Thanks again.
In reply to I have the same question but… by LeinerD
Oh, I tried again and realize now that the instruments initially mute when their staves are hidden, but pausing and restarting the playback unmutes them.
That said, this workaround is very cumbersome. It requires me to expand each instrument individually and then hide each of the instruments staves. At least in version 3 I only had to click the hide button for each instrument. It sure would be nice if there was some easy method to implement this common playback mode, like a command to show one instrument only while playing all other instruments.
In reply to Oh, I tried again and… by LeinerD
Indeed, it isn’t expected it will be this way forever. Design work is currently underway to find a better solution for this case. Other use cases got much simpler with the current design, but this one indeed got worse.
In reply to Indeed, it isn’t expected it… by Marc Sabatella
Sounds good! Thanks, Marc.