new user needs help with concert pitch
Hello
My son plays in school band. I have a piece Carmen Suite No. 1 in base clef and when I put it into Musescore as a tuba piece, 3/4 and no key and I click concert pitch, nothing happens.
We have had great success with another piece a few weeks ago so I must be doing something wrong.
It seems I am missing something. I have changed time signatures and key signatures and still nothing happens when I hit concert pitch.
Thanks for the help.
Comments
Tuba is not a transposing intrument, or is it?
See also https://musescore.org/en/node/103521
The concert pitch button will only change the display of instruments that aren't in concert pitch already. Tuba is almost universally a concert pitch instrument.
In reply to The concert pitch button will by Isaac Weiss
I play Tuba for many years and never played this a concert pitched instrument yet. Most of the time it is B-flat or E-flat. Concert pitch does exist though and also F.
So guess previous, when it was working fine, a transposing instrument was selected and now a non-transposing was selected.
In reply to I play Tuba for many years by Henk De Groot
There are basically three situations where tuba is treated as transposing:
1) music published specifically for an educational market where the low brass players are often converted trumpet players
2) British-style brass bands
3) certain Eastern European countries where, I gather, the tuba is part of the folk tradition
In pretty much all other situations, though, tuba is notated in concert pitch, regardless of the actual pitch of the instrument. Meaning, indeed, tuba players have to learn to transpose in their heads, or else learn the fingerings for Bb tuba as different from Eb etc.
I have to disagree with you on this Marc. In Netherlands and the tuba is written in instrument pitch, not in concert pitch and when I order music from Belgium I also get the tuba in instrument pitch.
So perhaps it is not just eastern european but most European countries.
It is more common though these days that the tuba part is also provided in concert pitch part but this mainly happens when getting music from US oriented publishers.
Glad I don't have to transpose on the fly while playing.
In reply to I have to disagree with you by Henk De Groot
I don't think it is "most" European countries. In fact, according to https://vsl.co.at/en/Contrabass_tuba/Notation, it really is just the Netherlands, Belgium, and France that do it the way you are accustomed to (with Switzerland using the British brass band convention - transposing but also using treble clef). I have found other references that corroborate this list.
In any case, it's a small minority of music worldwide. Which is why the defaults are what they are, but if you want to treat tuba as transposing in your music, you can use Staff Properties to do so.
In reply to I don't think it is "most" by Marc Sabatella
Thank you for the extra information, never knew this.
Just noticed something else now, the full instrument list contains Tuba in B-flat using treble clef and one using bass clef as well. When I add these, there is a difference in the key being used (when not displayed in concert pitched). Isn't that strange? Also when these are displayed in concert pitch, the treble clef reverts back to a bass clef. I would not expect the "concert pitch" function to have an effect on the clef being used, would you?
In reply to Thank you for the extra by Henk De Groot
The norm for most of the world is for Bb tuba to be notated in bass clef in concert pitch. The British brass band tradition uses treble clef and transposes up a second (plus two octaves). That is just how music is written for British brass bands. And for pretty much any Bb instrument - not just tuba but also clarinet, trumpet, etc - when transposing up a second, one normally adjusts the key as well. That is pretty much universally how music for transposing instrmuents is written, assuming it uses key signatures at all.
It is normal and good that MuseScore allows separate clefs to be used for concert pitch on versus off. For instruments that transpose by more than octave and display in treble clef (like tuba in British brass bands, also baritone saxophone and a handful of other instruments), it is very convenient to use bass clef while in concert pitch mode. If MuseScore forced you to use treble clef in concert pitch mode, there would be tons of ledger lines, because most notes for these instruments are way below middle C. That is why MuseScore allows you to have different clefs for concert pitch on versus off.
In reply to The norm for most of the by Marc Sabatella
Thank you for the detailed explanation. Clear to me know why it works like this.