Duplets in Swing
(because I have OS X Leopard and cannot download 1.2, I don't know if this has been fixed... but putting this out there anyway)
When a file is set to swing, duplets should be straight. This is an important issue, because duplets are the only way for composers to indicate straight eights in a swung piece (besides creating text saying "Straight eights")
Comments
If you mean you press 5 and then ctrl-2, I huess I wouldn,t see you'd expect that to result in straight eighths. After all, there is no difference berween these except in appearance. Anyhow, no it doesn't wortk that way in 1.2, so there is no way to mix swing and straight eighths in the same piece.
I've given some thought to the matter lately, and I think the better solution is a plugin (or, eventually, a builtin facility) that adjusted the ontime offsets of notes on offbeats in a selected range, by a specified percentage. That way you could control the amount if swing as well as where it swings where it doesn't. Bonus of this approach - it would work regardless of your play panel settings. Once you applied the swing, it would play back on all systems the same way.
Unfortunately, the plugin architecture doesn't currently support fiddling with ontime offset, but I'm hoping that will be a simple modification.
In reply to If you mean you press 5 and by Marc Sabatella
Since swing playback is often link to a text. Would you not prefer something like tempo texts?
In reply to Since swing playback is often by [DELETED] 5
"when a file is set to swing"
Is there another way for that than the playback window?
Anyway I would also prefer to use duplets rather than text to indicate this.
But it is "just" a playback issue anyway.
In reply to Since swing playback is often by [DELETED] 5
Definitely, text would be the norm as far as indicating it to the player. I can't recall *ever* seeing duplets used for this purpose. And if someone really wanted to break with established convention and use duplets with no text, they could always create the duplets, add the text to set the playback, then hide the text.
So yes, I'd say if the facility were to be built-in rather than via a plugin, that's exactly how it should work. The tempo text properties should allow you to define a ratio. That would be extremely slick!
In reply to If you mean you press 5 and by Marc Sabatella
How do you play sexteenth notes in a swing tune? If your answer is "Straight" or "With swing feel in double tempo" then you can write straight eighths as tied sexteenths and MuseScore will play them straight!
In reply to Tied sexteenths do the work by StureL
Select all the notes to be played as straight eighths. Right-click, choose "Note Properties..." and set velocity type, ontime offfset type and offtime offfset type to "user" instead of auto.
In reply to Select all the notes to be by underquark
Thanks. I have been using the sixteenth note method for playback.
Still, I would expect MuseScore to play both the notes in a duplet evenly. Duplets are used mostly in compound time, but if you think about it, swing is, in a way, 12/8. So duplets should still be played evenly. I could use the ontime and offtime offset, but it would get pretty tiring going through and entire file to do that.
In reply to Thanks. I have been using the by musiclover007
Can you point to any published sheet music that uses duplets to mean straight eighths? Not saying it's a bad idea, but again, I certainly wouldn't *expect* it to work, since as far as I have seen in my not inconsiderable experience, it is *never* done that way. What I would expect to work is the method that published music actually uses - a text notation like "straight" or "even eighths". So lasconic's idea of a new type of tempo text seems right on the money to me.
In reply to Can you point to any by Marc Sabatella
I agree, tempo text for this would be great and I think they're working on this for 2.0? But my point is, a triplet is 3 equal notes. a quadruplet is 4 equal notes. So a duplet should be 2 equal notes, no?
In reply to I agree, tempo text for this by musiclover007
I think this is an interesting logic extension. In my experience, usually most people understand the feel needed, but this is a way to capture a real phenomenon in notation. I like it.
In reply to Can you point to any by Marc Sabatella
Maybe we could too have an "inegales" text for French Baroque music which applies swing to the notes instead of staright.
In reply to Maybe we could too have an by ChurchOrganist
Oh, I figure it has to "swing" both ways. That is, there might be default texts "swing" and "straight" in the Tempo Text palette, but just like the existing texts, you can edit both their appearance and their behavior.
It's also possible these would be a new form of text, similar to but separate from tempo text. I could see symbols like "rit" also being defined here: "tempo modifiers", we might call them.
As for duplets, again, I'm not saying there isn't so e logic to the discussion or that I would be opposed to that behavior. But really, you say duplets divide the beat i to two equal parts, and I say, yes, and that's *also* what ordinary eighths do. If swing affects one, why shouldn't it affect the other? Both notations *mean* exactly the same thing: divide this beat into two equal pieces. Swing is just a way of altering playback of those equal pieces, to make them a little less equal, but it is not at all obvious why one method of *writing* equally divided beats should result in a different playback than the other. Again, I'm not opposed to it, but this just isn't how it is done in published music. So regardless of how computer playback works, you need to consider what the marking might mean to the human musician who will ultimately play the music. And for that reason, I could hever recommend using duplets to indicate straight eighths, any more that I could recommend inventing any new notation for so ething that already has a universally known notation. The idea might make sense to you, but no one else will have ever seen it before, and there is no more chance that anyone else will interpret it the way you have invented than that MuseScore will,
In reply to Select all the notes to be by underquark
Thanks underquark for that solution (and the idea for a possible future plugin),
Unfortunately, I didn't manage to apply your solution. Do I have to set a specific offset?
The system automatically states values like 0 or -80 or -78, I don't understand how (and if the changes can apply I all the notes selected either).
Any tip welcome.
Thanks
S.
Tempo text would be ideal but until the next version I think it isn't too hard to select the notes and change the offsets. I suppose a plugin could be made to change the offset properties of selected notes AND insert 'Straight eighths' or similar text over the first note but how often would it be used?
In reply to Tempo text would be ideal but by underquark
Such a plugin would be great! And I guess it would be used maybe not often, but just as often as the users who felt this function was lacking really need it. So if someone with programming skills is up to it...
I'd add that all the other comments were really interestin; although it's true that duplets seem to never be used for 'straight' notes in printed swing music, that's to me the most natural way to write it, and seems so logical and clear also as a performer point of view.
Anyway the offset solution provided (when I succeed to apply it) would allow either staff text or duplets to be used, to provide notation the way the user wishes (standard or non-standard), and the correct playback. So the problem would be solved for all!
In reply to Tempo text would be ideal but by underquark
Such a plugin would be great! And I guess it would be used maybe not often, but just as often as the users who felt this function was lacking really need it. So if someone with programming skills is up to it...
I'd add that all the other comments were really interestin; although it's true that duplets seem to never be used for 'straight' notes in printed swing music, that's to me the most natural way to write it, and seems so logical and clear also as a performer point of view.
Anyway the offset solution provided (when I succeed to apply it) would allow either staff text or duplets to be used, to provide notation the way the user wishes (standard or non-standard), and the correct playback. So the problem would be solved for all!
In reply to Such a plugin would be great! by laconcombremasque
Unfortunately the plugin architecture does not currently support changing the offsets, so a plugin cannot be written. If there are no plans to add the "tempo text" version of swing, then I will see what I can do about adding support for offsets to the plugin architecture (or convincing someone else to do that part), and then I would be happy to write a plugin to support it. To me, the plugin wouldn't be just for overriding a specific passage to be staight instead of swing or vice versa - it is how I would do swing from now on, in all cases (at least intil the tempo text was implemented). The diea of having control over the *degree* of swing is what I am especially missing, as well as the ability to have it playback correctly each time the score is loaded, without having to rely on opening the play panel and changing to swing each time I open the file. Similar,y having it playback correctly on musescore.com.
So no, I don't think the plugin would be of limited usefulness at all! But it can't happen until support for offsets is added to the architecutre, and if thee are plans to implement the tempo text solution for 2.0, then the plugin might be moot.