New Element in inspector for making selected elements cue sized
It would be really great to have a straightforward "one click" button to make selected passage a cue size (small size).
And by that I mean all elements in the range selection: notes, rests, slurs, dynamics and hairpins etc.
Right now it can only be achieved by ctrl selection notes, rests, and other elements separately, while slurs and ties cannot be made small at all looks like.
So I attach a screen shot with a range selection and drawn red box in inspector to demonstrate what I mean.
Use cases:
- all scenarios, where you want to give players a cue in their part, but the cue is not just few notes, but a fragment of music, which may include notes, rests, slurs, ties, hairpins, dynamics etc. at the same time
Thank you
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Comments
A better system for cues is definitely being looked at for MuseScore 4 and beyond. Ideally, there should be a way to simply select a range on the source staff and have this linked to the destination staff, so change in the source automatically reflect on the destination, plus of course everything should be small and silent, and also, the cue notes should optionally not show in the score, only in the parts. This is another fairly major design job to get right, so further input is definitely appreciated.
Meanwhile, someone could probably write a plugin to just handle the "make small" part, except as you note, not all elements support it.
In reply to A better system for cues is… by Marc Sabatella
Wow... that sound interesting, I've never used anything like that. Could be quite useful if done slick and simple enough. Is there any references already?
It looks to me though, that not all scenarios could be covered by such design.
There are several cases, where I have been simply using small sized music material (cue-SIZED) without the "source staff" as such.
- in piano music, or violin solo pieces or similar: those virtuosic ad lib. cadenzas where you can have quite long and diverse passages with all kinds of elements including rests, slurs and ties.
- Drum parts: in jazz charts it's not always practical to have exact drum notation and can be quite difficult for both - composer and player. While just slash notation is not sufficient. I would write sometimes two voices - one with x-heads (lower voice) to indicate kicks, and the upper voice to indicate the shape of the melodies. However I would not copy the melodies literally, since the intervals become too wide to fit in the staff and would clash with lower voice. So i would just indicate the shape of the melody, since actual pitches are irrelevant for the drummers. The result the upper cue melodies would be cue sized, but not real copies of the original melodies.
"except as you note, not all elements support it."
So that's the question
Would there be a way to make all elements small at once including rests and slurs/ties with some kind of plugin?
In reply to Wow... that sound… by antonjazzsax
Nothing even remotely concrete yet, just initial discussions. MuseScore 4 is shaping up to be a big project, probably more significant a difference than from 1 to 2 or 2 to 3.
Anyhow, yes, the idea of being able to make things small even though they are not literally cues is important, so hopefully that would be part of the design. Clearly, doing cues right means making all markings small, that means the internal support would need to be there, so presumably it would be exposed in the Inspector.
One thing that is pretty much already a given - the Inspector will most likely allow one to make more changes to non-homogenous selections. Meaning, with a range selected, you won't see just the five buttons you currently do, but you'd have access to a much wider range of settings. The initial PR for the new inspector was actually just posted a few minutes ago as I write this, and it includes screenshots so you can get an idea of the kinds of things you can expect (not any time soon, mind you - MuseScore 4 is , as I said, shaping up to be a big project).
To get a preview of what this new Inspector may look like, see:
https://github.com/musescore/MuseScore/pull/6149
In reply to Nothing even remotely… by Marc Sabatella
Huh, looks like "cue size" is already part of the general section, so that much looks like a done deal:
In reply to Huh, looks like "cue size"… by Marc Sabatella
That's a good news, and precisely to this moment :))
In reply to Huh, looks like "cue size"… by Marc Sabatella
That is good news indeed.