Adding a key signature and not wanting accidentals added to preserve pitches
I've found multiple threads with the same issue I'm having as a new Musescore user, and I think few of the responses understand the issue.
For example, https://musescore.org/en/node/292852 and https://musescore.org/en/node/312081.
I'm attempting to transcribe a particular piece of music. I've already identified that it's in G major.
- I open MuseScore and fumble around trying to figure out how to enter notes. I enter the first few notes.
- I hit the play button to hear MuseScore play the few notes that have been entered.
- I discover one of the notes I intended to play as an F sharp - but without accidental, as I was thinking in G major - is playing as an F natural. Oops! I had been writing assuming a G major key signature, but had forgotten to enter it into MuseScore.
- I figure out how to add a key signature, but now my F has a natural accidental attached to it.
So it's incorrect, in this situation, to suggest transposing. I don't want to transpose at all. This is just like in paper, writing some music with a particular key signature in mind, but just forgetting to write down the key signature. In paper we can just add the key signature without a bunch of accidentals showing up to preserve the pitches of the notes we've already entered. I think it's unfortunate that MuseScore doesn't allow us to fix our mistakes this way when entering a new key signature; the only solutions I've seen involve manually removing the accidentals, which is error prone and can be tedious depending on the solution required.
Comments
By adding those naturals, MuseScore is quite correctly keeping your F notes at the same pitch (F natural) as they were before you added a key signature with the F#.
Here's how you can get round it. After adding your key signature for G major, you can do this:
1. Select the affected section which contains unwanted F naturals.
2. Right-click the first F natural note, choose Select > More... > Same note name
3. Press UpArrow once to move all the F naturals to F#.
In reply to By adding those naturals,… by DanielR
This is unfortunately quite tedious if the key signature added accidentals to a lot of different pitches, and if you already had accidentals of that note - it makes notes that were previously different pitches the same pitch.
This however is transposing, as MuseScore stores pitches. And changimg a key signature doesn't change pitches, only transposing does
The solution is in the first thread you linked to. Please hear me out, because it involves two separate transpositions.
1. From the "Tools" menu, choose "Transpose...". In the window that pops up, choose "To Key", "Closest", "G Major/E Minor". Click "OK".
2. Once again, from the "Tools" menu, choose "Transpose...". This time, choose "Transpose Diatonically", "Up", "Fourth", "Keep Degree Alterations". Click "OK".
In reply to The solution is in the first… by mattmcclinch
Hrm... I see, I'll have to test this. I went and took a look in the first thread I linked to - while I see that they mention it in several places, most directly here: https://musescore.org/en/node/292852#comment-937327 it's not laid out as clearly as you have here.
To be clear, it wasn't a big deal for me to fix this manually - I actually only had a single note that got messed up. I was just trying to learn for the future how to fix this in case I had more notes to fix, or to help other people who run into the same issue.
I'm not particularly proficient in music theory. Is there a simple explanation to derive this for any before/after set of key signatures?
In any case, I do think that it would be useful to have a tool like this more directly as a feature in MuseScore. I guess I should file a feature request somewhere else?
In reply to Hrm... I see, I'll have to… by grantwwu
It is quite simply, really. First transpose to the key of the key signature that you want to add. This adds the key signature for you. Then transpose diatonically the number of steps in the direction that would bring the melody back to where it supposed to be.