Notation questions
I am transcribing a set of 5- and 6-voice motets written in the style of Palestrina, for an urtext edition of the work. Two questions about the notation arise.
1. Note placement. One of the notational conventions used in my source (a Welker edition printed in early 1760s) is the use of a single whole note (semi-breve) placed directly on and STRADDLING the barline dividing two measures. The musical intent is clearly that half the time value of this note belongs to the first of the two measures, and half belongs to the second. (The time signature is 4:2, notated with a ¢, for which I had to create as a custom time signature in the Master Palette).
In the days of manually engraved music, this was not a problem; the engraver just centered his whole-note punch on the barline and smacked it with a hammer. But I don't know of any way to accomplish this straddled notation in MuseScore. If I enter a semi-breve on the last beat of the bar, the program automatically converts it to two minims (half-notes) tied across the barline, and nothing I know how to do can persuade it to print a whole note on that beat. I could, I suppose, manually change the meter of the measure to add an additional beat, but that would affect all the other voices in the system for that same measure, which would mess up the notation of those. And even if there were a way to avoid that, I would then have to move the barline backwards until it split the whole-note, by manually altering the horizontal offset with the Inspector. And then, of course, that barline wouldn't line up with the ones above and below it in the rest of the system.
Even if those problems could be worked out, it all strikes me as an awful lot of manual fiddling around to present what most people would consider a historical curiosity. Still, I'd like to be able to do it, if only to create a png image I could plug into the text commentary that accompanies the music in my editions. For an urtext edition, this sort of thing is often considered important to some interpreters. I'm wondering if someone has run into this before and solved the issue, or if there is a built-in method of accomplishing this that I have not yet discovered.
Question 2: Clefs. In music of this sort, notation for the upper voices was most often written in a variety of C-clefs--soprano, mezzo, alto, and tenor--to reduce the use of ledger-lines. As most musicians today don't read C-clefs very well, it is usual for modern editors (even when doing an urtext of the work) to transcribe all those clefs to the treble G-clef, and to show the original clef and the ambitus at the head of the first system.
The problem I'm having is that the program automatically places a full-sized C-clef at the head of the line, and then when I change to G-clef before starting the music, the program makes that clef small (the size of a courtesy clef). This is, unfortunately, the complete opposite of what I want to appear in print. Is there a way to control the size of the clef, or do I have to resort to creating png images in a separate score, and then plugging them into a frame at the beginning of the first system?
See the attached score. I've tried to make clear what I'm trying to do, but it's not easy.
Thanks.
(Edited to remove attached file--it didn't show what it was supposed to--and a third question which I resolved myself).
Comments
Heh. It really ISN'T easy to demonstrate this graphically. I just looked at the sample score I uploaded, and it does NOT show the straddled whole note I worked for 15 minutes to place on the barline. But the saved version of that sample score here in my computer DOES. Go figure.
I'll try to create a screen shot and ulpload that.
See what I did to you 1st issue
In reply to See what I did to you 1st by Jojo-Schmitz
Oops. If you meant you worked on that sample score I uploaded, I just deleted it--before I saw your comment.
Do you want me to upload it again?
In reply to Oops. If you meant you worked by Recorder485
No, I think I got it earlier ;-)
In reply to See what I did to you 1st by Jojo-Schmitz
Okay, ignore my previous post. I see what you did.
But that's the opposite of what I want to do. See the screenshot I attached to my second post. That (sloppy though it is, and full of additional problems) shows more or less what I'm trying to do.
In reply to Okay, ignore my previous by Recorder485
Hmm, I don't really sree where my example fails to do it then?
(I did update it somewhen in between though)
In reply to Hmm, I don't really sree by Jojo-Schmitz
You took that whole note and split it into two half notes tied across the barline, but then made them invisible.
I want to keep that whole note as a whole note, but place things so that the barline runs right through the center of it, leaving half of the whole note in one measure, and the other half in the next measure.
I know it's odd, but that's what I'm looking at in this 1762 source edition. Want me to scan that for you?
Never mind; I extracted a single page from the pdf of the original. Look at mm. 3-4 in the bass line; mm. 4-5 and 6-7 in the tenor line.
In reply to You took that whole note and by Recorder485
See the option "Style / General / Display note values across measure bar". You'll still have to manually move the note over to make it straddle the barline if you want that.
In reply to See the option "Style / by Marc Sabatella
I did think of that, and in fact before I tried to make that sample score I checked the box for 'Display note values across measure bar'. Unfortunately, it didn't allow me to enter more beats in a measure than were defined in the measure properties. Possibly I don't understand the use of that function properly...?
Has this experimental function been upgraded/improved in the latest version? I should mention that I'm still running 2.0.1 because I've just completed final proofing on a number of scores created and formatted using that version. Minor changes in the formatting, etc., that might accidentally occur while running a new version would mean all those scores and parts would have to be proof-read all over again. (For instance if the line breaks changed, any courtesy accidentals based on the original breaks would not necessarily be needed, or even make sense.)
In reply to I did think of that, and in by Recorder485
No, it should work the same in 2.0, 2.0.1, and 2.0.2. Try it again. See for example the attached score, in which the time signature is 4/4, but I have a half note and whole note in the first measure, with the whole note also taking the first two beats of the next measure.
In reply to No, it should work the same by Marc Sabatella
Now that's interesting. If I can reproduce that here, I can move the barline to the left into the whole note, then move the note and the barline together to the right again until they line up with the barlines above and below in the other parts. (If I try to move the note to the right by itself, the barline just moves to the right along with it.)
I'll try it again; hang on a bit...
...Yes, I got it to work. If I type in a whole note on beat 4, it prints in that measure. I can work from that, I think. I'll have to do a fair bit of manual fiddling around to get everything lined up, but this is a much cleaner solution than creating phantom voices or altering the number of beats in individual measures. Thanks a lot, Marc.
Would you happen to have an equally elegant solution to my problem of clef sizes? ;o)
In reply to Now that's interesting. If I by Recorder485
The barline moves a bit, but keep moving the note, it is perfectly possible to get the note over the barline. Also try playing with the "Trailing space" parameter in the Inspector.
As for clefs, I didn't really understand the problem. But you can add clefs from the Symbols palette ("Z") or add them as text using the Special Characters palette ("F2" while entering text).
In reply to The barline moves a bit, but by Marc Sabatella
The problem I'm having with the clefs is that I can't figure out how to control the SIZE of the clef. I'm getting full-sized clefs where I need small, 'courtesy'-sized ones, and vice-versa.
In music of this style, most of the voices were written in a variety of C-clefs that are rarely used today. Because few musicians can read C-clefs well, in modern editions of these works those voices are generally presented in treble clef, but for urtext or scholarly editions the original clef is shown at the beginning of the piece, followed by an ambitus, after which the modern clef is inserted and the music itself begins. Music publishers use a number of different graphic presentations for this; what I would like to do is shown in the snapshot below, but I would like the original clef, shown at the beginning of the first system, to be courtesy-clef size, and the subsequent modern clef to be full-sized. Unfortunately I can't figure out how to persuade MuseScore to do that. Is there a way that you know of to accomplish this?
In reply to The problem I'm having with by Recorder485
What I was suggesting is adding the clef you want smaller as text, using the F2 palette, then you can make it whatever size you want
I don't think you get it to look exactly like the original (the vertical line on the brieves are difficult to do, for a start). One way to approximate it is to create measures of 8/2, populate them with whole-bar rests in Voice1 (default) and half-bar rests in Voice 2 (so, create the first measure and then copy and paste it a few times) and then split them into 4/2 pieces. You still have to move those big notes manually, though - no apparent way around that.
In reply to I don't think you get it to by underquark
The visual presentation in your attachment is quite good enough to print as an illustration of the original notation in the text commentary, but I'm afraid the complexity of the process to obtain that result would be too time-consuming to produce the scores for this entire set.
And in any event, notation of that sort does tend to drive modern musicians a bit loopy (my son, who is a bit of a renaissance specialist, says it still drives him nuts). It's hard enough for most amateurs or students to deal with ordinary 4/2; I have even seen a modern British edition of one of these motets transcribed into 4/4 for that reason. I can't go that far in 'modernising' the score--not for an Urtext edition--but I can probably justify using standard tied notation for those words or syllables that hold over a bar if it's explained and illustrated in the critical report.
An interesting thing about this music is these motets were written in the style of Palestrina, but they were written in the early 1740s, over a hundred years after that style had been defined, during the last glory days of the High Baroque. Renaissance musicologists will point out that the phrasing in this music cannot be determined by the metre or measure divisions--no Lullian thump on the downbeat here!--but must be interpreted in consequence of the meaning of the text, so even instrumental transcriptions of these works should include the lyrics. At the highest level of performance, there is a potential theoretical difference in interpretation between a word or syllable sung on a whole note as opposed to one sung on two tied half-notes, but it is akin, in today's world, to the difference between a B-flat and an A-sharp. We retain those differences in pitch names because they give us information about the tonality of the whole piece; in a similar way, those 'straddled' semi-breves and breves give the singers/instrumentalists information about the phrasing, but it is more difficult to justify retaining that notation when so few performers are conversant with it.
Thanks.