Shaped notes
Hello everyone,
I ran across this software recently and thought I would try it before I bite for buying Finale. One question though, is there anyway to use "shaped" notes, like is used in some gospel sheet music? I see that the symbols are all there, but is there anyway to automatically use this when entering notes, or do I have to go back and manually change all the shapes of the notes?
Lester
Comments
"I would try it before I bite for buying Finale"
I'm assuming you want all the notes of a particular line to be a triangle note head, or "x" note head, or some other shape? If so:
If want to change the note heads on any part other than a percussion part, you can put the notes in as usual. After entering the notes, click on the first note, go to the end of the music, and shift-click on the last note of the line, which will put a blue box around that line. Go to the "Note Heads" palette, and double-click on the note head that you want, and all the notes of that part will be changed (the rests will not). If you want to do a whole score with one specific note head, then you can put in all the parts, do a select all, and double-click on the note head you want. You can also have multiple types of note heads on one line by selecting part of the line and double-clicking the note head. The only exception is...
If you making a percussion part, you can only have one kind of note head, it can only be the whole line or none of the line, and "cross, diamond, or triangle" are your only options. To change note heads on a percussion part, you have to right-click in the empty part of a measure, choose "Staff Properties", at the bottom of the window click "Edit Drumset", scroll down until you find the pitch with the drum's name, select it, and change the note head in the upper right-hand corner. Again, only three choices, and it changes it for every note on that part.
It's not hard at all unless you're doing a percussion part, in which case it gets a little more complicated.
In reply to I'm assuming.... by newsome
That's exactly what I was after. That will work great. I'll try it out tonight. Thanks.
In reply to I'm assuming.... by newsome
Newsome: Unless I'm reading something wrong in your post, what you're suggesting won't work. Your method simply changes all round note heads to another shape. Shaped note singing means all DO notes are one shape, RE notes are another, etc. Unless you can select all DO notes only and change their shape, then RE and so on, I don't see a quick way to do this.
In reply to Shaped note heads by schepers
schepers: For what you want, there is a way to do it, but it's not exactly "quick." (although it's faster than one note at a time). You can select the first DO note, then hold shift and click the next DO note (both will be blue). Continue shift-clicking them until you have some/all selected, and double-click the note head you want. I sometimes do a half dozen notes or so then double click the note head, because if you miss one along the way, all of them will become unselected, and you'll have to start over. Then repeat for the RE notes, etc.
In reply to Not quick, but... by newsome
I think you mean control and click?
Regards,
In reply to I think by xavierjazz
Yeah, control-click. Sorry about that.
In reply to Not quick, but... by newsome
Well, this shaped notes thing isn't something I need to do, I just wanted to make sure it was understood what the requestor was looking for. The problem with changing the standard notehead to a shaped note is if you need to make changes to the note pitch... the note head won't change to the correct one and you have to remember to make a manual change again.
In reply to I'm assuming.... by newsome
"Go to the "Note Heads" palette, and double-click on the note head that you want, and all the notes of that part will be changed (the rests will not)."
I'm using 1.2, double-clicked on the diamond head and got a strange-looking diamond. The diamond is quite common in jazz for rhythm notation. It might just be a matter of making it bigger. Have people gotten the diamond to look good?
In reply to Good-looking diamond heads? by dfrankow
When you say rhythm notation, do you mean the thing the use of slash- and diamond note heads to indicate accompaniment rhythms? You should know there is a plugin that creates these automatically; no need for you to change noteheads manually. See this: http://musescore.org/en/project/slash. FWIW, I don't use diamond note head in this plugin; I simply use the slash note head, which automatically changes shape to a larger diamond (a hollow slash, really) when applied to a half note. So if for some reason you must create this notation manually rather than via the plugin, try the slash instead of the diamond. The diamond is more for indicating string harmonics and other sounds that are traditionally notated that way than for use in rhythm notation.
Also, you might want to check out tutorials I did on creating lead sheets. It seems likely they will answer a lot of other questions you might have: http://musescore.org/en/node/11723 and http://musescore.org/en/node/11726.
In reply to I'm assuming.... by newsome
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In reply to I'm assuming.... by newsome
This is a lifesaver. I couldn't read my drum notation with all the cymbals as crosses, I needed to squint at it to tell apart rides and hats, and that wasn't get me through section changes with my band! Fixed all of that thanks to this post.
Well thanks for all the comments. I'll try playing around with it and see how I make it out. I never thought of the fact that if you changed a note to a different pitch it would have the wrong shape. I think Finale is able to compensate for that. On the other hand, it might not be that big an issue...
Of course Finale isn't nearly as expensive as it used to be either.
LB
With MuseScore 1.1 release, a plugin to create shape note scores has been released. See http://musescore.org/en/project/shapenotes
In reply to With MuseScore 1.1 release, a by [DELETED] 5
Okay, I downloaded 1.1 and also the plugin. Seems to work great. Exactly what I was after...
In reply to Okay, I downloaded 1.1 and by Lesterbauman
If you still want to buy Finale, download the demo and try it first. I learned that is easier to learn to use MuseScore especially the editing and correcting parts. The new Shape Note plug-in makes note entry for MuseScore almost as easy as for Finale. You would probably have to buy Finale itself. I think Finale PrintMusic and below are inadequate. I haven't tried Finale Allegro. What you have downloaded free is now good enough that paying a minimum of $250 for Finale is no longer worth it unless you are a professional publisher and can afford to learn to use it. With patience and ingenuity, MuseScore output can be just as good.
I have reported a bug involving shared noteheads that existed before I started using the Shape Note plug-in. If your shape note heads for unison parts on a staff aren't shared properly, use the Shape Note plug-in to convert back to round notes, then use it again to convert back to the shape notes. The noteheads will be shared properly until something changes or you click on a note or press Ctrl+A, then you will have to repeat the process.
I use MuseScore to prepare music for a PowerPoint presentation in the Paperless Hymnal format. I have completed three songs so far. The last one was very complicated, but MuseScore could handle it. You can learn about the Paperless Hymnal here: //www.paperlesshymnal.com/ . They recommend Finale and have templates to use with it.
In reply to Shape notes by JaimeWJr
I don't think I'll bother with Finale. This is going to work fine for me.