Cross staff Beaming on the Grand Staff without layering.

Cross staff Beaming on the Grand Staff without layering. – three examples

2006-02-19 04:04 pm

Here are three examples of how to achieve cross staff beaming on the Grand staff without using layering.
In all cases it is safer to make sure that the vertical spacing is the same for both staves and before you start and to make sure that you are satisfied with the distance between the staves. If you alter this distance after completing the cross staff beams, it will throw the placement out. The examples are using NWC version 2 but should also work in version 1.75.

[glow=red,2,300]Example a[/glow] is where there are alternating notes on each staff.

The trick here is to play around with the “Override stem length” attribute of a note such that the beams from the notes on the treble staff co-incide with the beams on the bass staff. Remembering that for any three notes beamed together (with rests in between), only the first and last notes need to be modified. Notes in the middle take care of themselves. You can change the default for the intervening rests to hide them. The easiest combination is for the beam to be horizontal but sloping beams can be achieved with a bit more work.

[glow=red,2,300]Example b[/glow] is where there are a number of notes on the treble clef beamed with a number of notes on the bass clef. and the beam moves from the treble to the bass clef.
In the example, notes e and e an octave lower on the treble clef are beamed to notes d and a on the bass clef. To get this to work, place four notes on the treble clef. Move the first two notes to the correct position. Move the second two notes to the bass clef. You will get leger lines running down in between the staves. Select the notes and go to note properties. Remove the leger lines. These two notes will not have the correct sound so at the same time as removing the leger lines, mute the notes. Now the trick is to repeat the same process on the bass staff. Except here, the notes that you move to the treble clef will need to be amended so that they have no leger lines and muted while the notes on the bass staff will not be muted. When played, these notes will now sound correct.

[glow=red,2,300]Example c[/glow] is where only one note is to be beamed from one staff and a number of notes are to be beamed from the other staff.
The problem here is because there is only one note from one of the staffs, NoteWorthy won’t by default apply a beam – and the note will have the standard flag.
So to fix this, you have to add anther note and beam the two together but make the first note muted and not visible. You can then use the processes in example a to align the beams.

Re: Cross staff Beaming on the Grand Staff without layering. – three examples

Reply #1 – 2006-02-19 05:09 pm

Very helpful - thanks so much, Richard!

Best wishes,
Ann

Re: Cross staff Beaming on the Grand Staff without layering. – three examples

Reply #2 – 2006-02-19 09:37 pm

That looks pretty cool. Nice job.
Also, thanks for providing the .jpg - the .nwc cannot be opened by v.1.

Re: Cross staff Beaming on the Grand Staff without layering. – three examples

Reply #3 – 2006-02-19 10:42 pm

In Example b in v.2, if you chose not to mirror the sixteenths in each staff and mute certain notes you can also have playback sound correct by highlighting each individual note and changing its individual transposition under Staff|Staff Properties|Instrument.

Re: Cross staff Beaming on the Grand Staff without layering. – three examples

Reply #4 – 2006-02-19 11:35 pm

That's very true - but the transposition amount relies on the gap between the two staffs and so is more difficult to determine (rather than just doing it this way).

R.

Re: Cross staff Beaming on the Grand Staff without layering. – three examples

Reply #5 – 2006-02-21 03:02 pm

Are the examples actually shown? if so, I cannot see them.

Tony

Re: Cross staff Beaming on the Grand Staff without layering. – three examples

Reply #6 – 2006-02-21 03:36 pm

There are two attachments to the first post. (Look at the end of the text). One attachment is a JPG that shows the results in when printed and the other, an NWC version 2 file where all three examples are entered.

Rich.

Viewing attachments

Reply #7 – 2006-02-21 04:52 pm

In order to view attachments, you actually must be logged into the site. Perhaps this explains the question.

The absence of any attachment indication is a quirk of the SMF permissions system that we are working to improve. It would be better if guests had an indication that an attachment exists, but login is required to view it.