Re: Hiding empty staves

[Bob Kline]

Erik Sandberg wrote:

> The problem above, is that { } have different meanings in different places: 
> Usually {  } means sequential music, but the { } after \score are special: it 
> starts with a _single_ music expression, followed by optional \layout (etc) 
> blocks. So you must make \override part of the music expression, like:
> 
> \score {
>   <<
>      \override Score.VerticalAxisGroup #'remove-first = ##t
>      \context ChoirStaff <<
>          \context Staff = women << .... >>
>          \new Lyrics ....
>          \context Staff = men << .... >>
>   >>
>  \layout{...}
> }

I apologize for being so slow to grok what's going on here, and I
appreciate the responses posted so far on this issue, but I still don't
get it.  I have tried doing *exactly* what you're telling me to do here
(except for putting back in the missing ">>" to balance the delimiters
of the \context ChoirStaff chunk), and I'm still getting the blank staff
in the first system.  I've read the FAQ (multiple times).  I've tried
reading the manual top to bottom to try and get a comprehensive picture
of the lexical grammar at work here, but my brain is glazing over.  If
there's a place I should have been reading but missed (or nodded off
when I was trying to read it), I promise I won't be offended if someone
posts something which tells me how lame my efforts were at not finding
the obvious guide which explains how this works, as long as the poster
tells me where that guide is.

I have boiled down the problem to a minimal repro case, and I'm
attaching three tiny files which illustrate my attempt to do what Erik's
telling me to do here: the .ly source, the resulting .pdf, and a cropped
image of the relevant portion of the output.

Thanks for any guidance you have to offer!

-- 
Bob Kline
http://www.rksystems.com
mailto:address@hidden

\version "2.6.5"

melody     = \relative c'' { c1 \break c \break c \break c }
altoMusic  = \relative c'  { \skip 1*2 e1 e }
tenorMusic = \relative c'  { \skip 1*2 g1 g }
bassMusic  = \relative c   { \skip 1*2 c1 c }
verseone   = \lyricmode    { la1 la la la }

\score {
  <<
    \override Score.VerticalAxisGroup #'remove-first = ##t
    \context ChoirStaff <<
      \context Staff = women <<
        \context Voice = sopranos { \voiceOne << \melody >> }
        \context Voice = altos    { \voiceTwo << \altoMusic >> }
      >>
      \new Lyrics { \set stanza = "1. " \verseone }
      \context Staff = men <<
        \clef bass
        \context Voice = tenors   { \voiceThree << \tenorMusic >> }
        \context Voice = basses   { \voiceFour  << \bassMusic >> }
      >>
    >>
  >>
  \layout {
    \context { \RemoveEmptyStaffContext }
  }
}

repro.pdf
Description: Adobe PDF document