Percussion Setups for Contemporary Music Practice

[Bernardo Barros]

Hi List,

I'm trying to figure out this. I have a part in a score that is for percussion.
I read the manual and I find there is a lot of things done for percussion notation, but it is not out-of-the-box for contemporary notation as far as I could understand.

Imagine the very common situation of having one percussionist with various small instruments and sub-groups of instruments, each one with its own line or group of lines. But all in the same Staff (not different staffs). 

And now imagine that this setup can eventually be modified. So in the first section of the piece the percussionist uses 7 instruments, and in the second section he/she uses a different configuration.

I could make a customer distance lines for my Staff. That's all right.

But the question is:

1. How can I indicate with precision in the score itself where is the location of each instrument? Perhaps with post-editing in Illustrator with arrow? Must be a more elegant solution.

2. How can I change this configuration in the middle of a piece? Let's say in page 10 I want a completely different setup starting in the middle of the page or wherever is the setup change in the score.

3. is there an easy way to determine witch note is correspondent to what instrument? Maybe a fancy function will do that?

I came across an beautiful and very elegant example of all this in the web page of Victor Adan (I believe he's active in this community, really nice scores in his website). http://www.victoradan.net/media/music/solum_sample_page_.png

How can something like this be made?


Thanks a lot!
Bernardo




%{ ============= %}
%{ === Lily Code == %}
%{ ============= %}


\version "2.13.18"

\header {
    title = " " 
     subtitle = " " 
     composer = " " 
     instrument = " " 
    tagline = " "

}

#(set-global-staff-size 14)

\layout {
  \context {
    \type "Engraver_group"
    \consists "Time_signature_engraver"
    \consists "Axis_group_engraver"
    \name "TimeSig"
    \override TimeSignature #'font-size = #-1
    \override TimeSignature #'break-align-symbol = ##f
    \override TimeSignature #'X-offset =
      #ly:self-alignment-interface::x-aligned-on-self
    \override TimeSignature #'self-alignment-X = #CENTER
    \override TimeSignature #'after-line-breaking = #shift-right-at-line-begin


  }
  \context {
    \Score
    \accepts TimeSig

  }
  \context {
    \Staff
    \remove "Time_signature_engraver"
  }
}



staffPercussion = \new Staff  {
    
    \override Score.MetronomeMark #'stencil = ##t

    \tempo 8 = 75

%{ ========================== %}
%{ = Percussion instruments = %}
%{ ========================== %}
    \set Staff.instrumentName = \markup { 
            \column { 
                \override #'(box-padding . 0.25) \override #'(thickness . 0.01)  \box \tiny  "vibraslap"
                \override #'(box-padding . 0.25) \override #'(thickness . 0.01)  \box \tiny "tambourine"
                \override #'(box-padding . 0.25) \override #'(thickness . 0.01)  \box \tiny  "woodblock"
                \override #'(box-padding . 0.25) \override #'(thickness . 0.01)  \box \tiny "tomtom"
            
            
            }}
            
%{
    TODO : Make clear what box goes to what line in the score!!!!
%}


%{ ===================================== %}
%{ = Non-standard Lines for Percussion = %}
%{ ===================================== %}        
        \override Staff.StaffSymbol #'line-positions = #'(-18 -15 -7 -2 0 3 9 13)
        
        
        \clef percussion
        

          \override DynamicText #'font-size = #-2
            \override Score.Stem #'stemlet-length = #1.5
        \override NoteHead #'font-size = #-1
         \override NoteHead #'stem-attachment = #'(0.4 . 0 )


%{ ================== %}
%{ = Music Material = %}
%{ ================== %}

 a,,16 g b d f g b e f g b e f g g b d f g b e f g b e f g b
}


timeSignatures = { \time 4/8 s2 \time 3/8 s4. \time 4/8 s2 \time 4/8 s2 \time 5/8 s4. s4 \time 3/8 s4. \time 4/8 s2}


\score 

{
    <<
        \new TimeSig \timeSignatures
          
        \staffPercussion
    >>
    
    \midi {
    }

  \layout {
  
  \context { \Score \remove "Bar_number_engraver" 
        }
{  
   \context { \Score

%{ =========== %}
%{ = tuplets = %}
%{ =========== %}
          tupletFullLength = ##t
          \override TupletBracket #'bracket-visibility = ##t
          \override TupletBracket #'padding = #2
          \override TupletBracket #'springs-and-rods = #ly:spanner::set-spacing-rods
          \override TupletBracket #'minimum-length = #3
    \override TupletNumber #'text = #tuplet-number::calc-fraction-text
    \override TupletNumber #'font-size = #-3
    \override TupletNumber #'thickness = #0.5
    \override Beam #'breakable = ##t

    
    
               }%



        
        
    \context {
    \Score \accepts TimeSig
             \override Stem #'flag = #modern-straight-flag
  }

  
    }



}

\paper {
    #(set-paper-size "a3")
    systemSeparatorMarkup = \slashSeparator
    indent = 1\cm


}