Hi everyone,
Hope you're all having a great day. I had a friend ask me a
question the other day which got me thinking. I figured the best
way was to pass it along here and ask the community what they
think. (My friend is strongly considering switching to LilyPond
from Finale currently)
We were talking about the fact that when using programs like
Sibelius or Finale, composers often find themselves making changes
to the full score and the instrument parts *independently*.
Perhaps they want to change the spacing and position of a marking
or articulation, or maybe adjust the bezier curves of a slur in
the part only, not the score, etc. for whatever reason.
This sort of thing gets to be a habit from years of using the
software; you always find yourself wanting to make changes to
parts and not have those changes reflect on the full score. While
I don't really find myself needing to do these types of separate
tweaks to parts only since I switched to Lilypond, I certainly
remember doing parts-only tweaks when I was using Sibelius
especially. I'd have to scoot a dynamic marking a bit or fix a
slur shape that was looking cramped but I didn't want it to move
in the full score. Lots of fine-tuning to parts.
So here's my question.
Everyone has their own personal preference to how they approach
setting up their music: many like to create definition files for
all the music / maintain a separate score file with the variables,
etc. - so, assuming you did setup your projects like this, how
would you tell a new potential-LilyPond user the easiest way to go
about changing some markings or music specifically in the part
itself only while not touching it in the main score file?
I'm a bit confused because most of the time the part (ily) files I
have for scores are just barebones: setup a staff, paper, and
that's about it. There's really no "music" in the parts to edit
separately. I thought it would be helpful to hear how you all
handle this sort of situation, whenever it does pop up.
Imagine a scenario where you simply must make changes to the part
only, and you've already set up your definitions and score file
separately and organized. What do you do? Can you do
anything in that case?
I think it's a good question for those who are switching to
LilyPond (or seriously considering a switch). :)
Thanks for any feedback on how you approach this sort of
engraving situation! I appreciate it.
[Their exact questions were along the lines of how could you
adjust a slur marking in the part only, move a rehearsal mark
vertically in the part only, move a dynamic marking left or
right in the part only, stuff like that. I told my friend
essentially "that sort of thing really doesn't happen because of
the organization approach/mindset of LilyPond but...]