LilyPond, ties and voices

LilyPond: ties and voices

In the default LilyPond configuration, it is not possible to tie a note in a single-voice with the same note but belonging to a contextual multi-voices environment.

I recently had to resolve an author’s passage involving just such a problem and asked for help to the amazing LilyPond community.

So I learned a new “trick” that I would like to share with everyone: you can change the context in which ties operate.

More in particular: it is possible to make ties work from the voices context to the scores context.

In this way, ties can also be engraved switching from single voice to a multiple voice.

An easy example: tie from a single voice to multiple voices not engraved

In the following example I report a very simple code fragment with an “unterminated tie” warning:

\version "2.22.1"
\relative c'
{\key c \major
  \time 4/4

    c d e f~  % implicit oneVoice
  % start multiple voices
  << { f g8 a b4 c } % implicit voiceOne 
     \\
     { c,2 d4  e  } % implicit voiceTwo 
   >>  
  }

Here’s the log:

Starting lilypond 2.22.1 [easy-example1.ly]...
Processing `/home/franco/Documents/easy-example1.ly'
Parsing...
Interpreting music...
/home/franco/Documents/easy-example1.ly:6:12: warning: unterminated tie
    c d e f
           ~  % implicit oneVoice
Preprocessing graphical objects...
Finding the ideal number of pages...
Fitting music on 1 page...
Drawing systems...
Success: compilation successfully completed
Completed successfully in 1.2".

Here’s the score:

Highlighted in red: the tie has not been engraved.

Another easy example: tie from a single voice to multiple voices engraved

The same code fragment without the “unterminated tie” warning:

\version "2.22.1"
\layout {
  \context {
    \Voice
    \remove Tie_engraver
  }
  \context {
    \Staff
    \consists Tie_engraver
  }
}
\relative c'
{\key c \major
  \time 4/4
  
    c d e f~  % implicit oneVoice
  % start multiple voices
  << { f g8 a b4 c } % implicit voiceOne 
     \\
     { c,2 d4  e  } % implicit voiceTwo 
   >>  
  }

Here’s the new log file:

Starting lilypond 2.22.1 [easy-example1.ly]...
Processing `/tmp/frescobaldi-jz_pyunm/tmpg8nfdn1r/easy-example1.ly'
Parsing...
Interpreting music...
Preprocessing graphical objects...
Finding the ideal number of pages...
Fitting music on 1 page...
Drawing systems...
Converting to `easy-example1.pdf'...
Success: compilation successfully completed
Completed successfully in 1.3".

Here’s the score:

Highlighted in green: now tie has been regularly engraved.

Thank you for your attention.

Originally published at https://francopasut.netlify.app on December 1, 2021.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Vim: searching for text containing a slash or a question mark

Vim: searching for text containing a slash or a question mark Vim: the search command To activate a text search in Vim, press one of the following trigger keys in your keyboard: the slash "/" key (do not confuse with the back-slash "\" key) the question mark key. By pressing the slash "/" key will activate a forward search. By pressing the question mark "/" key will activate a backward search. To move the cursor to the results in your document, press the "n" key (mnemonic for “ next ”). To invert the direction of the cursor, press the "N" key, (“upper n”) . What about if you need to search for a slash or a question mark , i.e. the same trigger characters , in your document? You can prepend the Escape character to the trigger key. The Escape character The Escape character is the back-slash key: "\" . Just an example: if you need to forward search (then with / trigger k...
Read more

Vim: Cut, Copy and Paste to and from the system clipboard

Image
Vim: Cut, Copy and Paste to and from the system clipboard Table of Contents 1. Cut, Copy and Paste using the computer keyboard 2. Vim and the clipboard 3. From Vim to the Clipboard 4. From the Clipboard to Vim 5. Some key shortcuts in gVim Figure 1: Vim 1 Cut, Copy and Paste using the computer keyboard Everybody knows how to use the keyboard combinations Ctrl-c , Ctrl-x , and Ctrl-v in Windows and Linux (or Cmd-c , Cmd-x and Cmd-v in macOS) to copy, cut and paste text across applications. Many think that those combinations are universal and work with any application. But Vim and gVim are different, they use another system to exchange information with the rest of the IT world. For example, in Vim under Linux, the key combination Ctrl-v corresponds to the visual block function and does not affect the pasting text. I wrote this article to remind me, as a non-programmer, the key combinations to be used in the Vim world to sha...
Read more