Beaming conventions

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Schneider
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Beaming conventions

Post by Schneider »

In a recent discussion about Dorico I found that editor programs have fairly different conventions regarding the beaming.
Here's some pictures about them (thanks to Eric Crouch for MuseScore', Finale', Sibelius' and Dorico's ones).
All outputs are according to defaults settings.

Finale:
Finale.png
Finale.png (140.33 KiB) Viewed 9099 times
Sibelius:
Sibelius.png
Sibelius.png (157.1 KiB) Viewed 9099 times
Dorico:
Dorico.png
Dorico.png (139.11 KiB) Viewed 9099 times
LilyPond:
LPond.png
LPond.png (83 KiB) Viewed 9099 times
MuseScore (I do not have mes.13 but I gess the beaming rules are identical to the LP ones):
MuseScore.png
MuseScore.png (62.66 KiB) Viewed 9099 times
Any opinion?

Cheers,
Pierre
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OCTO
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Re: Beaming conventions

Post by OCTO »

Again and again, the Open Source rules. I like LP and MS2 output.
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Schneider
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Re: Beaming conventions

Post by Schneider »

Ok, but do you see any reason for having such conventions (I mean I can hardly imagine that all Finale, Sibelius and Dorico having similar bugs) ?
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OCTO
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Re: Beaming conventions

Post by OCTO »

It depends. I don't know how that examples were done - if they were imported by music xml.
To not going to the details, LP has for my eye the quickest response and easiest to sight-read. If MS gives the same output than, with its GUI alternative to LP, strikingly better than any other commercial software.
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John Ruggero
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Re: Beaming conventions

Post by John Ruggero »

This is the beaming I get when I input the notes of the upper voice into a Finale default file without any editing:
Finale beaming.jpg
Finale beaming.jpg (23.46 KiB) Viewed 9085 times
It is correct for 2/2. The version that you have must have been edited to produce the beam breaks.

The lower voice has the correct beaming in Finale and Lilypond. The stub should face toward the left. It is disappointing that it is incorrect in Dorico. I also prefer the position of the dot in all versions except Dorico.

However, if this was indeed produced without editing, Dorico does a remarkable job of positioning the notes and beams for the very difficult three voice portion of the example. Slight editing would make it even better. None of the other versions is acceptable.
Last edited by John Ruggero on 22 Oct 2016, 21:04, edited 1 time in total.
M1 Mac mini (OS 12.4), Dorico, Finale 25.5, GPO 4, Affinity Publisher 2, SmartScore 64 Pro, JW Plug-ins, TG Tools, Keyboard maestro

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OCTO
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Re: Beaming conventions

Post by OCTO »

John Ruggero wrote:Dorico does a remarkable job of positioning the notes and beams for the very difficult three voice portion of the example
I agree here completely.
Still it is unknown how these examples were generated / entered.
Knut
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Re: Beaming conventions

Post by Knut »

For the record, this is the default output from the current version of Dorico, only with slight beam adjustments in the up-stem voices.
Skjermbilde 2016-10-22 kl. 17.38.08.png
Skjermbilde 2016-10-22 kl. 17.38.08.png (62.35 KiB) Viewed 9081 times
I actually expected Dorico to adjust the beams automatically, but I guess that behavior is for a later day.
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John Ruggero
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Re: Beaming conventions

Post by John Ruggero »

Really nice, Knut. As you show, Dorico's REAL default output is even more remarkable. Now the middle voice is correctly beamed, and the secondary beam break in the second part is Dorico deciding what would be best in most cases, which is undoubtedly correct. Hopefully, there is also an option to turn this behavior off. I would prefer the lower dot in the lower space.

OCTO. may be right in suspecting some kind of import behavior going on with the beaming in the original examples.
M1 Mac mini (OS 12.4), Dorico, Finale 25.5, GPO 4, Affinity Publisher 2, SmartScore 64 Pro, JW Plug-ins, TG Tools, Keyboard maestro

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Schneider
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Re: Beaming conventions

Post by Schneider »

Thank you Knut, this is much clearer for me now.
MJCube
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Re: Beaming conventions

Post by MJCube »

Most people today seem to prefer (as John says) a dot on a down-stem line-note to go in the space below. I generally do not prefer this; it continues to look strange and wrong to me even after over a quarter century working with computer software. But in the particular case of this excerpt the lower position is actually better because of the horizontal offset of the upper dotted note.

But then if the dot on the E is in the lower position, I want it the standard distance from the notehead, not offset to the right to align with the dot on the G! I’m sure people will disagree with me on this, but to me it just doesn’t look like it belongs to the E when it’s that far away. There are no ‘back-notes’ on chords here.

Every other detail about Knut’s latest Dorico example I like.
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