NOTATIO

This slur challenge came up on the "Music Engraving Tips" (or MET) Facebook group today from a real-life scenario:
This is LilyPond's best attempt at the slur. Not sure how I'd improve the situation. What else do you think could be done to improve/beautify the situation here?

I like that slur pretty well, actually! One could make it a bit taller, perhaps ½ a space higher and ½ a space lower, to avoid touching the tips of the sharp and clear the top staff line. But more than another space taller would only draw more attention to how awkward it is. As is, its function is clear and unmistakable at first glance.

I notice LilyPond aligns the tips of the slur exactly above the stems. Sibelius indents them over beams slightly by default, but that is worse in this case. So I moved them outward, and adjusted the note spacing in 2 places before taking this screenshot.

tisimst wrote:This slur challenge came up on the "Music Engraving Tips" (or MET) Facebook group today from a real-life scenario:

It would be great to promote our forum there too!

Here are my solutions.

I'd like the tuplet number to be on the same side as the slur in this case, so here's my suggestion:

Interesting, Knut, an elegant solution!

Now I have a comment on the tuplet number's position for the first two posts. What is "the beam side" for the cross-staff? It is both a rhetorical and actual question. Therefore I slightly dislike the first two examples: the tuplet number almost disappeared in the texture.

But the topic's question was about slur! [emoji1]

OCTO wrote:Interesting, Knut, an elegant solution!

Now I have a comment on the tuplet number's position for the first two posts. What is "the beam side" for the cross-staff? It is both a rhetorical and actual question. Therefore I slightly dislike the first two examples: the tuplet number almost disappeared in the texture.

But the topic's question was about slur! [emoji1]

Thanks!

In this specific case, the 'beam side' can only be one thing, but I guess you're asking about situations where both sides of the beam are available. In that case I would simply use the terms 'above' or 'below' the beam.

Knut, I also considered your solution for the number, because it is a more traditional approach, but eventually discarded it because the slur might be misinterpreted as a triplet bracket. You moved the staves close together which is always important in getting a good result with alternating hands passages.

Here is my entry:

John Ruggero wrote:Knut, I also considered your solution for the number, because it is a more traditional approach, but eventually discarded it because the slur might be misinterpreted as a triplet bracket.

As far as I know, the tuplet bracket style you're referring to has been obsolete for quite a number of years, and are generally narrower than an actual slur, so, I don't think there is much of a chance for confusion.

...that's why I like the most my example no 1, regarding both the slur shape and the tuplet position!

OCTO, I like your slur 1 a lot too, along with Knut's, except that it seems a little far from the first and last notes. Perhaps if your staves were closer together it would work better. Also if the sharps were closer together the F# and the first note of the triplet would not compete for the slur's attention.

Knut, I considéred those issues as well, because the upper position of the triplet number is so tempting, but players see so many different styles of triplet slurs and in so many contexts that I was afraid that there is still a danger of confusion. But maybe I am over-concerned about it.