User manual

513
Entering and editing notes
Note values and positions
Two of the most important settings for entering notes (and
the ones you will change most often) are the length of the
note (the note value) and the minimum spacing between
notes (the Quantize value).
Selecting a note value for input
You can choose the length for entering notes as follows:
• By clicking the note symbols on the extended toolbar.
You can select any note value from 1/1 to 1/64 and activate/deactivate
the dotted and triplet options by clicking the two buttons to the right.
The selected note value is displayed in the Length Quantize field on the
toolbar and also reflected by the cursor shape of the Insert Note tool.
• By selecting an option from the Length Quantize pop-up
menu on the toolbar.
• By assigning key commands to the different length
values.
This is done in the Key Commands dialog on the File menu, in the cate-
gory “Set Insert Length”.
About unusual note values
Not all note values can be selected directly, for example
double dotted notes. Such notes are created by changing
the length of the note after you have entered it (see
“Changing the length of notes” on page 520), by gluing
notes together (see “Lengthening a note by gluing two no-
tes together” on page 520) or by using the Display Length
feature.
Selecting a Quantize value
When you move the mouse pointer over the score, you will
see that the position box on the toolbar tracks your move-
ment and shows the current position in bars, beats, six-
teenth notes and ticks.
Positioning on screen is controlled by the current Quantize
value. If you set this to 1/8, for example, you can only insert
and move notes to eighth note positions, at quarter notes,
at half bars or at bar positions. It is a good strategy to set
the Quantize value to the smallest note value in the project.
This does not stop you from inputting notes at “coarser”
positions. However, if you set the Quantize value to too
small a note value, it is easier to make mistakes.
The Quantize value is set on the toolbar in the Quantize
pop-up menu:
• You can also assign key commands to the different
Quantize values.
This is done in the Key Commands dialog on the File menu, under the
category “MIDI Quantize”.
• Just like in the other MIDI editors, you can use the
Quantize Setup dialog to create other Quantize values, ir-
regular grids, etc.
However, this is not often used when inputting score notes.
The “mouse position box”
While you will most often use the graphical position in the
actual score to determine where the notes go, there are
instances when you will want to verify the position numer-
ically using the mouse position box:
With the Quantize value set to 1/8, you can only input notes at
eighth note positions.