Re: Lyrics + rhythmic notation for chord charts
Moderators: Peter Thomsen, miker
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Hi. I'm wondering if there's any way to add lyrics to a chord chart containing rhythmic notation for a guitar strumming pattern. In other words, the staff contains the guitar rhythm, but I need to add lyrics below the guitar staff, which have a different rhythm. I've tried attaching the lyrics to a different layer, but that doesn't seem to work in rhythmic notation. Thanks for any help!
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Finale 2014, windows 10
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Finale 2014, windows 10
Last edited by campersand on Tue Feb 07, 2017 5:01 am, edited 1 time in total.
Finale 26.3.1.520, windows 11
- MikeHalloran
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Yes. Enter your lyrics as Text, not Lyrics.campersand wrote:Hi. I'm wondering if there's any way to add lyrics to a chord chart containing rhythmic notation for a guitar strumming pattern. In other words, the staff contains the guitar rhythm, but I need to add lyrics below the guitar staff, which have a different rhythm. I've tried attaching the lyrics to a different layer, but that doesn't seem to work in rhythmic notation. Thanks for any help!
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Finale 2014, windows 10
I really don't like Finale for this, however. I create my chord/rhythm chart in Finale and export as a PDF. Now you can open your PDF file in any graphics program that allows you to enter text. My favorite is Adobe Photoshop Elements—much easier than using a PDF editor such as Preview or Adobe Acrobat Pro. I'm on a Mac but there are a number of Win programs that let you do this.
Anyway, I enter lines of text and drag those lines where I want them. I use spacing and dashes to get the spacing exactly how I want. Unlike Finale or a PDF editor, I don't have to fight the application to get my lines exactly how and where I like.
You can do it in Word but PDF files imported aren't as crisp and the entire file shrinks to the page margins.
Mike Halloran
Finale 27.4.1, SmartScore X2 Pro, GPO5 & World Instruments
MacOS Ventura 14.5 (public beta); 2023 Studio M2 Ultra, 192G RAM, 8TB; 2021 MBAir M1
NotePerformer4, Dorico 5, Overture, Notion 6, DP 11, Logic Pro
Finale 27.4.1, SmartScore X2 Pro, GPO5 & World Instruments
MacOS Ventura 14.5 (public beta); 2023 Studio M2 Ultra, 192G RAM, 8TB; 2021 MBAir M1
NotePerformer4, Dorico 5, Overture, Notion 6, DP 11, Logic Pro
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Thanks for the great answer, Mike! I have Photoshop so I'll try that.
Finale 26.3.1.520, windows 11
- zuill
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I prefer to do this all in Finale, if possible. If you enter the rhythm for the lyrics in another layer, keep the option to hide the notes, but select the option to show the lyrics. If you don't want to have the notes play back, there are ways to accomplish that as well.
Zuill
Zuill
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- Lyrics Under Rhythmic Notation.jpg (20.81 KiB) Viewed 5451 times
Windows 10, Finale 2011-v26.3.1
"When all is said and done, more is said than done."
"When all is said and done, more is said than done."
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Hey Zuil, that would be much easier but for some reason my lyrics aren't showing up even with the lyrics checkbox checked in Staff Styles window. Is there somewhere else I need to select that option?zuill wrote:I prefer to do this all in Finale, if possible. If you enter the rhythm for the lyrics in another layer, keep the option to hide the notes, but select the option to show the lyrics. If you don't want to have the notes play back, there are ways to accomplish that as well.
Zuill
By the way, good to see you've come over to this forum! You answered a bunch of questions for me on the other one as well.
Finale 26.3.1.520, windows 11
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Perfect, thanks!
Finale 26.3.1.520, windows 11
- MikeHalloran
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Yep. That works and how I did it once upon a time. My way is much, much faster for me, especially with multiple verses.zuill wrote:I prefer to do this all in Finale, if possible. If you enter the rhythm for the lyrics in another layer, keep the option to hide the notes, but select the option to show the lyrics. If you don't want to have the notes play back, there are ways to accomplish that as well.
Zuill
The important thing is to find something that works.
Mike Halloran
Finale 27.4.1, SmartScore X2 Pro, GPO5 & World Instruments
MacOS Ventura 14.5 (public beta); 2023 Studio M2 Ultra, 192G RAM, 8TB; 2021 MBAir M1
NotePerformer4, Dorico 5, Overture, Notion 6, DP 11, Logic Pro
Finale 27.4.1, SmartScore X2 Pro, GPO5 & World Instruments
MacOS Ventura 14.5 (public beta); 2023 Studio M2 Ultra, 192G RAM, 8TB; 2021 MBAir M1
NotePerformer4, Dorico 5, Overture, Notion 6, DP 11, Logic Pro
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I wouldn't use Photoshop for editing PDFs from Finale. For starters, you'll massively increase the filesize when you save as a bitmap image, and secondly, you've converted your crisp vectors to bitmap.
Use a vector drawing package like Affinity Design or iDraw on the Mac, or Inkscape (free, open source), or Illustrator, or other.
Use a vector drawing package like Affinity Design or iDraw on the Mac, or Inkscape (free, open source), or Illustrator, or other.
- MikeHalloran
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I can see that. Just for kicks, I saved the changes in Elements (which I never do) and the resulting file size was a .psd of 4.4mB. Not what I want or ever get.BuonTempi wrote:I wouldn't use Photoshop for editing PDFs from Finale. For starters, you'll massively increase the filesize when you save as a bitmap image, and secondly, you've converted your crisp vectors to bitmap.
Use a vector drawing package like Affinity Design or iDraw on the Mac, or Inkscape (free, open source), or Illustrator, or other.
I've been doing this for so many years, I hadn't paid attention to my actual work process—here it is:
When I create the page in Finale, the .pdf might be 53K and when I'm done in PSE, it might be 227K. I do not save the file, however. I print to .pdf from within the app instead and renaming it so that it doesn't overwrite. When I close PSE and it asks to save changes to the original, I click No so that the original file is unaltered. I have no problem with 227kB page sizes and neither do my publishers.
I just did this now to see. It took me all of 5 minutes to mark up some files, save them four different ways and examine file sizes just now.
Mike Halloran
Finale 27.4.1, SmartScore X2 Pro, GPO5 & World Instruments
MacOS Ventura 14.5 (public beta); 2023 Studio M2 Ultra, 192G RAM, 8TB; 2021 MBAir M1
NotePerformer4, Dorico 5, Overture, Notion 6, DP 11, Logic Pro
Finale 27.4.1, SmartScore X2 Pro, GPO5 & World Instruments
MacOS Ventura 14.5 (public beta); 2023 Studio M2 Ultra, 192G RAM, 8TB; 2021 MBAir M1
NotePerformer4, Dorico 5, Overture, Notion 6, DP 11, Logic Pro