Formatting Parts

In Composer, a part displays the notes for one or more tracks. A part can be formatted and paginated independently of other parts extracted from the conductor's score.

The conductor's score, which displays notes for all of the tracks, is itself also a part in Composer. For example, you can format and print the conductor's part (score) with a different paper size or orientation (landscape versus portrait) than the paper size and orientation that you intend for the individual instrument or vocal parts.

If you are pleased with the formatting of a part and would like to apply the same formatting to other parts, you can quickly do this with the Copy Formatting to Other Parts command in the Part menu. You can also save the formatting in a template file and later use the Format Part Using Template command to apply the saved formatting to a current part.

The topics that follow describe how you can individually format the following details of each part:

     page setup: paper size and orientation; margins; and page numbering (determine the starting page number, and assignment of even or odd numbers to the left pages)

     overall font size: the point size used for notes and text, except where overridden for types of text or particular text objects

     horizontal and vertical spacing: the amount of horizontal stretch or compression, and the minimum amount of vertical spacing between staves and between systems

     font size for types of text: each category of text, such as lyrics and chord names, can have its own unique font size

     show or hide types of music annotations: optionally hide lyrics, chord names, rehearsal marks, ornaments, or instrument sound change marks

     show or hide instrument names: show long instrument names, or abbreviations, on every system of each page, or just the first system of each page, or not at all

     hide empty staves: optionally hide any staves in the part that have no notes and lyrics

     display "easy notes": optionally display pitch letters in noteheads

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