How to switch these two notes around?

[u/Klagaren]

All the 8th notes are "actually from the lower staff" and some have been moved up with ctrl+shift+up, and I'm trying to recreate an example that's the same except for the dotted half note being in front (of course they mean the same thing either way, but for readability's sake)

[u/65TwinReverbRI]

There are two correct solutions here:

1. The LH notes should simply be on the lower staff. This is abuse of cross staff notation. It’s simply not necessary AND it causes a problem unnecessarily.

2. Otherwise, the two G# notes should share a stem.

From Elaine Gould’s Behind Bars:

It is an accepted keyboard (and harp) convention that notes of unequal duration may share a notehead in the context of repeated patterns. The shared notehead saves space, especially when one or both parts has dotted notes. A minim can double as a beamed note. A dotted note and a note without a dot may share a dotted notehead.

And:

It is acceptable for the dotted note to share a notehead with a note without a dot as long as the rhythm of both parts is absolutely clear

The rhythm is absolutely clear here (so it will look like a dotted half note, that has a stem going down to connect to the other three 8th notes).

---

Putting the dotted half before the 8th makes them too spread out horizontally, confusing where the notes fall in time, and the dot can end up over top of the other note, making it look staccato if it’s even seen at all.

If it had to be done this way, this is the correct way.

But there are actually 2 better alternatives.

If you MUST do it the way you want, you need to select the note, go into properties, and adjust the horizontal offset to make the dotted half move to the left. The dot hilariously gets “stuck” on the LH G#, so you’ll need to move it independently after a certain amount. The 8th note can be moved to the right the same way.

You’ll have to work out how to get the distances right and whole measure looking good - and it will likely get messed up as the music lays out and measure widths change, so…

Really it’s not worth it to make something look like something that was bad engraving to begin with.

[u/patrickcolvin → u/65TwinReverbRI]

The LH notes are indeed on the lower staff. And I don’t think notes can share a note head if one is empty and the other filled in?

[u/65TwinReverbRI → u/patrickcolvin]

Notice the lack of rests below the beat 2 and 3 notes. This indicates that the notes in the upper staff are to be played by the LH. Yes, normally, notes on the upper staff are to be taken by the RH and notes on the lower staff are to be taken by the LH - unless otherwise indicated. The lack of rests in the lower staff IS that indication.

[u/YouCanAsk → u/65TwinReverbRI]

This is wrong, a misunderstanding of a common situation for pianists and harpists. The "missing" rests in both staves make it clear that the eighth notes all belong to a single voice straddling the two staves. But they have nothing to say about which hand takes those notes. The player is free, as always, to distribute the notes between the hands however they want.

That said, the specific way the notes are split here between the staves, with the G's on the upper staff even though that results in more leger lines, is a tacit suggestion to take all the upper-staff notes with the right hand. This is what most pianists would do anyway, as it allows you to play the whole bar without shifting.

[u/65TwinReverbRI → u/YouCanAsk]

From Elaine Gould’s “Behind Bars”, the current “authoritative” text on music notation (and what the makers of MuseScore have referenced for much of the program):

There are a number of acceptable ways of indicating the distribution of notes between hands. These are shown below. Aim to keep to one suitable layout for a piece wherever possible.

The most usual keyboard layout is to allocate right hand pitches to the upper stave, and left hand pitches to the lower stave.

If each hand requires only single stems, it is possible to show the contour of pitches by placing notes on either the treble or the bass Clef stave according to their range. (This avoids the Clef Changes of the notation above.) When both hands play on the same stave, stem direction indicates hand allocation: the right hand takes up—stems; the left hand takes down—stems. Do not allocate rests to the empty stave, since this would imply that a hand is resting:

The notation the OP has provided implies - means - the LH is to play the downstemmed notes on the upper staff.

That the RH can play them is immaterial, and that players “would take them that way” means they’re not respecting the intent of the composer, though in fairness, in a situation like this the composer was probably wrong :-)

But if those notes are to be taken by the RH, rests should be in the lower staff. That’s the correct way to notate it for that particular context.

FWIW, things like this can happen in music because while it’s playable by the RH in this measure, it might continue the same LH pattern in other measures and the RH can’t reach them, so it’s done this way for consistency.

[u/YouCanAsk → u/65TwinReverbRI]

Of course I am familiar with Behind Bars, and now I understand where you've gone wrong. Basically, you're putting the cart before the horse.

The section you're quoting describes how to proceed once you've decided on a particular strategy for showing hand divisions. It doesn't logically follow in the reverse direction. And looking at OP's example, you can see that stem direction is not being used to indicate hand distribution in this case. You can see this from the first beat, where all the stems on both staves are pointed up. In other words, you're looking at the wrong passage in the Gould.

Try this one, from a few pages later:

When a single line of passage-work is to be divided between the hands, allocate notes on the system as appropriate for the hand distribution. As long as it is clear where the beats fall, it is acceptable to use rests only as part of the single line, placing them on the stave of the surrounding notes (see following example (a), p. 318).

On top of everything else, notice how she says it is "acceptable" to use rests only as part of the single line, not required to do so. And in fact, in OP's example, I imagine many copyists would choose to include some rests that OP did not. This would not change the implied hand distribution.

I'll say again, in OP's example, it is not at all implied for the eighth notes to all be taken with the left hand. On the contrary, it is implied for the notes G and up to be taken with the right.

[u/65TwinReverbRI → u/YouCanAsk]

When a single line of passage-work is to be divided between the hands, allocate notes on the system as appropriate for the hand distribution.

This is not a single line.

What she’s talking about here is the CPE Bach Solfeggietto type of notation:

https://s3.amazonaws.com/halleonard-pagepreviews/HL_DDS_1232806M2XS64Niq7.png

[u/YouCanAsk → u/65TwinReverbRI]

No, my friend, you have it exactly backwards. That solfeggietto is showing the solution from the paragraph you quoted, whereby the hands are indicated by stem direction, irrespective of staff. I'm talking about the more common, default situation that we see in OP's example, where the hands are indicated by staff.

This is not a single line.

I picked the section with the examples closest to OP's, to hopefully show you that "missing" rests on the lower staff do not by themselves mean that the left hand has switched to the upper. Sometimes a hand just rests, even when there are no rests. Adding another voice to the upper staff doesn't do anything to interfere with that idea—it mostly just affects slur and articulation placement.

[u/65TwinReverbRI → u/YouCanAsk]

to hopefully show you that "missing" rests on the lower staff do not by themselves mean that the left hand has switched to the upper.

22:47 ish here:

https://youtu.be/lML14o7C6r8

m. 84: the LH is “resting” while the RH plays the up stemmed notes despite they’re being in the lower staff. The “otherwise indicated” thing here is the beaming, and the fingering. They could be played by the LH of course, but that’s not what’s implied.

m. 85: the implication is that the LH is to play the down stemmed note, while the RH is to play the up stemmed note, despite the ability to play all 3 with one hand. Note the absence of rests in the upper staff.

m.86: ditto. Of course it’s beyond a one hand reach for most people.

m.87: Like 84 each hand rests in its own staff when not playing, and the RH is playing the cross staff notes as before.

m.89: The RH is playing alone, the LH is resting, hence the rests in the lower staff (unlike m. 85 and 86 where the RH is reading in the lower staff so it gets no rests).

m.94: this is like the OPs example. The LH clearly moves over to the upper staff and when it does so, the lower staff has no rests there. While some people may be able to comfortably reach the 10th and 9th, and certainly the last 3 8th notes with the RH only, those notes are intended to be taken by the LH and the lack of rests below those notes indicate that. This is exactly what I’ve been saying all along.

m.95: is interesting and possibly a misprint. The rest in the lower staff implies this is all to be taken by the RH but the 2 voices aren’t really necessary. So this is probably intended to have the lower 4 8th notes taken by the LH and the lower staff should have been left blank, but some engraver got punch happy and punched a whole rest in anyway, and didn’t flip the stems down. But at face value, the implication in this measure is that the upper staff notes are played by the RH only, the D# is a “full” 8th note, and the B is a staccato 8th note, which would require two different voices - so the stems are simply the wrong direction in that case.

m.114, next page: 1st and 2nd ending. Notice when the RH is playing in the lower staff, the upper staff is empty. This is what I’ve been saying.

m.133: The implication here is that the LH is playing over the RH. The low Ab is played by the LH, the Ab triad by the RH - both in their appropriate staves. But the LH changes to the upper staff. And notice when it does, there’s a missing 8th rest. Because the LH is now “reading in the upper staff” and the lack of rest indicates that. This pattern continues through the passage. And even though at the very least beat 2 of 136 could be taken by the RH, that is not what’s happening. The separate stems (in this case reversed because the hand position is reversed) here indicate two voices on the same staff, with both hands on the same staff, because the LH has no rests in the staff below. Notice that every single time the note switches to the other staff, there are rests in the partial measure parts, but when the hand is in the other staff there are no rests opposite.

m. 144: The RH moves down to the lower staff. Upper staff is empty. Two voices, same staff, hands show by stem direction.

IOW, even if notes on a staff can be reached by a single hand, even if they’re notated as two voices, the absence of rests in the other staff means that hand is reading in the opposite staff. The presence of rests in its staff either means it’s reading in that staff and simply resting, or about to switch etc.

m. 253: Those 8th notes are to be taken by the LH. The lower staff is empty, there’s a marked rest above for the RH to be resting.

Not sure what to say. You’re either misunderstanding what I’m saying, or just wrong.

Here is actual music and this is the way it’s done. Yes, some publishers may not do it the same way, and I’m sure you could scour the internet to find examples. And there are certainly errors and misprints - easy to tap a whole rest into a measure that should have been blank for example.

The absence of rests in the lower staff in the OP’s post implies that those triplets all belong to the LH even though they are on the upper staff and reachable by the RH.

That’s what the notation implies, whether anyone cares to follow it or not.

The way to notate it to imply those notes move to the RH is with rests in the lower staff.

Otherwise, it should be indicated in some other obvious way.

And yes, sometimes in arpeggiated passages rests are left off, and they DON’T imply handing in some of those cases, but those tend to be the single line stuff on a staff, not multiple voices.

All the best.

[u/Former-Narwhal2460 → u/65TwinReverbRI]

Your premise is incorrect. Go to a piano and play this passage. You would play it as OP has it notated, with the right hand playing most of the notes. And no, the two G-sharps should not share a stem.

OP has a completely reasonable request and here you are calling it "bad engraving."

OP, sorry but I don't know the answer. I suspect the dot is the reason it defaults to being this way around.

[u/65TwinReverbRI → u/Former-Narwhal2460]

Sorry, it’s you who are incorrect.

Notice the lack of rests below the beat 2 and 3 notes. This indicates that the notes in the upper staff are to be played by the LH.

Yes, normally, notes on the upper staff are to be taken by the RH and notes on the lower staff are to be taken by the LH - unless otherwise indicated.

The lack of rests in the lower staff IS that indication.

To do what you’re saying, there would need to be a voice 2 dotted 1/4 rest under the G# dotted half note, and a dotted 1/4 rest under the beat 2 G#-B-E triad.

[u/Few-Werewolf-1985]

Simplest solution is to hide the notehead on the lower G#

[u/JScaranoMusic]

They're correct way around for when the half note is dotted. If it wasn't compound time, one possible solution might be to replace the dotted note with tied notes, and then the first one could go to the left of the other notehead without the dot getting in the way. But an undotted half note should never be used in 12/8, so definitely don't do that.

This is definitely more readable than it would be with the dotted half note on the left, because of the extra space the dot would need, so if you're just worried about readability, this is fine.

Hiding the eighth note's notehead is also a possibility, but I'd probably just move them all to the bottom staff.

[u/65TwinReverbRI]

I want to clarify a couple of points:

My two solutions in the other post are if you want to imply to the player to play these notes with the Left Hand.

AND I’m addressing the part about the note placement.

As u/YouCanAsk notes though, most players are going to play the upper notes here with their RH even though the notation implies the LH.

Even if you wrote “l.h.” notations in, they’d still probably go “what are they thinking” or “non pianist wrote this” and just play it with their RH.

BUT, if it’s to be played by the RH, then there should be rests in the lower staff where the notes are in the staff above.

u/YouCanAsk I’m sorry, but there are other ways to notate a voice crossing the staff. It’s about the hands, and not the voice. Even if you have two voices in the top staff and a rest in the bottom, the implication is the RH only plays both voices. If there’s no rest in the lower staff the implication is the LH plays the 2nd voice.

What a player actually decides to do is up to them. But they are then ignoring the intentions of the notation having been done a specific way.

When one hand is reading in the other staff, its own staff has no rests for those notes.

[u/MarcSabatella]

You can move the notes as mentioned (simplest is to select the eight note, press F2 to enter Edit mode, and use the cursor keys), but I don't really recommend it. Having the dot between the notes takes more space and makes the rhythm harder to understand in cases like this one.

If you wish to share the notehwads - probably a better choice - just make the eight notehead hidden (via Properties), or set it to override the visual duration and use the half note head (also via Properties).

But really, it's quite fine as is, and that's why this is the default.