Re: Problem with initial grace note

[Valentin Villenave]

On Tue, Mar 9, 2010 at 12:12 AM, Patrick Karl <address@hidden> wrote:
> Since I don't have any other staves, how does this note apply to my case?

This applies to your case because by using << >> instead of { } you're
actually creating *two* Voices. Using braces after \new ChoirStaff
solves the problem.

> And doesn't the above sentence, "Grace note synchronization can also lead to
> surprises", really mean that grace note implementation is buggy?  It looks
> to me that people have been bitten by these bugs since at least 2004 or so.

Grace note implementation is unconvenient, but does not prevent anyone
from engraving any kind of music. Of course, this sometimes requires
to carefully check your source code when grace notes are involved.

> I guess I'll have to concentrate on engraving music for composers who avoid
> initial grace notes.,

*My* guess would be that you need to clear up *your* source code and
understand the LilyPond logic rather than blaming it on the
developers.

<< >> constructs are for *simultaneous* events, while expressions are
enclosed with { }. Using << >> after \new ChoirStaff would only be
relevant if you had several staves in your ChoirStaff :

\new ChoirStaff <<
  \new Staff { \time 4/4 music music music }
  \new Staff { some other music }
>>

And then again, you'd need curly braces after \new Staff -- unless you
need to have multiple voices in your staff, in which case you'd need
to have

\new Staff <<
  \new Voice { \time 4/4 music music }
  \new Voice { blah blah blah }
>>

But as you can see, braces are *always* used as soon as simultaneous
events aren't needed anymore.

For your information, there already are thousands of scores engraved
with LilyPond, some of which are used by major orchestras in the
world. I am pretty sure most of these scores do include grace notes.

Cheers,
Valentin Villenave.