The disappearing glissando - a horizontal spacing saga

[Paul Hodges]

1) The problem

I have a grace note several degrees higher than the main note, and I have to draw a glissando between them.  This works if the main note has no accidental (though it's skimpy because of the minimal X-space available; but if the main note has an accidental then the grace note is placed above it and the X-space available for the glissando goes negative (as the end-point is before the accidental) and nothing appears.

2) Possible solutions

The composer has drawn the glissando to the note head, not to the accidental - this would work adequately, but the spacing would still be tight - and in any case I couldn't find any way to make this happen.

The horizontal spacing between the grace note and the main note could be increased.  Again, I couldn't find a way to do this directly, not least because most tweaks and overrides I thought of appear to operate simultaneously on both the notes.

3) Where I'm at

I have got somewhere with increasing the space used by the accidental - but again, this has an affect on the grace note, forcing it across unless there is nothing anywhere nearby.  As this follows a clef in my score, I tried giving the clef a negative extent - but that caused it to overlap the notes entirely.

Clearly I don't understand horizontal spacing adequately.

The example has three parts: the first is what I'm trying to produce - the glissando is fine, but the spacing from the clef is too great; the second shows the way the glissando gets lost; the third shows that my solution kinda works if the unwanted extension of the grace note is somewhere harmless.

Any clarification or advice would be greatly appreciated!

Regards,

Paul