Dear All
I am trying to recreate the tab in the attachment. I’m struggling to achieve the pre-note slides at the start (with no note given as a departure) and the 1/4 tone bends at the end (with no destination note).
On the second point, after searching the forum I found this post viewtopic.php?t=167552 where 24-TET is enabled for the passage, a grace note added a quarter tone above and the bend applied. Is this the closest the software can get to the notation?
I think people have requested elsewhere a more concise bend notation in future releases where no destination note is given, particularly for repeated bends, and I would also request that - the “1/4” text tells you all you need to know - plus here there is the added complication of adding the quarter note.
All help gratefully received on both points and I’d be delighted to hear of really obvious workarounds that I’ve missed for both cases!
The slides are available from the jazz articulations panel.
As for the bends, the notation must exist in both standard notation and TAB, as either can be hidden in the layout. In the example you posted, the bends are not shown in the standard notation, which is a problem.
To properly notate these bends, there’s two options. Either use a gracenote quarter tone bend, or use the doit jazz articulation and use staff text to write ¼. Either is fine in this context.
Hi ChuckDimeCliff
Thank you - very useful. On the 1/4 tone bend, I agree that the end results of both methods you give are clear.
I think there is still scope for a feature request to add standard bends to a single note (reflected in both standard notation and TAB) to give the ability to tab common examples such as the Guns N’ Roses tab at 31:06 in Dorico 3 review: Guitar features - YouTube. The grace note quarter note bend method requires adding the microtones and still has what is really an unnecessary grace note for reading the tab. The jazz notation method sits awkwardly if all your other bends are the guitar type - plus it contains an element of DIY with the text labelling and you’d ideally try to get the 1/4 label above both the standard score and the tab.
Given how common these 1/4 tone bends are in blues etc, an even simpler method would be good to see supported.
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I opened Guitarist magazine at random today and immediately found another example of a 1/4 tone bend (see attachment).
I think of the two workarounds suggested here - while I am very grateful to be aware of them - the jazz ornament method looks very different from all the other bends in a tab (and would not play back correctly when the promised playback of bends is introduced), and the grace note method is also clearly non-standard - I very much doubt if there has been a 1/4 tone bend in the history of printed tab leading to a grace note with a microtone accidental against it.
A future option of being able to apply bends to a single note, not leading to any other note, with the ability to define the tone bend amount, would be a very useful addition to be able to reproduce common tabs such as the one I’ve attached.
Are there any plans to introduce this please?
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We certainly don’t rule anything out, but it’s not something we’re actively working on right at this minute.
