# Entering Scores

&frescobaldi; provides a host of features to help you to enter &lilypond; music scores as fast as possible.

## Score Setup Wizard

The Score Setup Wizard, at Ctrl+Shift+N &lilypond; Setup New Score... , makes for a quick start of many types of music score. In the first tab you can enter titling information, in the second tab you can compose your score of many available part types. Doubleclick a part type to add it to your score (or click Add). Select the part in the score list to change some settings for the selected part, if desired. Many parts, especially Choir, have powerful options to set up the score the way you want it.

### Score Wizard: Titles and Headers

Score Wizard: Titles and Headers

### Score Wizard: Parts setup

Score Wizard: Parts setup

In the third tab you can set some general adjustments, e.g. whether to create MIDI output or not, which key and time signature you want to use, etc:

### Score Wizard: Score settings

Score Wizard: Score settings

Clicking Try presents a demo score with some random notes filled in. Clicking Ok writes the &lilypond; code to your text document, waiting for music etc. to be added.

## Context Sensitive Autocompletion

&frescobaldi; has a context-sensitive automatic completion feature. In most cases it will be enabled by default. It will pop up relevant completions as you type. The autocompletion popup can be enabled or disabled under Settings Configure &frescobaldi; Editor component Editing Auto Completion . Even if disabled, you can always show the popup with Ctrl+Space.

## Quick Text Expansions

Type e.g. `rel` and then press Ctrl+. (period). &frescobaldi; will expand it to:

    \relative c' {

    }

and place the cursor right after the pitch so you could change it. If you then move the cursor a line down, you can start typing music notes or other shortcut names. E.g. typing `F` and then Ctrl+. yields `\key f \major`. There are many more default shortcuts.

Press Ctrl+. (without having entered an existing shortcut name) to open a dialog with all defined text snippets. In this dialog you can also add, alter or remove snippets. It is also possible to assign a keyboard shortcut to a snippet so that it can be entered with a simple keystroke, without typing the short name.

All changes you make in the dialog are immediately saved. So clicking Cancel will still keep the changes. Clicking OK will enter the currently selected snippet in the text editor. See the "What's This" info (Shift+F1) in the dialog for more information.

Some quick text expansions have default keyboard shortcuts. The most important ones are listed below:

Alt+1 | Enter `\voiceOne`
Alt+2 | Enter `\voiceTwo`
Alt+3 | Enter `\voiceThree`
Alt+4 | Enter `\voiceFour`
Alt+0 | Enter `\oneVoice`
Ctrl+3 | Enter `\times 2/3 { }` and leave the cursor between the brackets
Alt+M, Alt+B | Enter `\markup \bold { }` and leave the cursor between the brackets
Alt+M, Alt+I | Enter `\markup \italic { }` and leave the cursor between the brackets

## MIDI input via Rumor (&linux; only)

&frescobaldi; can use an external program called Rumor, enabling you to enter music just by playing it on a MIDI keyboard (or even your computer keyboard). This has some limitations: you can only play monophonic music (notes or chords). Rumor also does not support tuplets. To use Rumor within &frescobaldi;, you must have installed it separately. Refer to the Rumor homepage for download and install information.

### Setup

Start the Rumor plugin with Meta+Alt+R or by clicking on its tab in the bottom of the &frescobaldi; window. The Rumor panel appears at the bottom. In the panel is a settings button where you can configure which MIDI input and output you want to use.

If you have a MIDI keyboard controller but no audible output device you can run an ALSA MIDI-client like &timidity;. Many &linux; distributions already start &timidity; by default on bootup. But &frescobaldi; can also run it for you when you press the TiMidity-button. You can configure the command to run in the main settings dialog under &menu.settings.rumor;.

If you have no MIDI-controller you can also set the MIDI input to 'Computer Keyboard' in the settings screen of the Rumor plugin. This way you can play on your computer keyboard like a piano.

### Entering music

Clicking the Record button starts Rumor. If all is well you hear a metronome and you can start playing; you'll see the notes appear. Clicking Record again or pressing Escape stops Rumor. If you already entered the key and time signature in your document, &frescobaldi; will automatically use it, to interpret alterations correctly. &frescobaldi; will also output pitches automatically in the language you use in the document.

You can configure the shortest note value to use using the Quantise option. If you enable the Step checkbox, Rumor will directly output every note played, without a duration. If you enable the Mono checkbox, Rumor will not output chords, but only single notes.

Under the Settings button you can configure some more settings. A powerful feature of Rumor is that it can load special scripts that change the Rumor output. This is useful when you write e.g. music with complicated rhythms. You can configure which scripts to load, and even put your own Rumor Guile scripts in `~/.kde/share/apps/frescobaldi/rumor/`. More information about writing Rumor scripts is on the Rumor homepage.

## Quick Insert Panel

The Quick Insert Panel (Meta+Alt+I) is available in the left dock. It has panels to add articulations, dynamics and other symbols to your music. You can use the mouse wheel to quickly flip through the panels.

Some music symbols can be place above the staff or below, or in a neutral (default) position. If you want to use an explicit position for those symbols, you can adjust the Direction control to Up, Down or Neutral before clicking the symbol.

Right-click a button to configure its keyboard shortcut if you want to. Some buttons have default keyboard shortcuts:

Alt+' | Enter a breathing sign `\breathe`
Ctrl+( | Enter a slur over the selected music fragment
Alt+. | Enter a final bar line `\bar "|."`
Alt+; | Enter a double bar line `\bar "||"`

### The Articulations panel

You can just click on a note in the PDF preview and then on an articulation symbol in the articulations panel. The articulations panel is smart enough to place the articulation after the current note or chord and its duration.

If you select a range of text and then click a symbol, the symbol will be added to all notes or chords in the selected music fragment.

You can select a music fragment using the PDF preview: click the first note of the range you want to select and then shift-click the second note.

### The Dynamics panel

Typing single dynamics in &lilypond; is not difficult at all, but the power of this panel is the possibility to easily insert crescendos and diminuendos in ranges of music.

If no music is selected the dynamic sign is just placed after the current note or chord. If a range of music has been selected (e.g. using the preview), you can click e.g. a dynamic mark, a spanner and another mark, to add them to your music. If you only click a spanner and a mark, the mark will be added at the end.

### The Spanners panel

This panel lets you add slurs, beams or trills to a selected music fragment. Arpeggios can be added to the chord the cursor is at, and glissandos can be added to the current note; &lilypond; will automatically conenct them with the next note.

### The Bar Lines panel

With this panel you can insert many different kinds of bar lines and breathing signs.

## Other shortcuts

Ctrl+; Repeat last note or chord repeats the last entered note or chord with all its suffixes (ties, articulations, etc.)

Ctrl+{ Insert pair of braces inserts a pair of braces `{ }` with an empty, indented line in between and places the cursor there. If text is selected, it is placed between the braces.

Ctrl+Y Special Characters opens a dialog where characters from the Unicode table can be browsed and selected. Doubleclick a character (or click Apply) to insert the currently selected character into the document. It is also possible to assign a keyboard shortcut to the currently selected character.