On 06 Feb 2004, at 02:12 PM, Andrew Stiller wrote:
68: It is impossible to have two brackets of the same type in different horizontal positions, as for example when a divided string section uses extra staves. Sibelius forces you to use their "subsidiary bracket" (actually a desk bracket) for this purpose even in places where it is inappropriate--and heaven help you if you need more than three layers of bracketing. I find it very strange that an application developed in England would enforce a bracket style that is standard only in France and Russia.
** This is true. Not a problem for me personally, but if you work with large ensembles and need to conform to a particular publisher's style, this is tough to do at the moment.
Tough? It is totally impossible, as I took nearly 6 months finding out. I am therefore in the process of publishing a score that contains a notation I regard as flatly incorrect.
Just to clarify -- are you talking about using a curved brace (like a piano or harp brace) for divided string sections, instead of the thin rectangular bracket used to group staves of like wind instruments (like the Horn 1-2 and Horn 3-4 staves)?
Is there a reason why using the rectangular bracket on divided string staves is "flatly incorrect"? (I mean, beyond "because that's the way it's done," which is certainly reason enough.)
... - Darcy
First of all, let's get our brackets straight. The thin, rectangular bracket is what is properly called a "desk bracket." It is used, as someone else noted, only in France and Russia, and even there is properly used only (as its name implies) to link staves each of which represents the player(s) at a single music stand--not, therefore, for divisi strings.
But that's neither here nor there. I am talking about the *thick* rectangular bracket, wh. is the only form of square bracket used in most countries. Now, composers and publishers show an amazing variety of bracket practices in orchestral scores, especially as to where a piano brace should be used and where a square bracket. My house style, which is not at all idiosyncratic, is to use a (thick) square bracket to unite each of the major orchestral sections (WW, brass, perc., strings). Additional brackets are used for all further subdivisions of staves, the outermost of any such brackets being a piano brace, and all intervening levels being (thick!) square brackets. So in the piece in question, where I have two separate staves for the first violins, and two separate staves for the cellos, the bracket arrangement should be: a square bracket for all the strings, another square bracket for all the violins, a piano brace for the two first violin staves, and another for the two cello lines. Note that this requires two different horizontal positions for both the square brackets and the piano braces (the vn-1 brace is a third-layer bracket while the vc. brace is second-layer). Sibelius--at least Sibelius 2--simply cannot do this, so in order to approximate an appropriate bracketing, I have to use a desk bracket for vn. 1, which as indicated above is both nationally and procedurally incorrect.
Aside from my own standards, Sibelius' inability to show a single bracket style at multiple horizontal positions makes it unable to accurately reproduce the scores of, e.g., Mahler, who uses multiple levels of piano braces. Many, many composers/publishers use a single huge square bracket to link every staff in each system; under Sibelius, anyone following that convention cannot use another square bracket anywhere else in the score!
-- Andrew Stiller Kallisti Music Press
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