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Simulating a fermata in MIDI

For outside-staff objects it is usually better to override the object’s stencil property rather than its transparent property when you wish to remove it from the printed output. Setting the stencil property of an object to #f will remove that object entirely from the printed output. This means it has no effect on the placement of other objects placed relative to it.

For example, if we wished to change the metronome setting in order to simulate a fermata in the MIDI output we would not want the metronome markings to appear in the printed output, and we would not want it to influence the spacing between the two systems or the positions of adjacent annotations on the staff. So setting its stencil property to #f would be the best way. We show here the effect of the two methods:

\score {
  \relative {
    % Visible tempo marking
    \tempo 4=120
    a'4 a a
    \once \hide Score.MetronomeMark
    % Invisible tempo marking to lengthen fermata in MIDI
    \tempo 4=80
    a4\fermata |
    % New tempo for next section
    \tempo 4=100
    a4 a a a |
  }
  \layout { }
  \midi { }
}

\score {
  \relative {
    % Visible tempo marking
    \tempo 4=120
    a'4 a a
    \once \omit Score.MetronomeMark
    % Invisible tempo marking to lengthen fermata in MIDI
    \tempo 4=80
    a4\fermata |
    % New tempo for next section
    \tempo 4=100
    a4 a a a |
  }
  \layout { }
  \midi { }
}

Both methods remove the metronome mark which lengthens the fermata from the printed output, and both affect the MIDI timing as required, but the transparent metronome mark in the first line forces the following tempo indication too high while the second (with the stencil removed) does not.

See also

Music Glossary: system.