Lute Tablature Stems

In French/English lute tab, the stems used depart from standard notation as follows: Whole Note - short diagonal flag on left of stem Half Note - stem with no flag Quarter - Short diagonal flag on right of stem, never beamed Eighth - Two short diagonal flags, beamed Sixteenth, etc - Three flags, etc, 32nds rarely used The attached image shows output from Fronimo, a lute notation program well-known and used in lute circles, and shows what the stems should look like with regard to flags for French/English tab. Sibelius doesn't understand this and wants to apply standard notation stems. This results in the following: Whole Note - No stem Half Note - Stem with no flags Quarter - Stem with no flags This is rather ambiguous as only the spacing gives a clue to the note duration, and the spacing can vary significantly depending on what's in other lines, especially lyrics. There doesn't seem to be a way to specify alternate stems for tab, and without this ability it's a little problematic to claim support for lute and other early fretted instruments.

Comments (0) Bugs , lute, tablature, stems, duration