6. Chords and lyrics

Lyrics and verses

Lyrics in Stab belong to the notes they’re sung on: a syllable on each note of a melody. They move, copy and repeat with their notes, light up as the song plays, and the Score writes them under the staff. The Stage shows them to a singer, a line at a time (The Stage).

Lyrics

Available on every platform.

Typing lyrics

You type a clip’s lyrics as one line, the way Guitar Pro takes them, and Stab puts each syllable on the next note:

1. Show the Lyrics row in an Editor pane: Song Rows in the View menu or the pane’s ⚙ menu (Song rows). It shows the lyrics of the selected track, or the caret’s, and says whose after its name.
2. Double-click the row over the note the words start on. A field opens with what’s already sung from there.
3. Type the words with spaces between them and a hyphen between the syllables of a word: Ma-ry had a lit-tle lamb.
4. Press ReturnEnter.

In a Score pane, select the note the words start on and press ⌥LAlt+LAlt+L (⌥L on a Mac); the field opens under the staff. Worked by touch, the tray’s Note tool has Lyrics… for it (on a phone, with the tool at its full height).

How the words land:

• One syllable a note, in order. A chord takes one syllable, as one moment.
• To the end of the clip. Words left over when its notes run out are left out.
• What you type replaces what was sung from that note on. Commit an empty field to clear the lyrics from that note to the clip’s end.
• A hyphen joins a syllable to the next one, and is written between them. A very long syllable is cut short.
• A note sung on the syllable before (a melisma) takes an extra hyphen: lo--ve holds “lo” over the second note and sings “ve” on the third; between words, a hyphen on its own does the same, love - you. The field shows them that way when it opens, so the line types back where it was.

Each line you commit is one undo step.

Once a track has lyrics, a Lyrics strip appears under its rows in every Editor pane, so you don’t need the row to see them. The strip works as the row does: click a syllable to put the caret on its note, double-click to type from the note nearest.

Where they show

• The Lyrics row and strip: each syllable at its note, cut before the next; while playing, the syllable being sung is lit.
• The Score: under the staff of their part, in the Lyrics font Score Setup sets (Score Setup).
• The Stage: under the chords in Lines, or a line at a time in Lyrics, the syllable lit as it’s sung. Show Lyrics in its menu turns them off.

Verses

Available on every platform.

A passage that plays more than once (a clip that repeats, or a linked copy of it) plays the same notes each time. Its verses ride on those notes: each note holds a syllable for up to five verses, and the second pass sings verse 2, the third verse 3, up to the fifth.

Writing a verse

Type a verse on the pass that sings it: double-click the Lyrics row or strip over the second time the passage plays, and what you type is verse 2. In the Score, ⌥LAlt+LAlt+L (⌥L on a Mac) types the verse of the pass the caret is in. The field shows that verse’s words, so you can correct one verse without touching the others.

Which verse plays

• A passage with one verse sings it every time it plays.
• Once it has more, each pass sings its own, and a pass with no verse sings nothing there.

The row, the strip and the Stage show the verse of the pass playing. The Score writes the verses stacked under the staff, a line each, where it writes the passage once between repeat signs; where the passes are written out, each shows its own.

Lyrics from files

• Guitar Pro (3–8): the lyrics and their verses (Guitar Pro).
• MusicXML: lyrics, up to five verses (MusicXML).
• MIDI: lyric events, or a karaoke file’s text (one tagged with “@”), each on the note nearest (MIDI files).

Exports keep them too: MusicXML with its verses, MIDI as syllables on their notes, Guitar Pro as one track’s lyrics, a .gp with each pass’s verse (Saving and exporting).