9. The Score

Transposing instruments and concert pitch

Some instruments read a part written in another key than they sound: a B♭ trumpet’s written C sounds a B♭, an alto sax’s sounds an E♭. Stab keeps every note as it sounds, so playback and the Editor are always right, and writes the part transposed only where a player reads it.

Transposing instruments

Available on every platform.

Setting a track’s transposition

Right-click the track’s header and choose Transposition:

• Concert Pitch (as It Sounds): the default.
• B♭: Trumpet, Clarinet, Soprano Sax: written a tone higher.
• A: Clarinet in A: a minor third higher.
• F: Horn, English Horn: a fifth higher.
• E♭: Alto Sax, E♭ Clarinet: a major sixth higher.
• B♭, an Octave Lower: Tenor Sax, Bass Clarinet: a ninth higher.
• E♭, an Octave Lower: Baritone Sax: an octave and a sixth higher.
• An Octave Higher: Piccolo, Glockenspiel: written an octave lower than it sounds.

It’s one undo step, and it changes nothing you hear. Drum and audio tracks have no transposition. A Guitar Pro 6–8 or MusicXML file brings its parts’ transpositions with it.

Where the part is written transposed

• Presentations, such as a full score and its parts, are written as the players read them: each transposing part at its written pitch, with its own key signature, its notes spelt in that key and its chord symbols renamed in it. See Presentations and parts.
• The working score is at concert pitch, everything as it sounds, which is easiest to write and check harmony in.
• A Stage showing one part reads it written, for the player in front of it. See Presets, parts and the band.

The Editor, the tab, playback and exports of sound are always at concert pitch.

Switching between them

In a Score pane’s ⚙, Concert Pitch is on while what the pane shows is at concert pitch. Choose it to switch:

• On the working score, it’s this pane’s view only: one pane can show concert pitch while another shows the parts as written.
• On a presentation, it changes the presentation itself, as one undo step: a conductor’s score in C, say. Its PDF follows.