4. Techniques

Grace notes

Grace notes are quick notes that ornament another: a hammered grace into a fretted note, a slid grace, a flam on a drum. They belong to the note they ornament, so they move, copy and delete with it, and the note itself stays on its beat. A note can carry up to eight.

Grace notes and the grace editor

Available on every platform.

Add a grace note

Select the notes, or put the caret on one, then:

• Add Grace Note (⌥G)Add Grace Note (Alt+G)Add Grace Note (Alt+G (⌥G on a Mac)) adds a grace before the beat: it takes its time from what comes before, and the note sounds on its beat.
• Add Grace Note on the Beat (⌥⇧G)Add Grace Note on the Beat (Alt+Shift+G)Add Grace Note on the Beat (Alt+Shift+G (⌥⇧G on a Mac)) adds one on the beat: the grace sounds on the beat, and the note sounds just after it.

You’ll find them in the Edit menu or the note’s menu; the note’s menu has both under Grace Notes. A new grace is a thirty-second note long:

• on a fretted string, two frets below the note on the same string and hammered on (two above when the note is too low);
• on a keys track, a whole tone below;
• on a drum hit, the same drum, softer: a flam.

A note that already has graces gets one more ahead of them. Adding to one note opens its grace editor. Grace Notes › Remove Grace Notes in the note’s menu takes them all off the selected notes. Each of these is one undo step.

In the tab

A note’s graces are drawn as a small prefix to its fret, each on its own string: “5”, “5 7”, or “x” for a dead one. In a Score pane, they’re small notes before their note, slashed, and slurred into it.

The grace editor

Select a single note with graces and the grace editor opens over the pane’s lower right corner, left of the bend editor if both show. It zooms in on the start of the note: the note’s beat is the line marked beat, time runs across on a grid of 128ths, and the strings run down (on a keys track, the pitches around the note; on a drum track, its lanes). Its title says where the graces are: “Grace notes · before the beat”, “on the beat” or “across the beat”.

• Move a grace: drag it, along in time or onto another string or pitch.
• Change its length: drag its right edge.
• Add one: double-click an empty place.
• Remove one: double-click it.
• Select one: click it. Then the digits type its fret, ← and → move it along the grid, ↑ and ↓ move it to another string (on a keys track, change its pitch), and ⌫ removes it.

Drags snap to the 128ths grid. Hold ⌃Ctrl while dragging for free timing. Graces reach at most two beats either side of the note’s start.

The buttons along the bottom:

• Before and On beat move the whole group, keeping its shape: ending on the beat, or starting on it.
• Legato and Dead turn that on or off for the selected grace, or for every grace when none is selected. A legato grace is hammered or pulled into what follows, with no new pluck; a dead one is a muted scratch.
• Remove removes the selected grace, or all of them.

In the tools tray the same choices are buttons a finger finds: Before the Beat and On the Beat as one switch; − and + round the selected grace’s fret (on a keys part, its pitch), beside Legato and Dead; + Add Grace, which puts one more ahead of the others on the note’s string and fret and selects it; and Remove This Grace (with none selected, Remove All Graces). Double taps still work.

Right-click the editor for the same choices in a menu, with Close Grace Editor. The × in the corner puts the editor away until you select another note. Each change is one undo step, a whole drag included. The grace editor doesn’t open in the Arranger.