Can the crescendo/decrescendo hairpins be moved freely?

[Ludwig Karl]

I wonder if the crescendo and decrescendo hairpins can be moved freely. So far whenever I place them under some notes I can't shift them either horizontally or vertically. Is there a way to do this? Sometimes I would like to adjust them for esthetics sake.

Thank you!

[Surfwhammy]

I wonder if the crescendo and decrescendo hairpins can be moved freely. So far whenever I place them under some notes I can't shift them either horizontally or vertically. Is there a way to do this? Sometimes I would like to adjust them for esthetics sake.

Thank you!

The best strategy is to use articulations and dynamics in a very consistent way, since if you put some of one type of articulation or dynamic above the staff but put other instances of it below the staff, this causes problems with NOTION 3 generating the audio correctly, so you want to use articulations and dynamics consistently . . .

I usually click the pointer in the middle of the staff when applying an articulation or dynamic, which then lets NOTION 3 determine where to put it, but for individual notes I select the note and then apply the articulation . . .

And there is a way select a set notes and then apply or remove an articulation for all the selected notes . . .

As a general rule, I put the loudness dynamics (piano, forte, so forth) below the staff, except that I usually avoid using loudness dynamics, since I prefer to control loudness dynamics in the Digital Performer 7.24 (MOTU) once I have recorded the NOTION 3 generated audio as soundbites via ReWire (Propellerhead Software), so I usually peg the volume sliders to 0dB in the NOTION 3 Mixer before doing the ReWire step, although I specifically set the panning location in the NOTION 3 Mixer, because the NOTION 3 Mixer has true stereo panning controls, which is very helpful . . .

For crescendos and stuff like that, I put all of them on top of the staff or I put all of them below the staff, where for the most part I use the "click in the middle of the staff" technique and let NOTION 3 determine where to put the first one, which then becomes the location for the other one on the same staff . . .

Sometimes for individual drums, I use staccato or one of the variations, and these are applied to the specific notes after I select the notes, so this is done by NOTION 3, where I think that general rule is that these types of articulations and dynamics usually go on the opposite side of the note with respect to the side where the stem of the note goes, where if the stem of a C4 quarter note goes upward, a staccato mark will go underneath the solid ellipse of the quarter note . . .

And for reference, the reason that I generally avoid using any articulations and dynamics is that unless the sample sounds for the instrument are done at every semitone and the musician is playing each semitone in the exact articulation and dynamic, what happens is that the rendering engine for the instrument computes non-sampled semitones and non-sampled articulations and dynamics using arbitrary algorithms, which usually have logarithmic aspects, since both pitch and loudness are logarithmic, all of which tends to make everything sound less than ideally realistic . . .

Also, I find it considerably simpler to avoid using different time signatures, key signatures, different clefs, and everything else, which for different clefs is very easy to do, where I use a treble clef for everything but adjust the way the notes are played on the treble clef via making them one or two octaves higher or lower as needed, where for electric bass and string bass, I use a treble clef that has its notes played two octaves lower, which for me is very convenient, since I learned how to read and to sight-sing treble clef as a child in a liturgical boys choir at a time when I was a soprano, which fits nicely with my general view that there are 12 notes and 8 octaves, which makes understanding music, instruments, and orchestration vastly easier than having to mess with 96 notes and a virtual festival of clefs that have varying offsets, key signatures, and all that stuff . . .

I also do everything in 4/4 time and the key of C, which basically is the "play by ear" or "what you hear is what you see (WYHIWYS)" strategy here in the sound isolation studio and is based in part on the practical perspective that there really do not need to be multiple names for each key on a piano or keyboard synthesizer . . .

In other words, here in the sound isolation studio there is C4 (a.k.a., "Middle C") and it is tuned to a 440-Hz (a.k.a., "Concert A") reference pitch, which avoids having to deal with such things as A##, B#, D♭♭, C♮, and so forth and so on . . .

Every note has one name, which is mathematically and geometrically elegant, plus it is vastly simpler . . .

From yet another perspective, this is based in part on a bit of serendipity which occurred soon after I got an Alesis ION Analog Modeling Synthesizer to make strange outer space sounds for one of my science fiction radio plays, where at the time I composed and played on a Fender American Deluxe Stratocaster® a bit of background music in real-time on the fly . . .

What happened was that I had the idea that it might be FUN to play some music on the synthesizer, which I did as an experiment, where I observed that all the white keys sounded good, which I thought was an odd thing, since I had no idea what the key signature for the guitar stuff was, and actually I continue to have few ideas what it might be, although C Major and A Minor Natural could be possibilities, except that you can make all the white notes be correct for any of the seven Greek modes and scales (Ionian, Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Mixolydian, Aeolian, Locrian) simply by using different root notes, as explained in the following video tutorial by Prof. Ruben Díaz, who actually understands all this stuff . . .

[NOTE: This is the prologue for one of the chapters in "Extreme Gravity™ Volume 2" (The Fabulously Fabulous Marvelously Marvelous Wonderfully Wonderful Science Fiction Theater of the Imagination™), and it has the guitar stuff and some drumkit and Latin percussion instruments, all played on real instruments, where basically I have no idea regarding the names of most of the guitar chords, what the key signature might be, or what mode it is, where for reference this was done before I discovered NOTION 3 and VSTi virtual instruments and realized that I already knew enough about music notation to be vastly productive, but so what . . . ]

"Chapter 8: Prologue" (The Fabulously Fabulous Marvelously Marvelous Wonderfully Wonderful Science Fiction Theater of the Imagination) -- MP3

Modes Applied to Flamenco (Prof. Ruben Díaz) -- YouTube video

Lots of FUN . . .