Whole rests

To save you extra work, PrintMusic automatically places a default whole rest in every blank measure in the score. It’s important to understand the difference between one of these default whole rests and a real whole rest that you’ve entered yourself using any of PrintMusic’s music input methods.

For example, a chord or a lyric syllable may be attached to a real whole rest (although PrintMusic automatically skips rests when assigning lyrics by itself). Only a real whole rest can be moved up or down with the Speedy Entry tool.

PrintMusic considers a “real” whole rest an entry—something you placed in the score—just like a note or another kind of rest. Therefore, a real whole rest will not be part of a multimeasure block rest when you extract parts; it will be placed in a measure by itself.

To add a real whole rest

• Click the Speedy Entry tool  , and click the measure in question. The editing frame appears.
• Press the 7 key. Unless Use MIDI Keyboard has been turned off in the Speedy menu, a whole rest appears. (If not, a whole note appears; click it and press clear or shift-delete to turn it into a whole rest.)

To move a real whole rest

• Click the Speedy Entry tool  , and click the measure in question. The editing frame appears.
• Drag the rest up or down. You can drag the whole rest to any line or space. It always appears with a short staff line segment when drawn in the score, so it won’t be confused with a half rest.

To fill measures with rests

• Click the Selection tool  , and select the region of music to fill with rests. Refer to Selecting music for different methods of selecting regions.
• From the Utilities menu, choose Check Notation, then Fill With Rests. PrintMusic scans each measure in the selected region, and automatically fills incomplete measures by adding the correct number of rests. (Of course, if Fill With Rests When Leaving Measure is checked in the Speedy Options dialog box, PrintMusic will automatically fill up any incomplete measure when you exit that measure. See Speedy Options dialog box for more information.) Note that PrintMusic does not convert empty measures to measures with actual whole rests.

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