Hi Peeps.

I've been getting into some old material I wrote for guitar during second year composition and wanted to get the sounds together of low melody strings.

For me, this brings up the question of notation for crossed / uncrossed.

Hey Greg, I've really enjoyed the improvements to staff tab, but I'm just not sure how folk manage to notate these changes crossed / uncrossed.

For example, I have used bass notes in their correct stem position for crossed, then reverse the stem for uncrossed.

Hope that makes sense.

Maybe a little note that says "Hands uncrossed" or HU and another note that says "Hands Crossed" or HC would be simplest in my mind; It could get a little whacky looking at a clef with the note stems all willy-nilly...

lol Nobody will probably ever look at my scores, so I am pretty much fee to do whatever I want hahah

Hi Jaye.

Classic. Yeah, I'm sure folk have their own way of notating these things.

Rad, me old!

I used the different stem orientation in Chapter 8 of The Stick Book for the two-handed bass, with the adition of putting the fret numbers for the right hand above the staff in question. If you don't want to go through the trouble of reversing the stems, I think just using the fret numbers in each hand's location is fine.

Cheers!

I think if I were notating uncrossed playing I would simply reverse the clefs on the grand staff the way it's often done in piano scores. Haven't tried it though, so I'm not totally sure it would work.

For playing on a single side with both hands I would most likely show the separation with stem directions if possible.

Yeah, I think that for me, a little note in brackets, and just bass and treble clef works best for me. My poor little mind wants the score as simple as possible. Adding a 3rd clef or messing with the stem directions looked kind of funny, didn't really present a distinct advantage.

lol I will, however be on the lookout for that sort of thing in people's scores that they share...

I’m not sure if you’re referring to playing uncrossed consistently or simply how to note crossing over occasionally or two-hand melodic playing.

In piano music (and StaffTab I would assume), the assumption is notes in the treble staff are played by the RH and notes in the bass staff are played by the LH. So any point where the hand is playing notes in the other staff should be noted in some way - usually just by letters denoting the hand, sometimes with a curved line, especially where one hands crosses over as part of a phrase. When both hands play consistently in one staff, it’s typically noted with stem directions, but I think this is usually when the hands are playing distinct parts/voices.

In more complex pieces where both hands go outside of their normal range, I’ve seen a third staff added generally with notes about what hand is playing what (see Ravel “La Vallee des Cloches”). Ligeti’s piano etudes also use a fair amount of the hand playing in the other staff.

For playing two-hands on one side of the Stick, I like Greg’s approach. I prefer the method using only the fret numbers above or below, I find that reversing the stems makes it difficult to read the rhythms quickly.

Thanks everyone for your comments.

What you said, Claire. that makes perfect sense, in collaboration with the advancements made to Stafftab.