Multi-measure rests and text markup

[John Williams]

The score below is my attempt to summarize the bugs, features, and
problems I am having trying to put text markup on multi-measure rests.

Illustrating the horizontal spacing problem requires a couple lines of
music, but the rest of the issues are one or two measures.

GNU LilyPond 1.7.15
Red Hat Linux release 7.2 (with various upgrades to compile lilypond)
Linux sharkpad 2.4.7-10 #1 Thu Sep 6 17:27:27 EDT 2001 i686 unknown

~ John Williams


\score {
\notes {
\property Score.skipBars = ##t
\clef bass
\key f \minor
\time 4/4

% Markup replaces number of measures.  feature or bug?
R1*20^\markup { \roman "Begin" }

% Only numbers exist in default font.  Documented, but a trap for newbies.
R1_\markup { "a1b2c3" }

% Only the first script is displayed.  Cannot get text both above and beneath.
R1*10_\markup { \roman "Tacet" }^"10"
R1*10^"10"_\markup { \roman "Tacet" }

% Text is always centered.  Is there any way to left-justify?
R1*10^\markup{ \roman \column << "I" >> }
% Actually lines are left-justified to each other, but are centered as a unit.
R1*11^\markup{ \roman \column << "I" "zzz" >> }

% This separates the first measure from the rest of the multi-measure rest.
< R1*50 s1_"Largo" >



% Example of spacing problems from <R1*30 s_"Text">

% The spacing here is nice.
a4 b c d e f g a |
% (you may need a break here to see the contrast better)
\break
% The spacing from here on is very cramped.
a4 b c d e f g a |
% This is the desired effect, but causes spacing problems.
<R1*50 s_\markup { "Tacet" }>
a4 b8 c b4 c8 d |
e8 f g f g a g a |
c2 ~ c2 |
g1
g16 b c a b e ees f    fis fis des a c cis ces g |
a4 c2 ees4
c'8-( bes a g   fis e des c-)  % I like the new consistent style markup
c'8-( bes a g   fis e des c-)
<<c c'>>1
}
}