Re: lyrics free from notes

[Mats Bengtsson]

Trevor Bača wrote:

> Oh cool Devnull magic; (if I had turned over to 7.3.7.5 "Lyrics
> independent of notes" I could have found it there).
>
> Is it possible to use the Devnull context as a general type of
> "reference voice" maker for items other than lyrics? Something like
> this to rhythmically position the dynamics against a hidden reference
> voice ...
>
> %%% BEGIN %%%
>
> \version "2.11.23"
>
> \new Staff <<
>   \new Devnull {
>      c'8 \p
>      c'8 \f
>      c'8 \p
>      c'8 \f
>   }
>   \new Voice {
>      c'4 c'4 c'4
>   }
>
> > >
>
> %%% END %%%
>
>
> ... but with, of course, the dynamics sticking around while only the
> Devnull *notes* disappear?

You cannot do any such general purpose Devnull context.
How should it know that it's exactly the dynamics that you
want to keep this time (maybe it's the rehearsal marks or
the text scripts or whatever else the next time).

If you lookup the definition of the context, you will see that
it's very simple. Unfortunately, you cannot use the similar
idea always. For example, in the specific situation you
describe where you want to typeset the dynamics, I made
an attempt to define a similar context where I had removed
all engravers related to ordinary notes, but  it resulted in a
more or less severe crash, since some engravers need
the results from others in order to work.

> I guess not since the purpose of Devnull is to junk stuff. But how
> cool it would be to have a generic type of context in which you could
> stuff all sorts of (possibly floating) decorative stuff -- spanners,
> dynamics, arbitrary text scripts -- and have all the reference notes
> to which those things attach simply disappear ...

  /Mats