Subject: LilyPond 2.0  - make beautiful music prints


Dear music enthousiasts,


LilyPond version 2.0 was released today. LilyPond is an automated
music notation system: it is used to make gorgeous sheet music.  It is
libre software ("open source"), and available for most Unix flavors,
including Linux and MacOS X, and MS Windows.

Use it for your music too!

For this version, we have dramatically simplified many parts of the
syntax, making it easier to use than ever before.  Other improvements
include quarter-tone accidentals, and conditional inclusion of music
fragments. With version 2.0, we have a solid platform for working on
notation and typography features for coming versions.

Downloads, examples and documentation are available from the website,

	http://lilypond.org

A big thank-you goes out to our hackers and bughunters: Mats
Bengtsson, Heikki Junes, Juergen Reuter, Antonio Palama, Benjamin
Milde, Daniel Berjon Diez, David Bobroff, David Rayleigh Arnold, Erik
Ronstroem, Fabio dos Santos, Fodor Bertalan, Frederic Bron, Graham
Percival, Ian Bailey-Mortimer, John Williams, Josza Marton, Marco
Caliari, Matthieu Amiguet, Michael Welsh Duggan, Patrick Atamaniuk,
Paul Scott, Pedro Kroeger, Peter Lutek, Richard Schoeller, Thorkil
Wolvendans, and Werner Trobin


Happy music printing,



Han-Wen Nienhuys & Jan Nieuwenhuizen
(core development team)

New features in 2.0 since 1.8

• Crescendos can now be drawn dotted or dashed.
• Quarter tones are now supported. They are entered by suffixing ih for a half-sharp and eh for a half-flat. Hence, the following is an ascending list of pitches:

              ceses ceseh ces ceh c cih cis cisih cisis
            

• The following constructs have been removed from the syntax:

              \duration #SCHEME-DURATION
              \pitch #SCHEME-PITCH
              \outputproperty func symbol = value
            

  For \outputproperty, the following may be substituted:

               \applyoutput #(outputproperty-compatibility func
                              symbol value)
            

• Clefs may now be transposed arbitrarily, for example

              \clef "G_8"
              \clef "G_15"
              \clef "G_9"
            

• The syntax for chords and simultaneous music have changed. Chords are entered as

               <pitches>
            

  while simultaneous music is entered as

               <<..music list..>>
            

  In effect, the meanings of both have been swapped relative to their 1.8 definition. The syntax for lists in \markup has changed alongside, but figured bass mode was not changed, i.e.:

              \markup { \center <..list of markups..> }
              \figure { <figures> }
            

  As chords the more often used than simultaneous music, this change will save keystrokes.

• Each music expression can now be tagged, to make different printed versions from the same music expression. In the following example, we see two versions of a piece of music, one for the full score, and one with cue notes for the instrumental part:

            << \tag #'part <<
              { c4 f2 g4 }      % in the part, we have cue-notes
              \\ R1 >>
              \tag #'score R1  % in the score: only a rest
            >>
            

  The same can be applied to articulations, texts, etc.: they are made by prepending

                    -\tag #your-tags
            

  to an articulation, for example,

                    c4-\tag #'with-fingerings -4 -\tag #'with-strings \6
            

  This defines a note, which has a conditional fingering and a string-number indication.

• The settings for chord-fingering are more flexible. You can specify a list where fingerings may be placed, eg.

              \property Voice.fingeringOrientations = #'(left down)
            

  This will put the fingering for the lowest note below the chord, and the rest to the left.

• The script previously known as ly2dvi has been renamed to lilypond. The binary itself is now installed as lilypond-bin.
• Markup text (ie. general text formatting) may now be used for lyrics too.
• Two new commands for grace notes have been added, \acciaccatura and \appoggiatura,

              \appoggiatura f8 e4
              \acciaccatura g8 f4
            

  Both reflect the traditional meanings of acciaccatura and appogiatura, and both insert insert a slur from the first grace note to the main note.

• Layout options for grace notes are now stored in a context property, and may now be set separately from musical content.
• The \new command will create a context with a unique name automatically. Hence, for multi-staff scores, it is no longer necessary to invent arbitrary context names. For example, a two-staff score may be created by

              \simultaneous {
                \new Staff { notes for 1st staff }
                \new Staff { notes for 2nd staff }
              }
            

• Octave checks make octave errors easier to correct. The syntax is

              \octave pitch
            

  This checks that pitch (without octave) yields pitch (with octave) in \relative mode. If not, a warning is printed, and the octave is corrected.

• All articulations must now be entered postfix. For example,

              c8[( d8])
            

  is a pair of beamed slurred eighth notes.

• The definition of \relative has been simplified. Octaves are now always propagated in the order that music is entered. In the following example,

              PRE
              \repeat "unfold" 3  BODY \alternative { ALT1 ALT2 }
              POST
            

  the octave of BODY is based on PRE, the starting octave of ALT1 on BODY, the starting octave of ALT2 on ALT1, and the starting octave of POST on ALT2.

  The same mechanism is used for all other music expressions, except the chord. Backwards compatibility is retained through a special program option, which is set through

              #(ly:set-option 'old-relative)
            

• Windows users can double click a .ly file to process and view it automagically through the new lily-wins frontend.