332: Drum notation - how to add open and closed articulations to hi-hats automatically

To input a note on a drum set (kit) staff that will play back as a closed hi-hat, just play G5 on your MIDI keyboard; likewise, an open hi-hat note is G#5. It's common to add open and closed articulation symbols to these notes. You can either do this by hand, adding the articulations from the fourth keypad layout, or, if you are willing to spend a few minutes, you can create custom open and closed hihat symbols which already have the articulation symbols built in.

Once you've set things up, you'll be able to export your new settings into a House Style for use in other documents. You'll need to edit three different areas of Sibelius:

1. Create a new symbol for both the open and closed hi-hat
2. Create two new X noteheads using a combination of symbols
3. Change the notehead assignments for open and closed hihat in the Drum Set Staff Type.

Creating new symbols

• First, choose House Style > Edit Symbols. Scroll down to the User Defined row, select the first open slot, and click Edit.
• In the Symbol dialog that opens, name this symbol Closed hi-hat.
• In the Number field, type 192 (which is the number of the X notehead).
• Now click in the Extra Symbols field to the right, and you will see the X appear in the staff above. Cick the Add button, and select the cross articulation called Closed / Mute Above. Position this above the X notehead 4 spaces above, and make sure it appears centered above the X.
• Click OK to confirm these changes.

The Open Hi-hat symbol is created using exactly the same process, substituting the Open / Harmonic Above symbol in the Extra Symbols field, which will appear above the X notehead.

When you OK the dialog, you should see both of your new hi-hat noteheads in the User-defined row.

Creating new noteheads

The next part of this process is to create two new notehead definitions.

• Choose House Style > Edit Noteheads, and click New. Name the notehead Closed hi-hat, select the solid notehead, and click the Change Symbol button.
• Locate your user-defined Closed hi-hat symbol and select it.
• Generally speaking, any longer note for hi-hat is going to be open by default, so you could put in the standard diamond noteheads for the other symbols. Of course, you could extend this combined symbol idea to include the longer durations if desired.

Once you've created the closed hi-hat notehead, you'll need to create a new notehead definition for the open hi-hat in the same way. When completed, exit the dialog.

Editing the drum set staff type

The final step of this process is to assign your new noteheads to the hi-hat for the drum set staff type, or whichever staff type you will be using for your hi-hats.

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Remember, you only have to do all of this once. Don't forget to export your new settings as a House Style. From now on, you'll be able to import these settings - the elements of the house style you'll need to import are Staff Types, Symbols and Noteheads.

Article provided by Robert Puff (www.musicprep.com)