mpdolce - LilyPond

Chapter 3: Fundamental concepts 69
3.4.1 Soprano and cello
Start off with the template that seems closest to what you want to end up with. Let’s say that
you want to write something for soprano and cello. In this case, we would start with ‘Notes and
lyrics’ (for the soprano part).
\version "2.12.3"
melody = \relative c' {
\clef treble
\key c \major
\time 4/4
a4 b c d
}
text = \lyricmode {
Aaa Bee Cee Dee
}
\score {
>
\layout { }
\midi { }
}
Now we want to add a cello part. Let’s look at the ‘Notes only’ example:
\version "2.12.3"
melody = \relative c' {
\clef treble
\key c \major
\time 4/4
a4 b c d
}
\score {
\new Staff \melody
\layout { }
\midi { }
}
We don’t need two \version commands. We’ll need the melody section. We don’t want two
\score sections – if we had two \scores, we’d get the two parts separately. We want them
together, as a duet. Within the \score section, we don’t need two \layout or \midi.
If we simply cut and paste the melody section, we would end up with two melody definitions.
This would not generate an error, but the second one would be used for both melodies. So
let’s rename them to make them distinct. We’ll call the section for the soprano sopranoMusic
and the section for the cello celloMusic. While we’re doing this, let’s rename text to be
sopranoLyrics. Remember to rename both instances of all these names – both the initial
definition (the melody = \relative c' { part) and the name’s use (in the \score section).