Creating Musical Examples without Meter

[ivan . k . kuznetsov]

I would like to be able to use Lilypond to create musical
examples for inclusion in papers and slides, and often,
these musical examples will have no notated meter.

With such examples, I will want to control exactly how much
space each examples takes so that they can "line up" with
other examples on my slides.

As far as I can tell, the only tool to notate "unmetered"
music  is the \cadenzaOn,\cadenzaOff pair of tags.
Am I right about this, or are there other ways?

Appended is an in-progress example I am working on.  Yes, both
systems are identical, at this point I am just trying to get the
notes to "line up" exactly underneath each other between systems.

The issue that is messing me up is the transparent time signature
that is at the beginning of system one:

  Ideally, there should be no time signature here but
  as far as I can tell, Lilypond requires that all
  "compositions" begin with a time signature.  Is this true,
  even for music with no meter?

  This transparent time signature prevents the notes of
  systems one and two from lining up exactly.

And so:

(1)
How can I make the time signature at the beginning of this
snippet not just transparent, but gone all together?

(2)
Are there other tools that are better suited to creating musical
examples, than the ones I am using?

Thank you very much for your help;




\version "2.12.2"
\include "english.ly"

#(set-global-staff-size 19) % Default is 20

\paper{
  #(set-paper-size "letter")

  left-margin =  5\mm % Default is 10\mm
  line-width = 200\mm

  print-page-number = ##f
  print-first-page-number = ##f
}


\score {

  \new PianoStaff <<

  \new Staff = "up"
  {
    \clef treble
    \cadenzaOn

    \autoBeamOn

    \change Staff = "down"
                        g,1  a,1  b,1

    c1   d1   e1   f1   g1   a1   b1

    \change Staff = "up"
    c'1  d'1  e'1  f'1  g'1  a'1  b'1

    c''1 d''1 e''1


    \bar "" % Reference, pg. 48
    \break

    \change Staff = "down"
                g,1 a,1 b,1

    c1  d1 e1 f1 g1 a1 b1

    \change Staff = "up"
    c'1 d'1 e'1 f'1 g'1 a'1 b'1

    c''1 d''1 e''1


    \cadenzaOff
  }

  \new Staff = "down" {
    \clef bass
    \cadenzaOn
                         s1-"E" s1-"F" s1-"G"
    s1-"C" s1-"D" s1-"E" s1-"F" s1-"G" s1-"A" s1-"B"
    s1-"C" s1-"D" s1-"E" s1-"F" s1-"G" s1-"A" s1-"B"
    s1-"C" s1-"D" s1-"E"

    \bar "" % Reference, pg. 48

    \break
                         s1-"E" s1-"F" s1-"G"
    s1-"C" s1-"D" s1-"E" s1-"F" s1-"G" s1-"A" s1-"B"
    s1-"C" s1-"D" s1-"E" s1-"F" s1-"G" s1-"A" s1-"B"
    s1-"C" s1-"D" s1-"E"

    \cadenzaOff
  }
>>

   \layout {

    indent = 0.0
    \context {
       \Score
       \override SpacingSpanner
       #'base-shortest-duration = #(ly:make-moment 1 16)
       \override TimeSignature #'transparent = ##t 
    }
  }
}

example04-post.png
Description: PNG image