Re: partcombine for choir and piano?

[Simon Albrecht]

On 02.08.2018 23:15, Noeck wrote:
> My questions (and some short reasoning):
>
> 1. Does \partcombine make sense for combining *soprano and alto* into
> one staff or should I use voices? I see pros (+) and cons (-):
>
>   - The fact that I would prefer the 'apart' style everywhere makes me
>     think that it's perhaps not what \partcombine is intended for.
It certainly isn’t; surely nobody ever considered vocal writing while 
working on the part combiner. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that it 
doesn’t work; since the part combiner always uses the same internal 
voice names, I can even imagine (without ever having tried it) that in a 
clever setup one could find a convenient way to flexibly attach lyrics, 
coordinated with the modes of the part combiner.

>   = From a quick test, \partcombineApart is equivalent to two voices.
>     Are there exceptions?
Don’t know about that – I’d guess not, but I haven’t used partcombine much.
>   + The positioning of dynamics is better for partcombine.
>     Why are all dynamics below the staff for the voices-setup by default?
I’m not sure what you mean. If there are lyrics below the staff, 
dynamics (and possibly a number of other things) need to go above the staff.
This somewhat spectacular Breitkopf&Härtel 1961 engraving comes to mind 
as an example for two vocal parts on one staff, with separate dynamics 
and often lyrics: 
<https://imslp.org/wiki/File:PMLP367510-Reger_op.138_Acht_Geistliche_Gesaenge_RGA_vol27.pdf>
But that’s extremely difficult to pull of well and if one isn’t going to 
invest a huge amount of time in details of placement, it’s probably 
better to use more staves.
> 2. Does \partcombine make sense for *piano music* with different voices
> starting here and there?
>
>   - Probably not as the 2...n voices are never used independently, so
>     I'd be better off writing voices explicitly as necessary.

As you know, piano engraving always has its very own challenges, with 
which the part combiner definitely won’t help.

Best, Simon