Re: Two questions about vertical layout and lyrics spacing

[Keith OHara]

Frank Steinmetzger <Warp_7 <at> gmx.de> writes:

> [...] However, this is one of the cases where it leads to a lot of 
> empty room between system.  What would be a good way to make the 
> overall appearance a bit lighter by un-squeezing the systems?
> 
> Essentially, I would like to make the basic line height of 
> lyrics a bit bigger, while retaining the small minimum-height 
> and keeping stretchability of the padding around lyrics the 
> same as that of system-system-spacing, so it's a proportional
> stretching.
>
The spacing concept in version 2.14 tries to make the spacing between 
staves close to their ideal spacing, regardless of lyrics in between, 
giving lines of lyrics only the space they need.  It seems that for
choral music, the staves should be more flexible, so :
 \layout { \context {
   \ChoirStaff
   \override StaffGrouper #'staff-staff-spacing #'stretchability = #30
 } }  % The default stretchability is only 5
 
> As lilypond tries to keep an even system-system-distance, the result is
> now that the first two systems on the first page are so tight together 
> that it is hard to make out which text belongs to which staff.
> [...]
> My first thought is of course to alter system-system-spacing #'padding,
> but I have not found a way to make this equal between all systems
>
That seems like the right thought.  The space between systems without 
lyrics in between is very stretchy (60) so you might reduce that:
\paper { system-system-spacing #'padding = #4
         system-system-spacing #'stretchability = #30 }
or possibly the adjustment above to ChoirStaff is enough.

> I know lilypond adheres strongly to some long-evolved engraving standards,
> yet the described pages look unbalanced to me.  

After the vertical spacing system was reprogrammed, the adhesion to those
standards needed to be re-done.  Some of the history of the re-adjusting
 http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/lilypond-devel/2010-10/msg00451.html
 http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/lilypond-user/2010-10/msg00726.html
shows input from people setting piano and orchestral music, but not much
from choral music.