Lyrics are printed by interpreting them in a Lyrics (lilypond-internals) context
\context Lyrics \lyricmode ...
This will place the lyrics according to the durations that were
entered. The lyrics can also be aligned under a given melody
automatically. In this case, it is no longer necessary to enter the
correct duration for each syllable. This is achieved by combining the
melody and the lyrics with the \lyricsto
expression
\lyricsto name \new Lyrics ...
This aligns the lyrics to the
notes of the
Voice (lilypond-internals)
context called name, which has
to exist. Therefore, normally the Voice
is specified first, and
then the lyrics are specified with \lyricsto
. The command
\lyricsto
switches to \lyricmode
mode automatically, so the
\lyricmode
keyword may be omitted.
For different or more complex orderings, the best way is to setup the hierarchy of staves and lyrics first, e.g.,
\context ChoirStaff << \context Lyrics = sopranoLyrics { s1 } \context Voice = soprano { music } \context Lyrics = tenorLyrics { s1 } \context Voice = tenor { music } >>
and then combine the appropriate melodies and lyric lines
\lyricsto "soprano" \context Lyrics = sopranoLyrics the lyrics
The final input would resemble
<<\context ChoirStaff << setup the music >> \lyricsto "soprano" etc \lyricsto "alto" etc etc >>
The \lyricsto
command detects melismata: it only puts one
syllable under a tied or slurred group of notes. If you want to force
an unslurred group of notes to be a melisma, insert \melisma
after the first note of the group, and \melismaEnd
after the
last one, e.g.,
<< \context Voice = "lala" { \time 3/4 f4 g8 \melisma f e f \melismaEnd e2 } \lyricsto "lala" \new Lyrics { la di __ daah } >>
In addition, notes are considered a melisma if they are manually beamed, and automatic beaming (see Setting automatic beam behavior) is switched off.
Lyrics can also be entered without \lyricsto
. In this case the
duration of each syllable must be entered explicitly, for example,
play2 the4 game2. sink2 or4 swim2.
The alignment to a melody can be specified with the
associatedVoice
property,
\set associatedVoice = #"lala"
The value of the property (here: "lala"
) should be the name of
a
Voice (lilypond-internals)
context. Without this setting, extender lines
will not be formatted properly.
Here is an example demonstrating manual lyric durations,
<< \context Voice = melody { \time 3/4 c2 e4 g2. } \new Lyrics \lyricmode { \set associatedVoice = #"melody" play2 the4 game2. } >>
A complete example of a SATB score setup is in section Vocal ensembles.
Program reference: LyricCombineMusic (lilypond-internals) , Lyrics (lilypond-internals) , Melisma_translator (lilypond-internals) .
input/regression/lyric-combine-new.ly.
Melismata are not detected automatically, and extender lines must be inserted by hand.
This page is for LilyPond-2.5.11 (development-branch).