Questions & Answers

Lyric entry/edit: verse select; cut & paste; view and print in colour

+1 vote
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asked Jul 25, 2021 in Notion Feature Requests by douglasgordon (220 points)
Songwriters are always changing their minds! And lyric entry in Notion is clunky.

You might want e.g. some or all of Verse 2 to become Verse 1, so there should be a way to do that, either by selecting and copying to notepad, or perhaps a 'swap verse' function

Notion seems to work by creating a 'container' for each word of the lyric. If you delete the text, the container is still there. That needs a re-think.

There should be an ability to show/print different verses in different colours to make it easier for singers.  Not exactly traditional, but why not!? That implies the ability to select a whole verse at a time, not just single or multiple containers.

Phrasing and alignment are a problem too. You want to squeeze lyrics into a rhythmic pattern that doesn't quite fit with the written notes of a previous verse, but you don't want to write out the whole verse again with only a couple of changes. That's difficult at present - you can use tacet notes in another voice but it's hard work!

Old-style song prints often listed the chorus and verses separately at the end (i.e. like a printed poem) instead of under the staff.  That can have advantages, giving the singer necessary flexibility to interpret the music while making the lyrics easier to read and leaving the staff uncluttered. Perhaps there's a place for that system as an alternative or supplement in Notion?

Others have already commented on the need to allow different font sizes, italics, etc, and I support that too

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