ST4 Feature Req - Individual lyrics/PDF display

byung

I want some songs to show the lyrics, but some PDF. Current setup is that we can only pick 1 type to show (either lyrics or PDF) in a queue/playlist.

Want to do this at song level within the queue/playlist. For example, I have 5 songs in the playlist, song 1, 3, 5 to show lyrics, while song 2, 4 show PDF, instead of removing the PDF of song 1, 3, 5.

Any other users want this?

AnthonyB

Interesting... I had had a similar thought previously but I think it important to understand the "Why?" behind this sort of request.

So, to clarify, you are saying that for a Song, you like the option to have BOTH:

A 'text' lyric sheet (i.e. one you can edit in the lyric editor, AND
An imported PDF lyric sheet

So, first question is 'Why?". What is the scenario driving this request? What problem or scenario would this solve?
Think of this as pitching a business case to Peter to consider the investment of his time developing this capability.

I think when I first pondered this, it was to solve for the fact that in my band, prior to using ST, we just had Word docs or PDFs as lyric sheets, and that let me embed a image amongst the text, e.g. an image of the tab of a specific riff.
Moving into ST, we chose to go the TXT lyric route as PDFs didn't allow all the MIDI event embedding, so we lost that ability and just had to live with it.
Thus, I did have a similar though, what if for a song you could have both TXT and PDF, and in Network Sessions, you could somehow choose which one is 'pushed' to Clients. even better, if some sort of User/role-based system was implemented, you could choose which type of lyric sheet was pushed to a specific individual.

As I thought about that more, I felt that was over-complicating things, and then evolved my ask of Peter to consider allowing different font types in the same lyric sheet. This way, I could use the default font for the majority of the lyric sheet, but if I needed to embed some tab, then there might be an option to change font type to a fixed-font width (best suited to consistent character alignment in tabs) just for a section of the lyric sheet.

This has been requested by multuiple people over the last couple of years (e.g. https://support.stagetraxx.com/d/2054-tab-and-inline-chords)

MarkGuitar

AnthonyB So, first question is 'Why?".

For me the Why is to allow different users in the band to have different versions of the song chart. IE for guitarist using a capo vs a bass player playing in actual key.
And also the PDF can display TAB as laid out in the source document so great for rehearsals/practice.
One more thing. The singer can use a PDF of just lyrics, the players can have text with chords.

Unless I am missing something that can achieve this, I will upvote.

AnthonyB

From that use-case wouldn't the "Show Local Lyrics" feature that already exists solve the problem?

https://stagetraxx.com/user-guide/network-sessions/#display-your-own-lyrics

This is what we already do when different band members want to see their own versions of a lyric sheet.

Flesh out your scenario in more detail, and how that might work in ST. How are all the different band members getting their specific lyric sheet? Forget PDF vs lyric, it sounds like you are talking about hosting multiple versions of a lyric sheet for a song AND then having each musician get their specific lyric sheet.

That's when we get into the much more complicated Role-based/User-based construct.

MarkGuitar

AnthonyB From that use-case wouldn't the "Show Local Lyrics" feature that already exists solve the problem?

Yes, but as you have already said in a different post, you then run into the version control issue of multiple copies across multiple devices. And the subsequent reliance on other users to keep their sheets up to date 😱

But I agree. The best solution (users/roles) is complex and beyond the scope of V4. Maybe Peter could be persuaded to create a “Premium” version?? 🙂

byung

I am in progress of building my band a song library with ST3 (and will be migrated to ST4 eventually), each song would get its own chord chard with lyrics, and a PDF lead sheet.

I myself would prefer to look at PDF lead sheet as it tells me the rhythm of each word, which is important for songs in Asian language, especially when I am the lead singer. The issue with PDF lead sheet is the lyrics font would be relatively small. For songs that I will need to check lyrics often, I would then prefer to switch to lyrics in ST3/4. That's why I suggest to add this feature.

I know I can get a midi comment to toggle PDF/Text lyrics. But want to see if this is possible to have this flexibility and save 1 midi control button for some other/better use.