Re: Fonts for TextScripts

[Aaron Hill]

(Adding mailing list for visibility...)

On 2020-06-26 6:19 am, Aberforth D - Instrumentals wrote:
> I'm using Inkscape and it runs on the same system as lilypond but 
> somehow
> it picks the wrong font for "serif".

This is probably because LilyPond itself is overriding font-config 
defaults to promote its preferred font families.


> However, opera scores are riddled with expressive and dramatic markings 
> so
> I would have to type this over and over again. Moreover, this makes it
> difficult to change the overall style at a later stage. I have been 
> trying
> for two full days to achieve a similar result with a user defined 
> function,
> but to no avail. Ideally I want to achieve something like this:
>
> c4^\expr "con grazia"
> d4^\drama "(she reads the letter)"
>
> The first line would be printed in the normal size, italic. The second 
> line
> would be printed in tiny size, upright. The actual font-name, size and
> shape would be defined in the respective functions. Is this even 
> possible?

While you can manually define your own event function, it is easier to 
let LilyPond do the heavy lifting and use \etc:

%%%%
\version "2.20.0"

{ c'4-. \tweak font-name "Times New Roman, Italic"
        \tweak font-size -0.1
        ^"con grazia"
  d'4-. \tweak font-name "Times New Roman,"
        \tweak font-size -2.0
        _"(she reads the letter)" }

expr =
  \tweak font-name "Times New Roman, Italic"
  \tweak font-size -0.1
  -\etc
drama =
  \tweak font-name "Times New Roman,"
  \tweak font-size -2.0
  -\etc

{ c'4-. ^\expr "con grazia"
  d'4-. _\drama "(she reads the letter)" }
%%%%


> Even better, but perhaps I'm asking too much now, would be that the
> function automatically recognizes text between (...) as being a 
> dramatic
> instruction and automatically prints it smaller, so I only need one
> function and the script could be reduced to:
>
> c4^\expr "con grazia"
> d4^\expr "(she reads the letter)"
>
> I hope I'm not over-asking, but any help is welcome.

You can certainly do things dynamically based on the content of the text 
markup:

%%%%
\version "2.20.0"

\paper {
  #(define fonts
     (set-global-fonts
       #:roman "Times New Roman"
       #:factor (/ staff-height pt 20)))
}

{ c'4-. \tweak font-shape #'italic
        \tweak font-size -0.1
        ^"con grazia"
  d'4-. \tweak font-size -2.0
        _"(she reads the letter)" }

#(use-modules (ice-9 regex))
expr = #(define-event-function (text) (markup?)
  (if (string-match "^\\(.*\\)$" (markup->string text))
    #{ \tweak font-size -2.0
       - $text #}
    #{ \tweak font-shape #'italic
       \tweak font-size -0.1
       - $text #}))

{ c'4-. ^\expr "con grazia"
  d'4-. _\expr "(she reads the letter)" }
%%%%

Note in this version I am demonstrating using \paper to set the font 
family, so that we can make use of font-shape.


-- Aaron Hill