Beats

Add and insert beats, split one in two, group beats into tuplets and choose how they are beamed.

Available on iPad, iPhone and Mac.

A beat is one moment of a bar: the notes struck together, with their duration, or a rest. The Beat tools change the beats themselves, not their notes.

The Beat tools

In Edit, Beat is among the tools’ categories. Its buttons, left to right:

• Add Beat and Insert: a new empty beat after or before the one at the cursor.
• Split: the beat in two.
• Tuplet 2 to Tuplet 9: the beats grouped as a tuplet.
• Beam, Break and Auto: how the beats are beamed.

With the Select tool and beats selected, the Beat tools show too, without Add Beat and Insert. On the Mac, they are in the Score menu (Insert Beat, Add Beat, Delete Beat, Duplicate Beat ⌘D, Split Beat /, Create Beaming ⇧B, Break Beaming, Automatic Beaming) and in Note › Tuplet.

Adding and inserting beats

Add Beat puts an empty beat right after the one at the cursor, and Insert right before it; the new beat has the same duration. Use them to make room in a bar you have written: the beats after move along.

An empty beat is a rest until you type a fret on it (see Durations and rests).

Splitting a beat

Split cuts the beat at the cursor, or each selected beat, into two beats of half its duration, both with its notes: a quarter note becomes two eighth notes. The key is /. Split again for four.

Tuplets

A tuplet plays several beats in the time of fewer: Tuplet 3, a triplet, is three eighth notes in the time of two.

• With the cursor on a beat: Tuplet n groups n beats of its duration from it, adding empty ones at the end of the bar when there aren’t enough, as long as the group fits in the bar.
• With beats selected (⇧ on the keypad and the joystick⇧→, or the Select tool): Tuplet n groups those beats.
• To take a tuplet away, put the cursor in it: its button is lit; choose it again.

When the beats can’t be grouped (they have different durations, or the group wouldn’t fit in the bar), the line Select the beats to group shows under the Beat tools for a few seconds, and nothing changes.

Beaming

Reflow beams eighth notes and shorter by the time signature. To beam them your way, select the beats, then:

• Beam joins them under one beam.
• Break breaks the beam at the selection.
• Auto gives them back to Reflow’s beaming.