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4.1.3 Nesting music expressions ¶

It is not essential to declare all staves at the beginning; they may be introduced temporarily at any point. This is particularly useful for creating ossia sections – see ossia. Here is a simple example showing how to introduce a new staff temporarily for the duration of three notes:

\new Staff {
  \relative {
    r4 g'8 g c4 c8 e |
    <<
      { c4 c }
      \new Staff { d4 c }
    >>
    r2 |
  }
}

Note that the size of the clef is the same as a clef printed following a clef change – slightly smaller than the clef at the beginning of the line. This is usual for clefs printed in the middle of a line.

The ossia section may be placed above the staff as follows:

\new Staff = "main" {
  \relative {
    r4 g'8 g c4 c8 e |
    <<
      { c4 c }
      \new Staff \with {
        alignAboveContext = "main"
      } { d4 c }
    >>
    r2 |
  }
}

This example uses \with, which will be explained later in more detail. It is a means of modifying the default behavior of a single staff. Here it says that the new staff should be placed above the staff called “main” instead of the default position, which is below.

参见 ¶