Q: I'm trying to write out some music... how would you write out something where you hold out notes, but add notes on top? Like for example if I wanted to play like a Cmaj appergio, playing the C on beat 1, E on 2, G on 3 and C and 4.. but I want the notes held out (so a whole note on C, dotted half note on E, etc)? When I plug a whole note into my software it doesn't let me add any other notes because I think the software thinks that I want to add the notes after 4 beats of the whole note and not while it's ringing out, but maybe I'm writing it wrong. How would you write that out (by hand)?
A: i can think of 3 ways, none of which are that great. make like 4 parallel universes, and put everybody's notes and rests in, as if there are 4 players sort of borrowing the same staff. if you want to convince a music program to do that, try making different 'voices'? it's a hassle, that's why handwriting is always easier. the next choice would be to tie everything over, and it would look like bigger and bigger stacks. this would be accurate but kind of a mess to read at first glance because it looks like stacked chords. and of course the other way is to just write 4 quarter notes going up and then write something on the top like "sustain" or "please don't let go" or something