Re: Shorten stem length

Dear Carolyn,

That's great. You can shorten the stems of unbeamed notes by modifying 
Stem.length, like this:

\version "2.26.0"

\relative e'' {
   e8 r8
   \override Stem.length = #5
   e8
}

-William

On 7/1/26 6:53 PM, Carolyn Beeton wrote:
> Thank you.  That gives me something to play with for the beamed eights.  Still haven’t figured out how to shorten the unbeamed eighth.
> 
> Carolyn
> 
>> On Jul 1, 2026, at 4:28 PM, William Rehwinkel <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>> Dear Carolyn,
>>
>> It seems that Stem.details.beamed-lengths gets overridden by other spacing rules in some way. You can try manually setting the position of the beam like this:
>>
>> \version "2.26.0"
>>
>> \relative d'' {
>>   \time 6/8
>>   d8 b cis
>>   \override Beam.positions = #'(-1 . -1.3)
>>   d b cis
>> }
>>
>> Does this work for you?
>> -William
>>
>> On 7/1/26 3:54 PM, Carolyn Beeton wrote:
>>> I am trying to shorten the stem length for a couple of notes (because there is another voice underneath, from the other staff) to reproduce this music.
>>> This snippet shows the default rendering, and then I’m trying to shorten and revert the stem length, but nothing changes.  This is only the one voice, but I can’t shorten the stems even in this simple example.
>>> I have been able to make the stems long, but not short.
>>> What am I doing wrong, and how can I achieve this?
>>> Thanks,
>>> Carolyn
>>> \version "2.24"
>>> \include "english.ly"
>>> shortBeams = {   % none of this works
>>>    \override Stem.details.beamed-lengths = #'(0.5)
>>>    \override Stem.details.beamed-minimum-free-lengths = #'(0.5)
>>>    \override Stem.details.beamed-exteme-minimum-free-lengths = #'(0.6)
>>>    \override Stem.details.stem-shorten = #'(0.5)
>>> }
>>> \relative c'
>>> {
>>>    \time 6/8
>>>    e'4^"default" d8 cs4 d8 | d b cs d e8 e8 | d4 c8 b4 c8 ~ | 8 a b ~ 8 d c
>>>    \section
>>>    e4 d8 cs4 \shortBeams d8^"short" | d b cs \revert Stem.details.beamed-lengths d^"revert" e8 e8 |
>>>    d4 c8 b4 c8 ~ | \shortBeams 8^"short" a b ~ \revert Stem.details.beamed-lengths 8 d c
>>> }
>>
>