Updated:

Dec. 15, 2006

How to Install and Use
the "EZ" Byzantine Music Font Package

1) Introduction...............................................................................................................................1
2) Installation instructions............................................................................................................2
3) Suggestions for Writing Music.................................................................................................2
a) Layout of characters on the keyboard................................................................................2
b) How to begin writing music.................................................................................................3
c) Common typing mistakes.....................................................................................................5
4) How to Use the Macros.............................................................................................................6
5) Using the Keyboard Shortcuts................................................................................................11
6) The EZ Psaltica Editor............................................................................................................12
7) Order of Operations................................................................................................................13
8) Afterword.................................................................................................................................13

: http://www.stanthonysmonastery.org/music/ Odigies.doc

1) Introduction
The "EZ" Byzantine Music Package was created at St. Anthony's Greek Orthodox Monastery
in Arizona in 2005. It is an improved version* of the Psaltica fonts made by Elie Daoun that are
available at www.cmkon.org. What makes this Byzantine music package the best set of fonts
currently available is its macros. These macros automatically adjust the relative note positions
for a professional look, and they can also instantly make all the appropritate notes red.
This package was named "EZ" because it allows one to write Byzantine music such that the
neumes are perfectly aligned with relative ease. The following instructions fill several pages not
because this package is very complicated, but merely because I wanted to explain thoroughly
every possible detail. Many users will consider my explanations self-evident.
As with any new program, an initial effort is necessary to become familiar with it. But after
writing a few hymns with these fonts, you will soon realize their versatility and will learn to type
music almost as fast as you can type regular text. Then you will be able to write music quickly
and with a distinct elegance that will give you great satisfaction and will also attract others to use
your music.
* * *
*
To see all these improvements, go to: http://www.stanthonysmonastery.org/music/ByzMusicFontsComparison.pdf
2) Installation instructions:
After unzipping the file you downloaded, if you have a Windows computer, open the "Fonts"
folder in your Control Panel, and from the "File" menu, select "Install New Font..." and then
select all five fonts included in the fonts folder of this package. If you have a Macintosh
computer, drag all five fonts from the fonts folder of this package into your Mac's "Font Book".
Doing the above should complete the installation process. However, many users get the error
message: "The macro cannot be found or has been disabled because of your Macro security
settings" when they try to run the macros. If this happens, you need to change your macro
security settings. To do so, go to Tools -> Macro -> Security... and select "Medium" security
level. It is then necessary to restart Word in order to implement this change. When you open "EZ
template.dot" you will be informed that the file contains macros and warned that some macros
contain viruses. You must select "Enable Macros" for this font package to work properly. Don't
worry; I promise that it doesn't have any viruses!
If you still can't get the macros to work, do the following: Open the file "EZ template.dot"
and go to Tools -> Templates and Add-Ins... -> Organizer... -> Macro Project Items. Select the
"EZ_Macros" in the left window and press the "Copy" button to move them to Normal.dot.
(back to top)

3) Suggestions for Writing Music

a) Layout of characters on the keyboard:
Since each of the five fonts in this package has almost 100 symbols, memorizing the position
of every symbol would be nearly impossible. Therefore, you should print the file "EZ-
CharacterTables.pdf" for quick reference.* Nevertheless, if you plan on writing more than just a
few pages of music, you will save yourself a great deal of time by familiarizing yourself with the
keystrokes for the more common symbols. At the risk of stating the obvious, in the following
paragraph in small type I will make a few observations regarding the layout of symbols. (Feel
free to skip it and continue on the following page.)
In the "EZ Psaltica" font (which contains all the most commonly used symbols) the jumps of
one through nine are represented by the numerals 19. Jumps down of one through nine are
represented by holding the SHIFT key and pressing the corresponding digits 19. In other words, "!"

*
If for some reason you can't print this file, download the file: http://www.stanthonysmonastery.org/music/EZ-
CharacterTables.doc (200 Kb)

2
 is an apostrophos (down one), "@" is an elaphron (down two), etc. The jumps of one through eight
with a petaste are represented by the buttons directly beneath the numbers 18: q, w, e, r, t, y, u, i.
The martyrias Nee, Pa, Vou, ..., Zo are all in a row on the keyboard letters: c, v, b, n, m, etc. The
lower part of the martyria is usually produced by typing the same button needed for the top part of
the martyria, but while holding the SHIFT key. In other words, the diatonic martyrias for Nee, Pa,
Vou, Ga, etc. are written by the following keystrokes: cC, vV, bB, nN, etc. In the fonts "EZ Fthora"
and "EZ Special-II" the same row of letters: c, v, b, n, m, etc. also corresponds to the notes Nee, Pa,
Vou, Ga, etc., but are used for note markers and the isokratema. Note that when the keystroke for an
isokratema is capitalized, it is shifted slightly to the left. In the "EZ Fthora" font, there is also more
than one version of each fthora. The capitalized version of a given letter will always be shifted
slightly to the right of the lower-case version. One will also notice that the keys beneath the numbers
1, 2, 3, etc. will write the same fthora beneath the previous note instead of above it. So, for example,
the "2" button on the keyboard writes a fthora of second mode above the note, whereas the "w"
button (which is directly below the "2") writes the same fthora below the note. Also, the diatonic
fthoras for NeeZo are associated with the keyboard buttons in the row: d, f, g, h, j, k, l.

b) How to begin writing music:

To begin writing music, you must begin with the template * "EZ template.dot" because it has
the macros embedded in it. The font size of the "EZ" music fonts should be about 20, but not less
than 18. Mac users need to set their keyboard to "American English." IMPORTANT UPDATE:
In older versions of this font package, it was necessary to press the space bar once after every
non-backstriking character for the macros to work properly. The user needed to be careful not
press the space bar before typing back-striking notes (such as the gorgon or the klasma), because
then some of the macros wouldn't fix things properly. So, for example, to type the first few notes
in the music sample on the following page, it was necessary to type:

0 SPACE J SPACE 3 ' z SPACE \ SPACE 0 SPACE ! S :

SPACE ! A etc.

But now with this new version of the macros, the necessary spaces are inserted automatically.
Users may still insert those spaces if they are already accustomed to typing in that manner,
because the macros are smart enough not to insert these spaces if they have already been

*
A "template" in Microsoft Word is a file that contains the structure and tools for shaping such elements as the style
and page layout of finished files. So every time you want to create a new music document, you should first open
"EZ template.dot", then select "Save As..." from the File menu and give your new document an appropriate name,
and then start typing your music.

3
inserted. Thus, in order to enter the first few notes in the music sample below, one can either type
the sequence mentioned above, or one may simply type:
0J3'z\0!S:!A etc.
IMPORTANT NOTE: The smart quotes (i.e., curved quotes) option must NOT be turned on
when typing music or running the macros, because it will change a ' character into a character.
To turn off the smart quotes option, go to Tools->AutoCorrect Options..., and in the tab entitled
"AutoFormat As You Type" remove the check from the first box, which says "Straight quotes"
with smart quotes.
The easiest way to combine the lyrics with the music using Word is to create a floating "text

box" for the lyrics. (This can be done from the "Insert" menu or by clicking the button on
the EZ toolbar) The following example of music with a text box in front will appear on your
screen properly only after you have installed the EZ music fonts:

A- rise, O____ God, judge___________ the___________

earth;_____

for____
Thou
have
shalt__ an____

in - -
her it -
- - - ance

a-

The lyrics were written using the font "CG Omega." In my opinion, this is an ideal font for
writing the lyrics of Byzantine music because the letters are compact without looking scrunched.
Using a compact font is especially crucial when syllables with many letters need to fit beneath a
single note. It is also a "sans serif" font, which some people find easier to read. If you plan on
using this font for your music, I recommend using our "EZ Omega" version of the font instead,

4
which is included in this font package, because our version has two subtle advantages.*
In order to make the text box to "float" over the other text, double-click on the boundary of
the text box, and then in the layout tab, select "In front of text". Also, in the "Color and Lines"
tab, you must select "No Fill" for the fill color and "No Line" for the line color.
In order to make successive lines of the text box take up the same amount of space as
successive lines in the music, follow the following steps:
1. Place the cursor in the text box, and then from the "Format" menu, select
"Paragraph..." In the "Line Spacing" drop-down menu, select "Exactly" and in the
"At:" drop-down menu beside it, enter the number "60"
2. Place the cursor somewhere in the music, and also make the line spacing "Exactly 60"

Instead of doing these steps manually each time, you can save time by simply pressing the
button on the toolbar.
(In order to get your cursor "behind" the text box so that you can edit the music, move the
mouse to the margin outside the text box, and then click the left button of the mouse. Then,
navigate through the music with the arrow keys. Or another way is to make the text box float
behind the music when you want to edit the music. To do so, right-click on the border of the text
box, select "Format Text Box..." and then in the layout tab, select "Behind text.")

WARNING: Some versions of Microsoft Word for Windows have a bug that make the
program crash when you try to create a text box. The way around this problem is first to select
the text you want to put in the text box, and then (with that text still selected) create the text box.

c) Common typing mistakes

The most common mistake people make with this font package is to type two separate
*
In particular, our version of the "CG Omega" font (which is named "EZ Omega") has the following two
advantages:
1) With our version of the font, you can type a "third-space" character (i.e., a space that is about one-third the
width of a regular space) by typing the key combination: CTRL-ALT-/ Normally this keystroke would create an
italic "f" (). On a Mac the keystroke is fn-command-; Using a third-space character is especially helpful if you are
a perfectionist and you want the words of the lyrics to be precisely aligned with the notes they are beneath.
2) Our version also has a third-width "low line" (the "_" character). The "low line" character is what should be
used in the lyrics for word extensions (i.e., the line placed after the final syllable in a word when that syllable is held
for more than one note). Having a third-width "low line" character is helpful for perfectionists that want the end of a
word extension to be perfectly aligned with the end of a note. To type this third-width "low line" character in our EZ
Omega font, you need to press the combination: CTRL-ALT-. (control-alt-period). Normally this keystroke would
create a capital "I" with a grave accent above it (). On a Mac the keystroke is option-f The width of this "third-
width" character is approximately one-third the width of the regular "low line" character.

5
characters instead of a single character that is the combination they want. For example, instead of
typing the hyphen key for an yporroe with a gorgon, they will type the ")" key (an yporroe)
followed by the "S" key (a gorgon). Likewise, they might be unaware of the "l" key which is the
combination: oligon-kentemata-gorgon, and try to create this combo with two separate
characters. The way to avoid making this mistake is to take a careful look at the character tables
so that you become familiar with what special combinations exist as a single keystroke.
The other common mistake people make is to be unaware that there is more than one version
of some characters. For example, there are four different keystrokes for writing a klasma: A, a, Z,
and z. "A" is the klasma that aligns well above an apostrophos, "a" is aligns well with most other
neumes, "z" is when you want the klasma beneath the neume, and "Z" is when you want the
klasma above the oligon in a jump of four. These four klasmas were probably self-evident to you
when you saw the character tables, but many people overlook the two options that exist for the
syndesmos, antikenoma, and omalon. The omalon can be either a "{" or a "[" , the antikenoma
can be either a "}" or a " , and the syndesmos can be either a "]" in EZ Psaltica or a "\" in EZ
Special-II. (back to top)

4) How to Use the Macros

There are thirteen macros that fix up the music in documents written with the "EZ" music
fonts:
Button on Macro Name Keyboard Function
Toolbar Shortcut
MoveUp CTRL-ALT-u shifts selected characters up
MoveDown CTRL-ALT-m shifts selected characters down
MoveLeft CTRL-ALT-h shifts a selected character to the left
without changing the position of the
characters before and after it
MoveRight CTRL-ALT-k shifts a selected character to the right
without changing the position of the
characters before and after it
Justify CTRL-SHIFT-5 makes the right edge of the music
justified, i.e., the same distance from the
edge of the paper
PolishNotes CTRL-SHIFT-1 automatically adjusts the relative
positions of neumes so that they are
aligned better

6
 MakeNotesRed CTRL-SHIFT-2 makes red all gorgons, martyrias, ison
symbols, etc.
ExpandLine CTRL-SHIFT-6 increases the spacing between neumes in
the line where the cursor is.
CompressLine CTRL-SHIFT-7 decreases the spacing between neumes in
the line where the cursor is.
MakeIsonBlue CTRL-SHIFT-3 makes all ison symbols blue
MakeIsonGreen CTRL-SHIFT-4 makes all ison symbols greeen
Insert Text Box inserts a text box for the lyrics
Format Text Box formats a text box

The macros "MoveLeft", "MoveRight", "MoveUp", and "MoveDown" shift the selected
character(s) in the given direction, without changing the position of the notes around it. The way
the "MoveLeft" macro works is by condensing the spacing of the previous character and
expanding the spacing of the selected character. This makes the characters before and after the
selected character remain in the same place, while the selected character is shifted to the left.
Similarly, the "MoveRight" macro works by doing the opposite: it expands the spacing of the
previous character, and condenses the spacing of the selected character.
WARNING: The macros "MoveLeft", "MoveRight", "MoveUp", and "MoveDown" should
not be run until you have typed in all the music and run the "PolishNotes" macro, because these
two macros will undo any manual positioning you may have done by using those four macros.
So in the event that before you have finished typing in all the music you see some notes that you
think will not be automatically fixed by the "PolishNotes" macro and thus will need to be
adjusted manually by using these "MoveLeft", "MoveRight", etc. macros, I suggest that you
merely highlight these notes temporarily until you have finished writing all the music and have
run the "Polish Notes" macro, and then you can easily go back and see if the notes you
highlighted still need to be fixed.
Since most of the backstrike characters have a width of zero or almost zero, it is almost
impossible to select a single backstrike character by using only the mouse. So if you need to
select a single backstrike character (in order to adjust its position), the easiest way to do so is by
using the arrows keys on your keyboard.

7
 Bear in mind that the macros "MoveLeft", "MoveRight", "MoveUp", and "MoveDown"
adjust the character attributes of the selected character. So if you continue typing music with the
cursor immediately to the right of a character that has been adjusted, for example, down by 2
points or condensed by 3 points, all the new characters you type in will also be adjusted down by
2 points or condensed by 3 points (in other words, too high and scrunched together). Likewise,
the "PolishNotes" macro sometimes raise or condense characters in order to align them properly.
So the same problem can occur if you insert the cursor after a character adjusted by this macro
and then continue typing in music. This is why it is advisable to run these macros only AFTER
you have completed typing in all the music.
Unfortunately, the "MoveRight" macro does not work well on backstrike characters (i.e.,
characters that do not shift the cursor to the right), because Word thinks that these characters are
already as condensed as they can be. For the same reason, the "MoveLeft" macro does not work
well on a character preceded by a backstrike character. So what this means is that if you have, for
example the following symbols:
in the order: Oligon, Klasma, Isokratema

you will not be able use the "MoveLeft" macro to shift the isokratema to the left, since it is
preceded by the klasma, which is a backstrike character. However, if you typed the sequence:
in the order: Oligon, Isokratema, Klasma

you can use the "MoveLeft" macro to shift the isokratema to the left, since it is now preceded
by a character that does not have a width of zero.

The "Justify" macro replaces all the spaces you inserted between notes (written with the "EZ
Psaltica" font) with a blank space using the Tahoma font, with the font size set to 1. The reason
why this is helpful is because the spaces in the "EZ" fonts are considered as characters by your
computer, which means you won't be able to have the music forced-justified unless these spaces
are replaced with spaces of a standard font. Note that with this latest version of the font package,
if you didn't insert blank spaces between every note (as mentioned in part 2), this macro will
insert them for you. Important: Since this macro will shift the horizontal position of the notes,

8
you will need to re-align the lyrics with the notes if you had already entered the lyrics. For this
reason, it is advisable to enter the lyrics only AFTER you run this "Justify" macro. No harm is
done if you run this macro more than once in the same document.

The "PolishNotes" macro polishes the relative note positions so that things look cleaner. It
works by running the invisible subroutines "PolishNotes1", "PolishNotes1b", "PolishNotes2",
and "PolishNotes2b". The reason why they were not combined into one big macro was because
they exceeded the maximum number of lines of code that Word's compiler could handle in a
single macro. The "PolishNotes" macro lowers all the martyries, shifts the klasma beneath a
petaste to its proper position (i.e., to the right and slighty lower), moves the kentemata to the left
when they collide with a psefeston beneath an oligon, and does dozens of other subtle alterations.
If you run this macro without having selected a part of your music, it will polish the notes in your
entire document. But if you select a particular section of your music and then run this macro, it
will only affect the music you have selected. (When you do so, you will be asked if you want to
save changes to a blank Word document that this macro created as a notepad. Your answer should
be "No.") WARNING: Even though this macro may be run more than once, it is not advisable to
do so, because it might make undesirable changes to your music. So if you have added new notes
to a document that has already been polished by this macro and you want to polish those new
notes, select those notes before running this macro, and this will ensure that only those notes will
be polished.
To view a list of changes made by the "PolishNotes" macro, open the following PDF file:
http://www.stanthonysmonastery.org/music/ByzMusicMacros.pdf (30 Kb)
I urge you to look through this list before you start typing up music, because if you are
unaware of what changes will be done automatically, you might waste time trying to fix things
manually that would have been taken care of automatically by the macros.
One minor flaw with this "PolishNotes" macro is that if a backstrike character is inserted
between two characters that it is looking for to adjust, it usually isn't smart enough to realize that
those two characters need to be adjusted. For example, if you type the following three symbols
in the order: Petaste, Isokratema, Klasma

9
 the macro will not realize that you have a petaste followed by a klasma, which needs no be
shifted to the right. However, if you typed the sequence:
in the order: Petaste, Klasma, Isokratema

the macro would realize that you have a klasma following a petaste, and then it would adjust
the klasma's position so that it would appear as follows:

It is unfortunate that this large "PolishNotes" macro can take 30 seconds (more or less,
depending on your computer's speed) to fix three pages of music, which is rather slow in terms
of "computer time." But bearing in mind that doing the same thing by hand would take at least
30 minutes, I hope you will be patient with this "slow" macro.

The "MakeNotesRed" macro is an optional macro that makes all the appropriate notes red. In
particular, it changes the font color for every gorgon, digorgon, trigorgon, fthora, elxis, tempo
mark, martyria, isokratema, and for all the older Byzantine music symbols (such as the isaki,
tromikon, lygisma, etc.). No harm is done if you run this macro more than once in the same
document. However, before running the "MakeNotesRed" macro, you should run the
"PolishNotes" macro first, because otherwise it will miss making several notes red.

The two macros "ExpandLine" and "CompressLine" increase or decrease all the spaces
between the notes in a given line. These macros will only work after the "Justify" macro has
been run. When the "Justify" macro is run, it will expand the spacing in all lines except the last
line. This can make the spacing between notes in the second to last line noticeably greater than
that in the last line. So by running the "ExpandLine" macro a few times (you must first position
the cursor in the last line) you can quickly make the spacing in this line match the spacing in the
previous line. And if you expanded the line too much, you can compress it again by running the
"CompressLine" macro. These macros are also useful when the words in the lyrics are too wide
to fit beneath their corresponding notes, which sometimes happens in heirmological melodies,

10
especially in English (which sometimes has syllables containing 7 or 8 letters!). Another trick for
expanding the spacing between notes is to insert a manual line break (SHIFT-ENTER) before the
second-to-last note in a line of music. Since the music is forced-justified, Word will force the
notes before this manual line break to fill that entire line, thus creating more space between each
note in that line.

The macros "MakeIsonBlue" and "MakeIsonGreen" are other optional macros that make the
color of all isokratema markings blue or green. The traditional color for writing the isokratema is
red (this is accomplished when the "MakeNotesRed" macro is run). But my experience has
shown that a red isokratema does not stand out very well when many other symbols in the
melody are red. So if you would like a different color for your isokratema markings, you can
instantly make all of them blue or green by running these macros. Although a blue isokratema
looks better on the screen, a green isokratema usually stands out better when printed by a color
printer. (back to top)

The other two text box buttons are for inserting and formatting a text box. As mentioned
above, using text boxes is an easy way to ensure that the vertical space between the notes and the
lyrics is constant for each line. The second text box button (which formats it) will work only if
the cursor is placed inside the text box.

5) Using the Keyboard Shortcuts

You can save even more time by using a keyboard shortcut to run each macro instead of
pressing each macro's button on the toolbar. These keyboard shortcuts are listed in the chart on
page 5 of these instructions. The keyboard shortcuts for the macros that manually adjust the
position of individual symbols are especially handy for quickly putting notes exactly where you
want them.
There are also keyboard shortcuts to change fonts that are not listed in that chart. They are as
follows:

11
 Button on Font Name Keyboard
Toolbar Shortcut
EZ Psaltica CTRL-SHIFT-q

EZ Fthora CTRL-SHIFT-w

EZ Special-I CTRL-SHIFT-e

EZ Special-II CTRL-SHIFT-r

EZ Oxeia CTRL-SHIFT-t

EZ Omega CTRL-SHIFT-y

I guarantee you will find these keyboard shortcuts to be great time-savers when you are
typing up the music. (back to top)

6) The EZ Psaltica Editor

Thanks to Nicolae in Romania, the EZ package now comes with an auxilliary program that
allows you to enter characters by clicking on a chart on the screen with your mouse rather than
entering them with the keyboard. The advantage of this is that a person can instantly begin
writing music without first investing the time necessary to become acquainted with the keyboard
layout of each font. In the long run, however, entering characters with the mouse will end up
consuming much more time than entering them with the keyboard would. This is due to the fact
that actions with the mouse are inherently slower than actions with the keyboard. Therefore, if
you think you will be writing many pages of Byzantine music, I urge you to learn how to type
the characters rather than relying on the EZ Psaltica Editor. (back to top)

7) Order of Operations
My experience has shown that doing things in the following order will save you the most
time:
1. Write all the music without the lyrics, highlighting any notes that you think might not be
automatically aligned by the macros.

12
 2. Add the ison (optional)
3. Add vertical measure lines and "3's" and "4's" (optional)
4. Run the "PolishNotes" macro
5. Run the "MakeNotesRed" macro (optional)
6. Run the "MakeIsonBlue" or "MakeIsonGreen" macro (optional)
7. Run the "Justify" macro
8. Insert the initial martyria by copying the appropriate one from the file "martyrias.doc"
(which is a part of this font package) and pasting it into your document.
9. Insert the drop cap* and adjust the indentation of the first line of music so that it is not too
close or too far from the drop cap. If the drop cap is not a graphic, it should be inserted in its own
transparent text box that floats above everything else. (optional)
10. If any of the notes you highlighted in step #1 need adjustment, remove the highlighting
and then fine tune their position using the macros: "MoveUp", "MoveDown", "MoveLeft", and
"MoveRight".
11. And if you are a perfectionist, you may wish to position the cursor in the last line and run
the macro "ExpandLine" a few times in order to adjust the spacing between notes in this line. If
you expand it too much, you can run the "CompressLine" macro.
12. Create a text box that floats in front of the music and type in the lyrics.
13. If you need to edit the notes later, first change the lyrics' text box so that it floats behind
the text, and then edit the notes. (back to top)

8) Afterword
During the past two years, several people have thought of ways to improve the macros and
the fonts. If you also have any suggestions or encounter any problems using them, please contact
me at: byzmusic@yahoo.com and I will do my best to help you. To see if this font package has
been updated since you obtained your version, check the dates at the bottom of the following
webpage: http://www.stanthonysmonastery.org/music/ByzMusicFonts.html

the least among Hieromonks

+Fr. Ephraim
*
An elaborate set of drop caps in both color and grayscale that look sort of like ones found in Byzantine
manuscripts may be downloaded for free from:
http://www.stanthonysmonastery.org/music /ByzDropCaps.zip (The file is 1.4 megabytes)

13
 Jan. 5, 2005 Dec. 15, 2006

P.S. I have compiled a list of 106 rules of orthography for Byzantine music notation that may
be downloaded from:
http://www.stanthonysmonastery.org/music/ByzOrthography.pdf (550 Kb) (English)
http://www.stanthonysmonastery.org/music/ByzOrthographyGreek.pdf (550 Kb) (Greek)
I urge you to read these rules carefully before you begin writing Byzantine music, because
there are many orthography rules that even experienced chanters are unaware of.
I have also compiled several thousand Byzantine music formulas and posted them at:
http://www.stanthonysmonastery.org/music/Formula.html
If you are composing new melodies of Byzantine music, you will find these lists or formulas
to be a tremendous aid that enables you to find exactly the right melodic phrase to match your
text (in any language), without breaking any of the complicated formulaic rules of Byzantine
music.
(back to top)

14