Do all voices deserve rests, or can I tactically omit rests?

Question

The voice 3 (magenta) plays for just two semiquavers at the end of the bar:

should I add a series of rests for that voice?

it's hard to understand which rests belong to which voice when rendered in black-and-white:

we could merge the voices (hard to see that only the E is tied):

---

Well, probably the pragmatic answer is to just relax the interpretation (this is a piano arrange of a multi-instrument song) and say that the notes don't overlap:

but nevertheless: if we were to try and notate the semiquavers + minim scenario: are all of the aforementioned representations legal? which would be preferred?

Answer 1

Elaine Gould, in her standard reference to music notation, Behind Bars, indicates that "Parts on one stave share a rest where possible" (p. 312) Thus, the initial half rest should be shared between the magenta and green voices.

In the second half of the measure, there should be a quarter rest and an eighth rest in the magenta voice so that it's clear the green voice is separate. (Again according to Gould, a dotted quarter rest is not permitted. "The longest permitted dotted rest is one value smaller than the beat. In crotchet [X/4] metres, the longest dotted rest is a dotted quaver [eighth note]" [p. 162].)

It also would clean things up to move the "repeated A" voice to the upper staff. If desired, "handedness brackets" can indicate which As to play with which hand. (In MuseScore, these are found on the Master Palette in the Symbols list under Keyboard techniques.)