Here is an excerpt from the score.
In the left-hand staff (Si-Fa bécarre), Dorico automatically corrects a tied quarter note followed by a dotted half note with a whole note. I couldn’t find any other way to achieve the desired result other than using the “force duration” key. Have I perhaps missed a specific setting buried deep within the software?
I don’t think you’ll find a Notation Option that would allow this, because if I understand correctly you want (well, Ravel wants!) the upper part of the left hand in 6/4 (a 2 beat bar, two dotted half notes — as the right hand looks like, btw) and the lower part in 3/2 (a 3 beat bar, three half notes). If an option were splitting your tied note in the upper voice after the third quarter note, it would also split the whole note in the lower voice, I’m afraid.
So, Force Duration is the solution, I believe.
Thank you, Charles
As usual, your analysis is perfect, and as an old teacher myself, I’d give you 20/20.
What I regret about these arbitrary corrections made by Dorico is that they are unpredictable, force you to go back and re-input the notes using the O key, and waste a lot of time.
It would be so much better if Dorico, like all other music notation software, simply entered what you ask it to… after all, a Dorico user is never a beginner for whom music is a mystery, is it?
But that’s another story, as Kipling writes at the end of The Jungle Book.
I don’t see these as arbitrary, they’re rule based, and you can change lots of the rules in engraving options.
That would be me 
The Rules by Mrs Gould only. Which isn’t necessarily a benchmark.
All kinds of rules are all over Dorico. Displaying of notes are just one thing, there are rules for vertical and horizontal spacing for all kinds of musical objects, the way chords are shown, etc., etc. And lots of options to change those rules based on the users wishes.
Doesn’t it behave like that if you check this in preferences, and click on force duration at entering the first note of the session?
Hi @ObiwanKenobi, you don’t need to reenter the notes:
you can split the whole note (and it will be splitting only that voice), activating the caret (in the correct voice and on the 4th quarter), then pressing U (untie), then just press Enter to exit note input, and click O (force duration) and T (tie):
Good afternoon, Christian.
I didn’t explain myself properly. I did exactly what you’re showing, but it’s still a waste of time. 
According to advice of many brilliant users on this forum, activate permanently FD is the worse thing we can do.
Not if you don’t like the “rules.”
There seems to be a lot of “if I don’t like the rules, I make up my own” these days.
In this field it’s called artistic license: one can do whatever one wants, but if everything goes south, it’s the “artist’s” fault.
The issue here isn’t the “rules”, and you’ve perfectly understood that. There’s no need to get worked up.
I simply want to be able to write exactly what Mozart, Schumann, Liszt, Brahms, Sibelius, Strauss, Ravel or Debussy wrote – and they didn’t always follow Helen Gould’s guidelines. That’s part of what makes an Urtext edition necessary.
Furthermore, to return to the subject of leaving FD enabled in the preferences, I was told on this forum that this could interfere with Dorico’s page layout calculations. So I will use it sparingly, only when absolutely necessary.
But only rarely do they ever disagree (and those ‘disagreements’ may be caused by copyists/publishers taking shortcuts)
In most cases, I agree with you. But in specific cases such as the one mentioned at the start of this thread, I imagine Ravel would have been very unhappy that Durand published it in that way. 
On the contrary. I think Durand and Ravel are 100% consistent in their use of 3/2 (3 beats per bar) and 6/4 (2 groups of 3 per bar). It is not the phrasing of the crotchets that determines the beat, rather it is the accompaniment. eg…
Notice the horn notation differences between the 6/4 and 3/2 bars. My conclusion is that Durand, Ravel and Dorico all agree how this should be done and that it is you who are in the minority!
Hello Janus.
I don’t think you’ve followed the story through to the end. You’re referring to the 1913 orchestral score, which alternates between 3/2 and 6/4 time; but the 1912 piano version does not: it is written in 3/4 time. I am therefore referring to another manuscript held at the BNF which transcribes this score for piano with the same time signatures as those used for the 1913 orchestral version; no doubt a version subsequent to the first piano version of 1912. And this manuscript does indeed use the tie I discuss at the start of this thread.
Yes, but @Janus’ example shows precisely what can be the advantage of automatic durations for note input.
For example, to enter the bass trombone in the first bar, you just input two half notes, for the tuba, you input a whole note. There are many situations like this one where the T key simply isn’t needed, and overall it saves a lot of time (at least in my experience!).
And when you do need to override it, you press O — personally, with practice, I can generally anticipate the situations where O will be required. The result (for me, again!) is a much faster note entry.
I agree, but it is not the problem here (read my post above).
Nevertheless, what you’ve shown me does indeed work well, and I think I’ll have to start thinking differently about entering music in Dorico. It’s not always easy when you’re used to other software.
Yes, but you are a Master Jedi ; not me. 
Actually it is the 1912 first edition (Durand… 1912. Plate D. & F. 8476) on IMSLP.
I’d guess your re-written piano version simply removed every 2nd barline without changing the original notation.
Yes you are Right. I mean Orchestral 1912 and piano 1911. On a Saturday morning, I’m never fully awake. Ha, ha.
Ho ho. you mean I can do that for the other piano version I cited above? This could simplify incredibly my work! Thank you.
Yes, but only if you force duration on all notes (else Dorico will automatically apply its rules again!) … and we are back to square one.
