Can Dorico do this? A layout different from the full score?

Hi everyone!

I have a song for piano and choir. It has a refrain you go back to after each verse (repeats). Verse 1 & 2 have the same music and are under each other. However, verse 3 is different and has its own music. There are 76 bars.

There is a part for 2 woodwinds in C. However it is written out separately without repeats. In fact, each verse and refrain has a different arrangement. There are 127 bars.

Can this layout part for woodwinds somehow be part of the full score, even though it is written out fully without repeats? Or does it need to be a different flow altogether?

If it can be part of the full score, how would that work? Would the woodwind part be playable with the full score?

Thanks for your help. David

Hi David,

from your description alone there is a good chance that we will misunderstand what is really needed. Is there a chance that you can upload a simple yet clear form scheme that helps to exactly grasp the structure of the piece?

Mmm, I don’t know how to more clear than that. The full score has repeats, the woodwinds part is written out, without repeats. Don’t know how else to describe it.

I don’t understand the different amount of bars… 76? 127? How fits that together? Repeats/no repeats? When play the woodwinds?

As I understand it at the moment: you have to write out all of the music (without repeats) and add the woodwinds staves. For different arrangements of all verses is it impossible to notate it with repetitions.

Yes, I thought that might be the answer. Thank you. Won’t work.

I am not sure at all that it should not be possible. If anything, it might be easier to achieve with Dorico than with most other software. (This is separate from my conviction that it probably is not a good approach overall to use such a construction.)

But to say more I really need a bit more of a concrete grasp of the piece.

I think what David is saying is that the Choral score has the repeats, the woodwind score is thorough written, and the full score (as of now) does not exist in written form.

Essentially what you have, as I understand it, is alternate woodwind parts for each run through the repeated section.

I am pretty sure this cannot be done in Dorico without writing out the full score without the repeat, not unless you write out the alternate wind parts on separate staves for the repeat and combine them.
repeatDemo.zip (1.05 MB)

He means that ignoring the chorsus, he wants

 

Choir:
|: A :| C 

Winds:

A B C

The only software I’ve ever seen that handled this well was the guitar software “PowerTab”.

You could have, say, a lead guitar part fully written out, but the drums and bass just repeat a 2 bar phrase over and over again.

The question here is first of all how this affects the common understanding of a “full score”. It is perfectly possible to have the choir with repeat brackets and the winds written out. But how do you reconcile these two approaches within a synchronized score? This is completely independent from any software – how would you do it on paper in the first place?

I am not saying it can’t be done. I just say that I am still very unsure what the end result is supposed to be. I understand what the intent is functionally, but right now I have no idea by what means specifically you want to use to achieve what you need.

I think Ein Mädchen oder Weibchen in Mozart’s Magic Flute is like this. There are three verses and all the orchestral parts are the same except for the keyed glockenspiel part which has a different part in each verse. In the Eulenberg pocket score it is written as a repeat but there are, as Derrek suggests, three pairs of staves for the glockenspiel.

Are you sure? Rereading the original post, I guess what is meant is more like:

Choir: ACACBC
Winds: DEFGHI

That is a bit more complicated than the Mozart (and also a recipe for disaster if not written out). In General, though, for such a problem Derrek’s approach seems to be the right way to go, even though it can be streamlined: you do not need two Players for each of the wind instruments; just give to the single Players two flutes and two clarinets each.

You are correct: Dorico will print two instruments held by one player simultaneously, and that is the more elegant solution.
(I should not have been surprised that the two-at-once solution was possible, since that will be crucial when the Development Team fleshes out percussion.)
repeatDemo2.zip (1.34 MB)