Changing meters - splitting the empty bar in half always?

Dorico
1

I have a feeling this is a preference somewhere I can’t find … but maybe not.

I’m doing some writing and changing a bunch of meters and key sigs in my score as I’m working.

I’m fine with getting use to the ‘placeholder’ idea - if I want to insert a 6/8 time sig in the middle of a 12/8 passage I first have to create the ‘return’ time sig (12/8) in the bar after where my meter change will be. Fine - different from Finale and Sib, but no big deal.

My question is about the next step - when I change the time sig on the empty 12/8 bar into 6/8, it creates 2 bars of 6/8. If instead I change the meter to 5/8, it creates two bars of 5/8. But if I change the bar of 12/8 into a (larger) bar of 15/8 it only creates the single bar of 15/8.

I understand the idea of the splitting into two bars - any music in those bars will be spread out of the two bars for me to then edit. But most of the time when we create meters aren’t we setting up the meters for entry so the bars are still empty?

Suggestion - wouldn’t it make sense if the bars are empty when creating a smaller time signature to only change the meter on that bar and not insert a second empty bar? But if any music has been entered to then split it into the two bars as is presently done.

2

Your suggestion wouldn’t make sense to me. To me, it makes more sense that things work the same if there is music there or if the bars are empty. If you have 12 8ths of rest, that’s still 12 8ths if you re-bar it as 6/8 bars.

3

But I don’t want 12 8ths - the whole point of changing the meter for an empty bar is that I want 6 8ths not 12. If I needed the same number of beats, why would I have changed the meter in the first place?

This is such a small nit-picking point to be arguing about … but I just want to change the meter for one bar - and when there is no music present, I’m not asking for the bar to be split in half. I’m changing the meter because I want there to be less time or fewer beats in the music.

I DO appreciate the purpose of splitting the bar up when notation is present. That’s a good thing.

Oddly though -

  • converting an empty 12/8 bar to 5/8 makes two empty bars of 5/8
  • but converting a filled 12/8 bar to 5/8 creates two 5/8 bars with notation and an additional bar with the final two 8’s. But this last bar has no time signature. I’m glad Dorico didn’t throw away the extra music, but surprised it didn’t take the initiative to add an unrequested time signature (2/8 or 1/4).