Hi there, I just recently discovered the combined dynamics panel (prior to that I only manually typed fp etc.)
It’s pretty interesting but I’m a little confused what is happening under the hood in playback. For example let’s say I had this phrase:
Where does it end? I noticed in the inspector panel there’s a bit where you can change the “transition duration,” but I searched the manual and google and I could not figure out what the numbers represent (I will assume seconds, but it could be notes or bars or a percentage of the total phrase for all I know, since it does not specify)?
Also, is there any functional difference between my first example of mf-pp vs typing the same thing with a hairpin in between (both in terms of playback and performance)?
Is there a reason to use one over the other? I googled around but couldn’t really figure out the use case for combined dynamics in that way.
As for me, sometimes I would like a player (and Dorico playback) to bring a short phrase to the foreground and then relatively quickly dip back down to a quieter volume. Is a combined dynamic such as my above example mf-pp the tool for the job?
That property is connected to the multiple handles a combined dynamic has in the Dynamics editor: it sets the time between the end of the first dynamic and the arrival at the destination 2nd dynamic.
It gets set automatically when you play with the handles in the Dynamics editor.
No. That is what many users want and expect when they see the panel, but these combined dynamics are all-at-once, like fp. I believe there is still not a way to play different dynamics on repeats.
In recent versions of Dorico, one has the ability to suppress items on different passes of a repeat.
So one can set pp suppressed on pass 2 and ff suppressed on pass 1.
The trick is to enter one of the marks a tick after the other and then use ALT/OPT + Left Arrow to move the later dynamic back to the same position as the first.
All of this can then be hidden if one wanted to show a pp-ff with its playback suppressed “always” instead of the two separate dynamics.
Hmm, it’s still not clear to me after looking at that article what the number “transition duration” refers to or is measured by. I noticed that it can in fact be inverted into negative values too. But what do the values represent? If use the arrows I can change transition duration to “–1/2.” But what does that mean, –1/2 of what?
So based on what others seem to be saying here, the primary use case for this combined dynamics panel is to affect playback for repeats?
That page doesn’t talk about the transition duration: it demonstrates the handles and points that the transition duration property relate to.
I would recommend playing around with it, moving the handles of a combined dynamic in the Dynamics editor, then checking the impact on the property values. I’d have to double-check, but I suspect the fractions relate to note durations (ie how many beats offset).
The ongoing discussion here about the playback of dynamics in repeats is unrelated to the Transition duration property.
Hi Lillie,
Apologies for the confusion with my original post, but I was asking two questions in one. The first was indeed what does the number transition duration relate to (time, beats, etc)?, but the second which is relevant here is I’m just trying to understand when and why to use combined dynamics, after recently discovering them. I checked out the manual which I know you write (thank you!), but it doesn’t say much apart from stating they “specify a sudden change of dynamic.” So does that mean they are basically the same as a subito style marking? It’s just that I’ve never seen anything like mf-pp in an actual score before, so I’m trying to wrap my head around when and why I would use this, and what difference that has with playback as compared to using either a hairpin (I assume that’s more gradual?) I totally understand that the manual cannot bother to explain the creative application of every tool and technique, it’s just seeing the combined dynamics panel, apart from the hallmark basics like fp and p sub. I’m trying to figure out how to use these. Thank you!
That’s all there is to it, really: a sudden change in dynamic.
As to when you’d use one or the other, if there isn’t space for a hairpin (e.g. because the change is only happening over a quaver’s worth of time), then you might consider a combined dynamic. There’s often an implied performance style, though: like a fp will generally come across as more accented than even a quick f>p.
All very subjective, all very contextual. In terms of Dorico functionality, a “f>p” group contains 3 separate dynamics, whereas “fp” is a single dynamic item, although it has several points in the Dynamics editor that are connected.
