Create BLANK music paper

I am new and from Finale…so I am just learning the commands.
How can I specify the exact number of bars I want in a staff line?
I wish to print some blank music paper with six bars per staff.
Thanks! Shannon

There are several posts in the forum about this. Here’s one: Create Blank Manuscript - #5 by Christian_R

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Go to Library > Layout options > Staves and Systems > Casting Off

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Ah! Interesting post. Great video by Anthony!

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Hi @sparrish1313, there are several ways.

One is the one suggested by the link posted by @dan_kreider (where you can see the mentioned video in another post, and a visual guide in my post, following those video instructions). But that method has no barlines.

Here another way to do it, using hidden clef in the instrument definition, hiding the time signature, casting-off 1 measure per system, setting the default barline as dashed and setting the dash length in Engraving Options/Barlines to 0, and no barline at end of flow in Notation Options/Barlines, and No labels in Layout Options/Staves and Systems, and narrower Inter System gaps in Layout Options/Verticals spacings, and some other little customisations in layout options and editing of the Default Page template.

For your case the casting-off is 6 bars per staff in Layout Options/Staves and Systems/Casting-Off, and normal default barline and normal barline at the end of flow, in Notation Options/Barlines

You can then add/subtract bars with the system track, and narrow/expand the inter System Gaps further, to control how many staves are on the page, and of course change the Rastral Size in layout Options/Page Setup;

Here the Dorico files with this method:

With no Barlines:
blank manuscript paper 12 staves A4.dorico (388.3 KB)

With 6 bars per staff:
blank manuscript paper - 12 staves A4 - 6 bars.dorico (399.8 KB)

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Is it possible to print blank staves on A5 paper, portrait or landscape ?

Yes. Just set the required page size in Layout Options>Page Setup>Page size.

well, I didtry to set up for blank manuscript pages, using the helpful hints I have been sent, but it did not work.

I set up the page size, orientation etc for SE, which is allowed I think, but nothing showed on the screen - no staves, nothing.

Is it me ? Am I missing something elementary ? Is it because I did not put any notes , or set it up as a project - blank pages 1, for example ?

I am really at a loss as to what I do now, short of buying manuscript sheets, until I want to work on them in Dorico .

Any ideas, please ?

Did you try downloading the provided projects in Christian’s post, above?

Then all you would have to do is change the page size.

I did download the 12 page details, but it became a project. Try as I might, it was impossible for me to change it to A5 landscape , and then try to alter the size of print, margin, etc to make sure that I could get 6 staves per page. I was using SE at that stage, but even when I moved to 5Pro there were no effective changes that I could make to get the result I wanted - blank 6 stave pages in A5.

I am not going to try further at this stage : it would be better for me to go back to paper pages, and leave Dorico out of it. I might even give up this impossible task and drop out of Dorico altogether - it has been so opaque to get anything out of it that I am thinking that it is just not worth keeping on with simple requests which cannot work .

Is this what you want?

Or without the barlines. I can certainly give you the doc. None of this is particularly difficult, especially without the barlines - that takes seconds. With barlines involves a few more commands, but it’s no at all onerous. It’s just that the program works differently and you need to slowly learn where everything is.

This link came back as page not found

With 6 bars per staff:
blank manuscript paper 12 staves A4.dorico (400.0 KB)

The first link downloaded just fine. The blank music paper looks good.
When I tried creating blank paper myself, the part page had whole rests in every bar…
How can I write emptiness? I looked at Page setup and did not find any way to
make empty bars.
Thank you for being patient with me as a Finale migrant.

As a recent Finale migrant, I am on a steep learning curve too. Please do not give up!
Benwiggy pointed me to Christian’s post, which has this link in it…which I think you may have already found.
With no Barlines:
blank manuscript paper 12 staves A4.dorico (388.3 KB)
My plan is to keep asking questions until I learn how to create a blank music page myself.
Stay tuned!
:musical_score: Shannon

Yes and thank you…
As a recent Finale migrant, what I more deeply want is the instructions on how to create blank music paper myself.
I think it is a good project for me to learn about the layout options. Is there a way to do this without having to assign players first or creating an entire project? Or are there settings that will create generic parts without whole rests in every bar?

Thank you , Victor!
I just found the video Tip you suggested for creating blank music paper.
Next thing I will do is watch it and try to do the instructions! Yay!
:musical_score: Shannon

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First things first. I’ll give you this

Blank - A5 - Landscape with barlines.dorico (389.8 KB)

I’ll do a quick tutorial for you later today hopefully. Empty staves is dead easy, but with barlines is admittedly a bit more involved, but nothing too scary!

OK, big breath, remain calm since no one will die! There are several steps in involved in creating this. Once you know and understand the program, this is very easy, logical and quick, but right now, it will seem very byzantine! At the bottom, I have the recipe for fully blank paper, which is done in seconds.

First off, from the hub, select “Create New from the top tab.

In the screen you now see, select “Emtpy” on the left, choose paper size and orientation on the left (A5 and landscape icon), and uncheck the Key signature box.

Select Solo Player, in the screen that appears, write “staff”, then select “treble clef staff” and click “add”.

Go to write mode, select the time signature, check “Hide time signature” in the properties panel.

Select the first bar rest, then click on the “Clef” tool on the right of the screen. Click the drop-down arrow on “Uncommon Clefs” and you will see an invisible clef (4th down on the left-hand column). Click to select.

With the rest still selected, type poopies-B and enter 64 and return, to make it a total of 72 bars.

Type ctrl-shift-L to go to Layout options.

Select “Brackets and Braces” on the Left and select “No brackets”

Select Staves and systems on the left and set both staff labels options to “None”

Scroll down to indents and change “Indent first system” to 0

Scroll down to casting off and check fixed number of bars and fixed number of systems to 6

Unclick “Scale number of systems”

Click on “Bar Numbers” on the left and select “None”

Click on “Players” on the left, go down to “Bar rests and Multirests” and uncheck “Show bar rests in empty bars".

Click apply and close

Type ctrl-shift-N for notation options

Click “Barlines” on the left

Go to automatic barline at end of flow and select “Nomal barline”

Scroll down to “systemic barline” and select "Show for one or more” for both options.

Click apply and close

Now go to engrave mode

Double-click on the “Default” master page on the right. You will see two pages.

On the left page, select and delete both green frames (select with mouse and press delete), select the blue frame, and click and drag the top handle of the frame up until it touches the margin.

In the properties panel, with the frame still selected, click both “Top padding” and “Bottom padding” so they both set to zero.

Click on the L>R icon on the top of the screen to copy the layout on the left page.

Click Apply and close.

Now, you will see two pages on the top right. Right-click Page 1, and select insert Page Template Change.

Select “From this page onwards” (:the Default master page should already be selected in the drop-box)

Click OK and you have your paper

For completely empty paper, you only have to go to engrave mode, double click the default Master page, select the blue drop box on the top left of the page that says “Flows” and select “Blank staves”, then apply and close. Then you can select the frame and choose how many staves you want in the properties panel. Dorico is set to make fully blank paper more automatically that paper with barlines.

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Thank you! When I get home, I will check it out. :musical_score:Shannon

Haha! Poopies must be an autocorrected word for a misspelled “shift.” Gotta love autocorrect! :rofl:

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