In this example I created text (Shift-x) above the treble staff. The text overlapped the title. So in Engrave I repositioned the text. No problem. I then created text (Shift-x) attached to the bass staff. The staves were spread apart to make room for the text. I thought the text (notes to myself as I compose) would work better below the bass staff and in Engrave moved it. But the gap between staves remains and the text comes out on top of text attached to the measure below. Since Dorico automatically made room for the text between staves what needs to happen so that Dorico automatically closes the gap it made and account for the text below the staff?
It collapsed the extra space out of the system. I’ll have to move the note again (and I’m not surprised I need to ). Thank you. I see Dorico isn’t good at preventing clashes with the system below.
Also, don’t drag the text to put it below: Press F to flip it.
Dorico will make space where there is supposed to be space. If you only drag - and it doesn’t matter how far - Dorico is still thinking “it’s above the staff and it needs this much room”.
If you flip it, Dorico will think “I need to make more space because they want the text here instead of above”.
I’m very aware the measure has a lot more notes than Dorico thinks is wise. I’m still puzzled why all those notes are not evenly spaced and some are so clumped together as to be indistinguishable.
At the moment I preferred an overfilled line rather than one where Dorico puts three beats on one line, then stretches the fourth beat to fill the entire next line.
All this is for compositional use. I’ve got other ideas for how I would stick it in front of the performers.
As @DanielMuzMurray says, Dorico won’t ignore its rules. When you have note spacing and spacing gaps set, Dorico will honor those. If the system is this full, it gives up because it doesn’t know what to do.
The easiest way then would be to choose a much bigger page size for that score layout - or a much smaller rastral size.
Change it until you get to 100%.
Another additional way, besides the suggestions above, is to select the many fast notes and set their Property Scale to Grace or Cue grace, so you gain some space for them.
Dorico will do its best to cram notes together if they’re just noteheads and stems, but not if there are ledger lines. The width of ledger lines is negotiable in that there are circumstances in which ledger lines may be shortened, but leaving a gap between notes with ledger lines is completely non-negotiable to Dorico.
Same goes for the spacing gaps to either side of accidentals: they’re defined minimums, not something that can be proportionally modified.
Look carefully at your bar 12 and you’ll see that the notes with ledger lines and/or accidentals are reasonably well spaced, and the notes without are crammed in.
