Drum notation with triplets and multiple layers

Australian_Composer · March 17, 2026, 1:19am

Hi I am very new to Dorico and after watching the excellent Tim Buell how to videos for drum notation, I am still encountering strange behaviour. Especially when using the R key to repeat a “template” bar featuring triplets in multiple voices

when I press R the next bar looks like this with weird nested triplets??

I want to be able to copy bars as a rough template then add the extra voices such as:

The other issue I’m having is none of the repeat bars are getting copied either when I press the R key or if I select everything in the bar.

Australian_Composer · March 17, 2026, 1:20am

I would like this to be the template of which to copy:

Derrek · March 17, 2026, 10:41am

I’m not sure, but you might help us by sending an image with voice colors displayed, or better yet, a Dorico file with just that measure so we could take a closer look at it as you have it entered.

And welcome to the forum, @Australian_Composer .

Australian_Composer · March 17, 2026, 9:49pm

Hi Derrek

Thanks for your warm welcome. I have selected “show colours” and started a new template. I can’t seem to replicate the same nested tuplets now, so i’m not sure what was going on with the original document. I’ve written out the ostinato in 3 different forms and have successfully applied the “R” key duplicate the measure without nested tuplets. I have attaced the .dorico file here. There are still strange things happening with the orginal document, but maybe that was my inexperience with the software.

Still not sure how to get the bar repeat signs to get copied as well. Or is there a way to apply this to all the bars in one go?

Thanks for your help.

Jazz Cymbal Ostinato Template.dorico (3.0 MB)

Derrek · March 17, 2026, 11:21pm

Bar repeats are set up as regions (like slash or chord regions); Dorico takes care of the repetition for bar-repeat regions automatically.

repeat-barsTest.dorico (1.3 MB)

Australian_Composer · March 18, 2026, 2:42am

Hi Derrek

Sorry I meant the repeat bar lines aren’t copied with the “R” key command:

Is there a way of copying those as well, or applying globally, that all bars (or a set range) will have a beginning and ending repeat bar line?

Derrek · March 18, 2026, 10:39am

One can use the System Track to select a measure or measures including repeats, but apparently, even when the selection includes a close repeat or end/start-repeat barline, only the opening repeat barline will be copied.

Feature request?
@dspreadbury