On page 160 of Elaine Gould’s book Behind Bars it says that there is an alternative notation to empty bar rests in which they are tailored to the metre. I’m doing a big project at the moment where the composer prefers this notation most of the time.
I know this topic has been mentioned before and I know there is a ‘workaround’ way to do this with ‘force duration’ but it takes a lot of time and I also have run into a situation where it doesn’t work: it seems to be impossible to put a quarter rest in a ¼ bar in a drum set staff.
This made me think that it would be handy to have the option to have ‘show actual rests’ or ‘replace whole bar rests with actual rests’ regions in which the actual rest show in empty bars instead of the whole bar rest symbol. This would be an incredible time saver in the project I’m working on at the moment.
I can’t help you with the rest of your request but as a workaround for this specific issue, entering a 1:1q tuplet in a 1/4 bar in a Drum Set will get you a quarter rest (you can hide the tuplet number in the Properties panel).
(You’re probably aware of the current limitations regarding explicit rests in percussion kits, but in case you need them for less than a full bar, I believe the current workaround is mentioned here).
@Plutones I just had a brainwave about this. If you enter the tuplet and then select the rest and activate Force Duration, you can actually delete the tuplet rather than hiding it.
This will keep your file cleaner for future use (you won’t have to wonder years from now why all those hidden tuplets are there).
I’m leaving this out here since this might also be a useful trick in other scenarios involving forced rests for percussion.
I’m not sure this is less than work than other methods for a forced rest in a percussion kit, which involve producing an implicit rest with an extra note or something and then forcing the duration of the implicit rest.
In either case, once you have one of these forced rests, you can copy or Alt/Opt+click it elsewhere.
I’m aware of those methods (and use them), but the specific issue here was creating an explicit rest that equals the duration of the whole bar in a 1/4. The extra note thing won’t work then (though the alt/opt+click will). In any case, deleting the tuplet is cleaner than hiding it in this specific scenario, so I thought I’d add to my previous reply.
You can use the extra note trick in a 1/4 bar by adding an 8th note in the second half of the bar, producing an implicit 8th rest in the first half. Apply Force Duration to the rest, delete the note, and then change the duration of the rest.
Thanks for these ideas, great! They both work well and end up having the same result filling the bar with a quarter rest without the remaining tuplet, which is what I was looking for.
However the unsatisfactory feeling having to trick Dorico in doing this remains, and I’m still hoping that there will be an option one day to apply regions where empty bars are filled with actual rests.
Perhaps Dorico could have a feature that let the user choose whether Dorico handles rests automatically like it currently does or let the user add and/or delete the rests him/herself just like notes.
Note that you already can enter explicit rests, with Force Duration. But there is a particular issue with entering these explicit rests in percussion kits.
Back to the original question, it might be nice to have the possibility of displaying empty bars with time signature-appropriate rests instead of standard bar rests.
I understand but that is not the same as being able to compose that way. I know some with get their backs up and I hesitate but again you did it that way in Finale. Dorico felt change the duration before/after input a thing so perhaps being to enter your own rests is another. I actuality think most composers are totally capable of entering their own rests wherever they want them in any fashion. The fact is Finale did get some of it right.
Once again I want to thank you publicly for being a real asset in helping me anyway transitioning to Dorico from Finale. Thank you.
People have lots of different working methods, of course. Personally, I find that using the space bar to advance the caret by the currently selected rhythmic duration feels like I’m entering a rest, and it has the same effect. Now, it is the same as entering a note in Dorico, in that if I advance by a half note and then enter a note, Dorico will format the two beats of rest according to the current Note Grouping options, same as if I’d entered a half note. That’s fine with me, but some people will want something different.
And that’s great but it could/should be an option IMHO. The thing is any and all of us will adapt to Dorico or we will stop using it. If Dorico was more flexible it might be a good thing. They must have thought so, too, and is why they offered the note before/after duration feature.
