Feature Ideas for Commercial Chart Workflow: Section Headers & Voice Panel
First, I’d like to thank the Dorico team for creating such an outstanding notation program. I’ve been producing commercial rhythm section charts in Dorico 6 over the past several weeks, and I’ve developed a real appreciation for the engraving engine and the overall design philosophy.
While working on these charts, I came up with two workflow ideas that I believe fit naturally with Dorico’s goal of allowing users to describe the music while the software intelligently handles the engraving.
1. Section Headers
Commercial charts typically identify new sections with both a rehearsal mark and a section title.
[A]
Verse
[B]
Chorus
[C]
Solo
Currently this requires multiple independent objects that must be created, positioned, and maintained separately.
I’d love to see an optional Section Header feature where a rehearsal mark could include:
- An optional section label beneath it.
- Optional rehearsal mark styles (rounded rectangle, oval, etc.).
- Optional placement in the left system margin.
- Both elements moving together as a single object.
It would also be wonderful if a Section Header could optionally define the beginning of a musical section by:
- Adding preferred vertical spacing before the section.
- Visually grouping systems that belong to the same section.
- Preserving that spacing automatically as the score reflows.
This would allow users to define the musical form while Dorico handled the presentation automatically.
2. Voice Panel
One of Dorico’s strengths is that users generally don’t need to think about voices.
However, commercial keyboard charts often use multiple voices for different musical purposes, such as:
- Melody
- Rhythmic Slashes
- Rhythmic Hits
- Cue Notes
As a project grows, it becomes increasingly difficult to remember which voice serves which purpose. Dorico provides voice colors and caret indicators, but there isn’t a central place to view or manage the voice structure of a staff.
I’d love to see a dockable Voice Panel that exposes information Dorico already knows.
For example:
Piano RH
🟢 Melody (Upstem Voice 1)
🟡 Slash Rhythm (Downstem Voice 1)
🔵 Rhythmic Hits (Upstem Voice 2)
🟣 Cue Notes (Downstem Voice 2)
Current Voice:
Slash Rhythm
The panel could include:
- Current active voice
- All voices on the selected staff
- Stem direction
- Voice type
- Optional user-defined names
- Optional user-assigned colors
- Quick voice selection
User-defined names and colors could also be saved in templates, allowing users to establish a consistent voice structure across every project.
This wouldn’t change Dorico’s voice engine. It would simply make the existing voice structure much easier to understand and manage, particularly for commercial chart production.
I really enjoy Dorico’s philosophy of describing musical intent rather than manually engraving everything. To me, song sections and voice roles are also part of that musical intent. My hope is that features like these could help commercial users spend less time managing layout details and more time simply writing music.
I’d love to hear whether other commercial arrangers (jazz, pop, Broadway, worship, studio, etc.) have experienced similar workflow friction, or whether you’ve found different approaches that work well.
Thank you again to the entire Dorico team for all the incredible work that continues to go into the program.
