Dorico’s option to add one or more staves above or below a regularly appearing staff (or portion of a staff) is brilliant! So good! However, I run into situations where adding a single-line staff would be more helpful than a 5-line staff. (Yes, I can think of several workarounds, but this would be less clunky.)
Here are some scenarios where the option to add an occasional extra 1-lined staff could be helpful.
- In certain teaching scenarios, sketching in a simplified version of a complicated rhythm can help students master it more quickly. (Think of times in your youth when you penciled in counting and/or a simple rhythm in your orchestra part.)
- Some pieces call for a performer to tap a counter rhythm on their instrument (or with their foot on the floor).
- In cases where a cue contains rhythmic and harmonic information (e.g., when a cue consists of a certain series of chords), notating the cue on a rhythm staff would make more sense than on a full staff. For example:
- Adding cues can address some of these issues superficially. But what about when we want to add an indication of some rhythm that is either not (a) in another player’s part, or (b) something we want to add in either a student exercise or a solo piece?
