Typically in an orchestral score, there is additional vertical space above the string section. Sometimes this is to allow for rehearsal letters, tempo alterations, etc., but often it just exists to make it easier for the conductor to look down and instantly recognize Vln I. Layout Options/Vertical Spacing allows for a lot of settings, but unless I’m mistaken there’s no way to always create additional vertical space above/below certain staves in the score.
Finale’s solution is the “Add vertical space” button in the Setup Wizard. I’m not sure that’s really the best solution, but it does give the desired result.
If there was some way to tell Dorico to always attempt to add additional space above/below a certain staff for the entirety of the score, that would be very useful for fine-tuning score layout. If there’s an easy way to achieve this now that I’ve overlooked, please let me know, otherwise thanks for considering!
The problem is that this doesn’t provide you with selective space just between two specific instrument groups. I agree there’s a need for something like this, but perhaps it could be done in concert with whatever items are responsible for you wanting the extra space in the first place, e.g. bar numbers, tempos or rehearsal marks, etc.
Also, I found that if I set a larger number for extra space between groups, this does not apply if the staff (staves) are not bracketed. For example, I am working on a small orchestra score with Timpani (no percussion) just above the strings, and I am forced to use a bracket even though I would prefer not to.
I did put the Timpani in a separate group, to no avail.
At least for me, it’s purely a visual thing, not necessarily to allow for additional entered items. The additional white space clearly sets the string section apart from the other instruments and makes it easy to locate at a glance. I often do something similar in a big band too, and add a bit more space above the top rhythm section instrument. Even though woodwinds, trumpets, and trombones are distinct instrument groups, when taken as a whole a little bit of white space serves to separate the “winds” from the rhythm.
I’m not really sure the best way to implement this, but it definitely would be great if there was some way to add additional space between certain staves in an entire score at once.
Looking at the online Boosey perusal scores, on the main page under “New Scores,” of the first 5 listed, I think 4 of them add additional space above the strings, so it is very common to see in orchestral scores. Some, like the Vaughan Williams, have an enormous amount. (I think that one might just be essentially removing a manuscript staff above the string staff, but it is a huge amount. That one might be Ken Williams’s copy work too.)
+1 for adjusting space between two systems manually for a whole flow!
It would also be great to add options for adding more vertical space for Tempo markings and Rehearsal Marks — this is something that I always seem to need to adjust manually.
And also to be able to control the vertical space between systems specifically allowed for lyrics — I often find Dorico allows too little.
No, because it treats all groups equally. For example, it’s very common in orchestral scores to add additional space above the strings, whether or not rehearsal marks, tempos, etc. are present, as the additional offset makes it easy for the conductor to locate them. The Takemitsu score below is a bit of an extreme example, but there is a massive gap above the strings, even accounting for the system objects, while no additional gap at all between the woodwinds and brass.
It would be useful to be able specify additional gaps at various positions in the score. These could be compressed as needed to accommodate vertical spacing issues, but could give a better appearance by default if the gaps are desired.
One way to add an additional gap is to use a 0-line staff. The gap above the strings in the Takemitsu score is sufficiently large to require two 0-line staves:
Set the minimum barline protrusion to zero spaces, change the names of the 0-line staves to one or more spaces, make their time signatures local and hide them, force duration of the first rests in these staves, set the custom scale of the rests to one and activate their ends voice property.
Although I haven’t tried it myself, I remember reading on this forum that if you create a 0-line staff in another notation program, export an XML file and import it into Dorico, then that is another way to obtain a 0-line staff in Dorico.
Does Daniel’s file from that post actually work for anyone? Something changed with D5 in how it handles instruments added through doricolib files, but I never quite figured it out. In any event, some added instruments that worked fine in D4, didn’t in D5 for me. With the Edit Instruments dialog it’s mostly a non-issue now anyway, but with a 0-line instrument it still is and Daniel’s zero-lines.doricolib file doesn’t actually seem to work for me on Win11.
I noticed he has the Sketch family assigned to Order 0, instead of Order 9 as it’s defined in the InstrumentFamiliesDefinitions.xml file, but even changing that to 9 didn’t make a difference for me. Just curious if anyone else can get it to work on a New project. My own 0-line file works if I type it in the New Player dialog box, but doesn’t show in my Custom family that I created until I type the first 0, so something is definitely different with these in D5 than it was in D4.
