One Dorico feature I really appreciate is how it highlights notes as being potentially out of range for the given instrument.
What would additionally be useful would be for Dorico to highlight, for wind instruments, when the duration of a note, or legato phrase, in the written range of the instrument, at the written dynamic, and at the written tempo, may result in the player taking a breath during the phrase.
There is no universal value for the duration, but in the same way that Dorico starts to tint notes red that are in the “advanced” range, Dorico could hint at phrasing that may need extra attention if it is to sound unbroken.
I often forget that flutes need more breath than oboes and tubas need more than both, especially in certain ranges.
That’s not a bad idea, but in many cases, it is perhaps more a function of the individual performer. Consider the opening solo of Corigliano’s Clarinet Concerto: I suspect many would flag that as a potential problem, but that’s something that many virtuosi can do.
That said, it would have been very useful to me years ago. I’d been very guilty in earlier years of assuming wind and brass players can do circular breathing, only to find that most don’t do it. So I have two works that involve wind and/or brass players that probably will only exist in the recordings I made using non-human players (eg, Noteperformer, Garritan Personal Orchestra, etc). They sound great, honestly, but a tool like what you described would have at least flagged it as a concern. That said, I composed one of them long before notation programs existed (early 80’s) and only in the past few years did I copy them into a notation program (in both cases, Finale since that’s what I was using then) so as to enable audio recordings.
That’s not a bad idea, but in many cases, it is perhaps more a function of the individual performer.
I had considered that, but I think the same thing is also true about the range warnings and Dorico does have those and they are very useful, so I thought, “why not here as well?”
Agreed. But instrument ranges generally are a function of the instrument. The main exception are voices as some professional singers may have extended ranges. I’d love to see this type of thing for breathing but it seems so individual that it may have a lot of false positives. But perhaps that’s not too bad if it isn’t triggered frequently.
I’m guessing you’re not a wind player yourself? You can’t treat breath like gas mileage. Apart from an individual’s characteristics, how much breath I have left when playing an extended sentence depends on a lot of factors (acoustics, room temperature, the state of my chops, how considerate my fellow players are in their dynamic output, how nervous I am, did I have a cold recently, did I sleep poorly… not to mention the actual instrument I play. Or whether or not I master circular breathing. Etc, etc..).
Apart from that, nothing kills the musicality of a melody more than an overload of breath marks. They prevent you from making musical sentences and interpretations of your own. A teacher once told me: you can breathe anywhere you want as long as you can justify it musically. In a solo context that’s part of the challenge and fun, and also a significant part of putting in my own musical interpretation (which I feel is what it’s all about). I think breathmarks should only be used scarcely and very deliberately. Just my 2 cents as a brass player.
I’m a trombone player. I’m interested in this kind of feature not because I want to pollute a score with breath marks, but just so I have a reminder to not make phrases too long and to give players some occasional respite with sections of rest. I agree about the negative effects of breath marks.
For the love of pepperoncini, don’t use breath marks in your scores unless it is a special event. Your performers will breathe when they need to do so.
If you don’t want them to breathe at a particular place, use a dashed slur to connect the two notes.
I’m concerned that the discussion of breath marks is causing a distraction from the original idea, so I’ve removed any mention of it from the description. It was an uneccesary appendage anyway.
You can’t treat breath like gas mileage. Apart from an individual’s characteristics, how much breath I have left when playing an extended sentence depends on a lot of factors (acoustics, room temperature, the state of my chops, how considerate my fellow players are in their dynamic output, how nervous I am, did I have a cold recently, did I sleep poorly… not to mention the actual instrument I play. Or whether or not I master circular breathing. Etc, etc..).