I wonder if it would make sense to include the dynamic (p, mp, mf, f etc. etc.) of the selected note here as well?
Sometimes that information is not readily available in the Write view because the dynamic has been set in a bar that is outside the view of the current zoom level.
You can see it in the dynamics lane of the Key Editor.
Yes, but only if you have the note selected with the dynamic, e.g.,
If I understand the request above, when there is no immediate dynamic and you select the note, there is currently no indication anywhere.
I +1 the request.
Ah yes, I’m aware that it’s there. This request is for making the dynamic information visible for a selected note in Write mode, not Play mode.
I’ve just had some instances where I’d like to have a note / notes played at one higher dynamic then previously. I’d like to select the note and see what dynamic it is at the moment, inherited from earlier, so that I can apply the correct new dynamic without having to zoom out or scroll back to find the previous dynamic marker.
Bonus feature request 
: Being able to press Shift-D for dynamic and then write “+[number]”, like +1, to insert a dynamic value that is raised/ lowered relative to the it’s current, inherited dynamic.
Not sure how useful that is, but it seems to me it would remove some friction.
Christerdk:
I want to second your suggestion. It would be nice to be able to click a note and view its current dynamics setting in the note-properties/status bar of Write Mode; and to display dynamics in the standard notation format used in the score: f, p, mf, etc. Being forced to launch the Key Editor and translate its graphs and numbers into standard dynamics markings for such a simple task is not an acceptable alternative.
E.g., if I’m writing a longer large-ensemble piece with many dynamics changes, I might very often want to fine-tune the orchestration or bring out different lines by changing the dynamics of one or more players. The most recent dynamics setting in the score might be dozens of bars off the screen or even partially buried if the score is not yet in its final engraved form.
Unless I’m missing something obvious, the easiest ways to do this without leaving Write Mode is to either search visually by manually scrolling through the score or else simply start guessing, adding best-guess dynamics & listening to hear whether the player gets louder or softer.
I don’t want to second-guess Dorico’s programmers, but if the program is what we used to call an object-oriented design, simply adding one more note parameter to the status bar may not require a prohibitive amount of coding and testing. But it sure would be useful to anyone composing a modern piece for a larger ensemble.
C
One could probably get similar information by switching to the part in question where many more staves of music would visible in page view to check for a prior dynamic marking.
You can use the Key Editor Dynamics track, where the line shows the current dynamic level.
That was the second place I looked (after the status bar). All I could find was numeric levels, not convential dynamics markings. Am I missing something obvious?
It would normally look something like this…
The line continues to the right until it meets the next written dynamic.
No, the dynamics in the dynamics lane appear only where they are in the notation. +1 for this new request to put dynamics in the status bar (or at least the option).
Yes, derAbgang is right. the Properties/Key Editor doesn’t show “current dynamics level.” LIke the score itself, it just shows points where the dynamics are formally changed. This isn’t an improvement over trying to find dyn markings in the score. And it’s arguably even harder to read them in the properties window.
I hadn’t noticed the tiny, tiny (at least on my display) dynamics markings at the bottom of the screen, probably because I hadn’t displayed properties for a measure that specifically changed dynamics. Now that Janus has pointed them out to me, I at least now know they’re there.
I think the bottom line is that Dorico simply doesn’t provide a way to quickly determine the dynamics setting of a score object without having to scroll horizontally, sometimes for dozens of bars, and just hope you don’t miss a marking that may be embedded deeply in a dense work-in-progress measure.
I toggled Signposts/Dynamics in the hope that it might do the job. However, that option seems to do something completely different and counterintuitive.
Signposts appear when there’s notation in the score that is not visible — here, for example, when you have entered a dynamic marking and then hidden it. You can choose to either display or hide these signposts.
+1 to OP request.
To me it’s not a matter of whether the information can be gleaned from the graph that can be shown when the Key Editor is opened in the lower pane. It’s a matter of convenience when working on the score itself and not having to interrupt one’s workflow to look at a different presentation and then interpret a graph when all one is interested in is a primary dynamic marking.
The Key Editor can be used when focusing on playback, but initial playback depends one what is entered in the score. Why switch between two “hats” when one wants to focus on score entry?
Switching hats makes some people (finger pointing directly at myself) lose their train of thought, their focus.
We’ve been getting a bit afield (albeit justifiably), but I want to come back to my original goal, this time state with more generality:
I’d like to be able to display the current dynamic setting of a player, by clicking a note, rest, measure, whatever is within the region of interest – I’m not particular. Right now, we can easily see parameters like tempo, pitch, voice, etc. IN WRITE MODE. But not dynamics, key signature, or meter. It’s not too burdensome to infer the last two by examining a few measures (although it would be nice if sig & meter were also displayed in a status bar), but much harder to ID a current dynamics setting for a specific passage, esp. in a fully orchestrated piece that has a lot of dynamics changes, and where dynamics vary from player to player.
I agree with others here that pulling up Key Editor & then mapping a numeric level onto an instrument-specific dynamics marking isn’t a satisfying alternative.
My gut tells me: “Can’t be done in Dorico Pro 6.1.”
D
