Figured Bass options, priority uncertain

For the settings of figured bass, I always select the second choice in
Follow Engraving Options Follow Input Litteraly
whether for the popover or for musicXML import.
But it seems, at least for the popover scenario that some options from engraving take priority.
I say “some” but I am only certain for one case, that I can reproduce an describe. In the following Engraving Option:
Calculate accidentals: Relative to Key Signature Absolute from Bass Note
If I do not select the second choice, this makes a difference. In the case of minor tnality with at least flats, when we come to a “tonic dominant” harmony, with the bass note being the fundamental i,e, the dominant of the tonic, an alteration figure is needed to make the chord major. If I give a natural to the popover, and if the engraving option is the first choice, I get a #, while if it is the second choice I get the expected natural. This is not a big problem at all, I can select the second choice and I do, and anyway many baroque composers did use a # in that case, and I might do it also if I wanted to respect the style of a given manuscrit. This is just that it seems to contradict the documentation, and I wondered, if it was by design, or might it be a glitch?

Apologies, but I can’t quite envision the situation you describe. Would you be able to give a concrete musical example where Dorico isn’t respecting the natural in the popover and is converting it to a sharp?

Well I have this project, a Rameau piece, transcribed by me from G minor to F minor. In the 2nd measure we move to the tonic dominant C major. I have entered a “n” in the popover. Absolute from Bass Note is selected, and here comes a snapshot:
natural
Now I select Relative to Key Signature without changing anything in the score, here is the new snapshot:
sharp
And even if I open the popover, and fix the contents from # to n, and validate my entry, the dispaly remains a #, and the popover can be seen to indeed contain a # now.
Of course I can send you the project if necessary, but it is not a small one, more than 1MB. Should I truncate it?

In the original key of G minor, you would want an F sharp on D.

E natural is a “sharpened third” from C in F minor.

If that’s not what you want, then use “Absolute from Bass Note”.

I suppose there is a debate about whether this is a “style” change, or a “substantive” change to the notation; and so whether it should be in Engraving Options or somewhere else.

This does look like it could be a bug in the way that “natural” is handled in the popover for “Relative to Key Signature”. I’ll log it for one of the developers to look at.

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Thank you :slight_smile: !

Hi @benwiggy,
Yes, what you say about the G minor version, this is exactly why # and were used quasi-interchangeably for sharpened thirds in a lot of baroque scores. I am quite okay with that, even here, if I had started by printing a G minor score and kept using the # for the F minor, the 2 scores would have totally identical figures, and it would make sense.
It is just that, once I had made the choice:
Follow Engraving Options Follow Input Litteraly
I expected the Engraving Options to be ignored, and they still have an impact. So I reported it, but as I said, it is not an actual problem for me.

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