How do you change a staff type

Dorico
1

I have imported a midifile, and it has come in as a complete mess.
Most of the staves have come in as split staves (like a piano part),
so how do I convert the split staves to a single treble clef ?

thanks,

2

Andy, you can send selected notes in a grand staff up or down to the other staff using Alt-M and Alt-N.

Select all the notes in the bass clef and send them up (click on first measure, then select to end of flow).

When you have moved all the notes up to the top staff, you can create a new single staff instrument in setup mode, then copy and paste into that staff and delete the piano instrument.

3

OK, thanks for that. I can solve the problem that way,

though seems I have to select the offending bass staff, do a “select to end of flow”, then ALT-N, and then delete staff (bass clef).

That does work, but seems a bit clumsy, is that really how Dorico is dealing with this functionality ?

thanks

4

You imported a MIDI file, and Dorico is assigning it to a piano staff with a split at middle C. As you probably know, MIDI files don’t contain a lot of identifying information, so Dorico doesn’t know what you want to do with it.

You’re better off importing MusicXML if possible. If MIDI is your only option, the way I described above can be accomplished in about 10 seconds.

5

Thanks for the info, I have fathomed out how to get Cubase to export an XML now, and that does work better.
The snag I had was that there were about 40 tracks (parts), so that was a lot of clicking.

thanks again

6

Nice to know that, Andy. It’s clearly the way to go, when available !

7

I just starting using Dorico and and piano was divided in two channel and Dorico created double staff (piano staff) for each one, ending in 4 staffs. If I understood there is no simple command to tell Dorico to change a piano staff to a single staff as can be done in Cubase score editor as it seems to be a so common task?

8

Having too many staves is much better than too few! because combining is much easier than separating. I would work this way:

  • Start with the 2nd (LH) piano. Inspect the whole piece, and where there are any differing rhythms between the 2 staves, move the lower notes to a second voice.
  • Select all the notes in the upper staff of the 2nd piano and move them down with Alt-M. (They will combine with any notes in the up-stem voice, and stay separate from the down-stem voice.)
  • Do the same with the 1st (RH) piano: Add a treble clef on the lower staff if desired. Move any notes with different rhythms to a down-stem voice. Then move the upper staff notes onto the lower staff.
  • When the RH notes are all together, select that whole staff, and copy (don’t move) everything onto the top staff of the 2nd piano. (This preserves the two voices.)
  • When you’re sure you’ve got all the notes in the 2nd piano, delete the 1st piano.

Note that when you move notes to the next staff, they always go into the primary voice, so that’s why you need to work downward rather than upward when combining.

If all this sounds too complicated (it is easier to do than to describe!) post the midi file here and I can probably do it for you pretty easily.