Independent time signature horror

Dorico
#1

I am calling it “horror” just because for now this is the most complicated problem I have in Dorico.

In this topic I explained my problem with independent open meter part.
https://www.steinberg.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=246&t=132066

It’s hard to impelement open meter part without bars in a big score, when you have global time signature changing all the time. I followed by snakeeyes021 advise (which is – I think – only possible solution) and implemented to this part global meter change and to rest parts (of a really big score, let’s call it “tutti”) independent global changes. And it was very bad experience for me. Thats why:

– it took me a lot of time to implement independent changing time signature to all parts, and I had to do it almost in every bar (because I have very variable narration in my piece)
– this is of process of composition, not engraving existing score, so from time to time I am deciding to create new instrument. Of course I have to implemet independent time signature changing and because the new instrument is appearing sometimes in the middle of the page, I have to also change the previous meters, event if his part is empty
– during the narration of the piece another instruments are starting to play ad libitum, so I had to manage it (it was not so easy)
– Because of “hide empty staves” I started to have a problem with bar numbers, because in every page different part is at the top. Sometimes it was a part from tutti (global time signature change) and sometimes one of the parts with ad libitum (each of them has a different bar numbering).
– now some of parts don’t have common barlines any more, even before the “ad libitum” section and after. It’s occurs only in galley view. In page view it is ok.
– QUESTION: I had one week brake. After that, when I returned to my score, I get lost, because I forgot which parts are with global time signature changing and which have independent. Is it possible to somehow check it in the score? Is anywhere the information about it?
– QUESTION: after “ad libitum” part of the piece I tryed to reset the independent time signature in all parts to have one global time signature, but I don’t now how can I do it. Any ideas?


If I could keep the global time signature to the tutti, It would be much, much easier to deal with polymetric music in big orchestra. Please, Dorico team, do something with it in next reliese. The open meter music (aleatoric, sonoristic, etc.) is still very hard to engrave in Dorico.
Thank you in advance.

#2

I could maybe give you a kind of answer to the first question, but honestly I don’t know about open meter, I have not worked on that field yet. Any global meter (I mean a meter that has been input WITHOUT alt+enter) will turn blue if you select the corresponding meter of another staff that received a global meter. If you click on a meter and no other meter changes color (turns blue), chances are that this is an individual meter. Hope I am clear…

#3

We are certainly aware that there are some things that would improve the workflow when using independent time signatures, including being able to restore a global time signature after deleting the last independent time signature on a staff, which is not currently possible. You should be able to see which time signatures are independent and which are not by selecting them in the full score: those that are independent will select only on the staff to which they belong, whereas global ones will of course show as selected in all staves. You may find it helpful to use the W shortcut to swap back and forth between a part layout and the full score.

#4

Thank you for tips.
To make it clear, when I write e.g. „part”, I mean not the layout, but part of particular instrument in full score (I am mostly working in full score layout).

#5

Hello,
I’ve just noticed, that in one of the pages of my score there is empty part of one of the instruments (a few bars). I have turned on „hide empty staves”. After a while I realised, that I accidentally inputed independent time signature to this part and that’s why it appears in my score despite the fact that it is empty.
I can’t simply delete independent time signature. Is it a way to remove this empty bars from my score?

#6

You have tried deleting it in each of full score, galley view and part view?

#7

Yes, I tried to delete signpost and also tried to input new time signature. And even to add empty bar, which has global time signature, but when I move the material to this new bar and delete old bar, which has independent time signature, this independent time signature is also moving to the new created bar.

Edit. This is important problem, because currently I can’t edit my score. I have additional instrument, which has empty bars and in fact it’s fake instrument, I created it just because I needed to have divisi in strings, but in the same page I have tutti in strings. For now my score doesn’t have sense.

#8

Do not panic, dear DelGesu
In any case, you can copy paste the bars that are ok in a new file with players created from scratch. You might think that it’s a waste of time but actually the process is quite straightforward and you might find that the problems disappear…
Let is know how you go on, we’ll try to help you!

#9

One of the possible solutions would be to create mini flow for this couple of bars and exlude this instrument for that flow. I haven’t tried it yet, but it could work.
But I hope there exist more – as the saying goes – elegant solution.

#10

If you email me the project (d dot spreadbury at steinberg dot de) with a description of the problem and where it occurs in the file, I can take a look and see if I can come up with a solution for you.