Key command or shortcuts for common Playing Technique symbols?

Dorico
#1

There is currently no key command or shortcuts for common Playing Technique symbols. I searched the forum and found this mentioned in a few threads. For instance https://www.steinberg.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=246&t=129152&hilit=playing+technique+shortcut and https://www.steinberg.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=246&t=133606&p=724801&hilit=playing+technique+shortcut#p724801.

I think everyone will have her own favorite list of technique symbols. For cello music, upbow and downbow symbols are used every other bar. Please see attached picture. I know I can call it up using Shift+P, then ‘downbow’. Or I can use the mouse to copy it from note to bar - but that defeats the purpose of keyboard-only note input.

Dorico_preferred_string_not_engraved.png
Dorico_preferred_string_not_engraved.png684×692 35 KB

#2

We will in due course add an editor that will allow you to edit and define playing techniques, and as part of that you’ll be able to change the characters you can input into the popover to create a given playing technique. It’s not quite as direct as being able to hit a specific key combination to add a playing technique without going into the popover, of course, but it should be possible to assign a shorter string than e.g. “upbow” or “downbow”.

#3

Thanks, Daniel. I think that will be great. So something like shift+p u [enter]. That will be more than good enough :slight_smile: After all, I’ve got shift+f 1 [enter], etc. encoded in my muscle memory after just one night of using Dorico (long-time Sibelius user, planning to jump on the Dorico bandwagon).

I love it. And I think this software has great potentials.
Fred

#4

Hi,

This is slightly off-topic, but it ties into a feature request of mine: I seem to have a need for directly inserting certain notation item like techniques, repeats and articulations into the score using key commands. Yes, like in Sibelius…
Is there any hope this will at one point be possible?

Thanks a bunch, and I’m using Dorico more and more!

All the best,
Benji

#5

Benji,
I noticed this too when moving from Sibelius and I found that using AutoHotKey solves this problem very well on windows. I’ve automated filtering voices and notes in a chord, creating common playing techniques and dynamics, and adding an interval above or below selected notes. I believe Keyboard Maestro works in a similar way for Mac OS.
Perhaps the the developers of Dorico could consider allowing built in keyboard shortcuts to open a popover and enter text in the future.