Hello,
I created a new project with a single instrument.
I would like to insert the first note.
It turns to be a dotted note. It is a dotted quarter note. It’s the first note of the document, it is on the first beat.
I can create a note that is made of two notes, a quarter and a quaver, tied together.
I cannot put a dotted quarter as my first note, as I strongly desire.
I saw that in a tutorial there is a trick that makes it appear, so the speaker talks about dotted notes, but it is automatic and it is not decided by him.
So it seems that the video is misleading, at least for me. It suggests that real dotted notes are possible.
To sum up: I wanted to input the very first note on the staff, a single note, that turns to be a dotted quarter, and I do not like to have a quarter and a quaver tied together.
How I do it?
Thanks
Hi @am74
congratulations for your first note in Dorico!
If you input (after you’re appearing "quarter note tight to an eight note) a further eight note, you will see that Dorico intelligently adjusts the quarter note to be displayed with a dot.
If you, instead move to beat three, leaving the eight rest, and eventually inputting other notes after the rest, Dorico leaves the first note as “quarter note tight to an eight note”, so that the player can “see” the second beat.
You can change this behaviour
-
Globally (from menu Library > Notation Option > Note Grouping)
-
or Locally, using Force Duration:
with the caret (Note Input) active, press the letter O (to activate Force Duration), and then double click 6 (to choose a dotted quarter note value) , then choose your pitch (with the mouse, with the letters, or with the MIDI keyboard.
Here the Manual:
and
Thank you
I somehow managed to write the dotted quarter note before your suggestions appeared.
Now my desire is to create a half dotted note. It exceedes the measure and if I write it I get a quaver tied to a half note (the quaver comes first), then a further tied quaver on the next measure.
I would like to have a half note tied to a quaver (the half note comes first, then the tied quaver, then a further tied quaver on the next measure).
How is it possible to achieve this?
press: 5 o 7 (so you create a half note that is Forced, and will sty so) and then use the shortcut to prolong your note with two further eight notes (shift+alt+right arrow twice, having the rhythmic grid set to eight note:
But there are other methods to achieve this peculiar note grouping, as you can read in the links I posted in my previous post:
Thank you.
I managed to write this kind of grouping but it is lost if I uncheck the “force duration” or “dotting” button while the note is selected. So I have to rewrite it, or use undo.
It seems that the note can be changed any time you hit the wrong button at the wrong time, then it uses its automatic grouping again to recreate in the previous form I do not like, so the undo is necessary and pay attention to unselect the note before touching the buttons again for whatever reason.
It’s cumbersome. It seems that the underlying DAW midi notes are displayed according to different possibilities, but they are volatile enough to bother me.
Whatever, this is the Dorico way, I suppose.
There are much more advantages than disadvantages with this way of handling tied notes, that you will hopefully see when you have embraced the (elegant and powerful) logic behind it.
So it is definitely a cult?
@am74 Seeing now that this is your attitude, I regret a little bit having spent some of my time trying helping you, sorry…
Sorry, but you are talking about embracing some cumbersome way of writing music.
Learning — it’s a beautiful thing.
That’s what we embrace here.
That is not what you are doing. You are indeed insulting a growing community of users who have adopted this software, and not all because Finale’s demise. Time is money. I use this software because half of my income as a musician comes from using a scorewriter and I chose Dorico because I believe it is superior. Because of it, my productivity has increased as well as the quality of my output. We are talking tens of thousands a year here, which pales in comparisons to other professional composers/arrangers/orchestrators etc … many of them award winners, who use this product you call cult-provoking after writing one note. Why on earth would we do this because we’re blinkered - it’s our very profession, our livelihood. That does not mean that you will agree that the program is superior, that’s fair, but there is no need to call users blind followers. We all had a choice. Sorry it’s not working out for you, but don’t come here and blame us.
Ok, please chill out. I am not insulting anyone. It was meant as a fun comment about the cult.
I just do not think I will unlearn the elegant way of writing music I already know, be it on paper or on other notation software, to learn a new weird method, that needs me to watch lots of videos and check lots of configuration options just to input my first notes, only to justify having spent a mere 40€ for the discount Dorico Essentials license. It is only my opinion, of course.
If I need it, I will use it just to import some XML to test the audio rendition on a different software, not more.
If mass users do flock to Dorico, in the end it would really end up into some form of unrest.
I don’t know anyone who starts learning a new program and thinks he can brute force it and understand it all in the first 10 minutes.
Just this Monday my class had to learn a program called “Resolume”, I didn’t know jack nothing about it. The class being 4 hours and the next day 5 hours made us understand the basics and some cool stuff.
It’s weird to you because you don’t understand its potential and where and how to use it.
Christian_R is like one of the most helpful people I know on this forum, always active 
As I said, this forum is a place for those with a serious interest in learning to use Dorico to come for help from other, highly experienced and generous members.
If and when you decide you want to learn it, we’ll be here to assist you. In the meantime, the video guides (accessible from the hub or Dorico’s YouTube channel) and First Steps tutorial will give you the opportunity to see it in action and try it yourself. That’s the best way to determine whether the new and unknown (“weird,” in your words) is, in fact, something potentially valuable to your work that you care to learn.
I want definitely reassure all of you I appreciated your help and commitment.
Please take also into account this was due to my strong desire to help many other people. Sometimes you have to choose the right side.
Best regards
Not at all. There are conventions about notation and Dorico follows those conventions in real time as you enter notes. You are able to choose from a wide range of options to suit your own style and needs.
Most of the ‘complaints’ I see about dotted notes come from people who either don’t understand the basic conventions, or have not yet learned how to tailor Dorico to meet their needs.
If Dorico is cumbersome it will not survive. There are many here (myself included) who will attest to it being quicker and easier to produce publishing quality output in Dorico than using the alternatives.
Hi @am74 – Dorico notates rhythms according to:
- the duration of the note
- the prevailing time signature
- where that note comes in the bar
- whether that note is followed by another note or a rest
These things all influence accepted conventions for how to represent note durations in various contexts. For example, splitting notes into ties if they span the half-bar of 4/4, say, or grouping notes into 2 dotted crotchets in 6/8 vs 3 crotchets in 3/4.
However, this is music, where almost every rule has an exception, and most conventions have an alternative convention that does the opposite. Therefore, Dorico provides a fairly comprehensive set of options that allow you to determine at a high level (either per-layout, per-flow, or project-wide) how you want to represent X, Y, and Z.
We believe this approach is helpful, because it means you only need to change some settings once, and every time your music has that situation, your preference is followed; rather than you having to spell out the exact rhythm dots and ties you want, every time it crops up. However, yes the flip side is that new users see their notation changing or not coming out how they expected it the first time they reach that situation.
In the case of dotted notes vs ties, that’s in Notation Options > Note Grouping. You should also find that if you’re in eg 4/4, and entering a dotted crotchet followed by a quaver, that actually all you need to do is then input the quaver: Dorico’s factory defaults (if my memory is correct) then adjust the crotchet-tied-to-quaver into a dotted crotchet, because it’s now followed by a note rather than a rest.
I hope that as you continue to try using Dorico, some of Dorico’s philosophy becomes more familiar and that you start to reap the benefits of the streamlining this default-setting-first approach provides.
And if you haven’t already, you might want to try working through our First Steps guide: it explains every step you need to take to produce a piano piece, followed by an excerpt of a blues song.