Hi,
I’m a composer who like to compose on my Dorico Notation SW using MIDI keyboard, and really appreciate the ease of use and intuitive user friendly features of Dorico.
However I still struggle with defining each Notes duration when I composing.
Here is a video #1 example attached where I demonstrate this new idea (of course in an edited video) where you can see how each note that is pressed - it causing the other held notes of the chord to expand their duration (according to the new note’s duration value):
During this video all this composition can be done without manually changing the duration value even once!
Please watch with Full HD quality to notice the duration changes automatically of held notes while entering new notes)
Hope you will like this idea 
Explanation and background:
Since I’m struggle to compose in Real time note entry (since I still don’t have all the composition in my mind and I don’t always think so fast at metronome beat (even if it slow) - Sometime I like to hold some notes together and then resolve one after the other where I have time to think where I want to go next step.
So most of the time I compose in regular step-entry - note by note.
The problem with it is that I have to define each note separately with it’s duration prior to specifying which note. I still don’t know while composing this note how long it is going to be pressed. Also each note in the chords or harmony resolves in different timing (so few notes held 3/4, few held 2/4, few 4/4 etc. - which makes it hard to compose this way.
So I was thinking in a way to combine the benefits of both worlds - step entry and real time note entry but without having to care so much for the accurate performance and standing on beat of the metronome.
In this way you will be able to compose fluently without having to think about the duration all the time…
Of course there will be some complex parts where you will want to change it to other value or maybe Triplets, but even then it will stil be much easier to compose the 80% of the song.
Main feature concept is:
- as in regular step-entry - need to define the minimum note duration that requires for the step entry (1/4, or 1/8) - define which beat is the main progress of the track.
- Start Step entry as usual - but in this new feature you can hold the notes that you want to keep, and change only the notes you want to change.
Each time the notation SW detects a new note entered, it will expand the note durations of the held notes by 1 beat (according to the beat defined in step #11). - In case you want to repeat all chord again, simply leave all notes and press again same chord.
- In case you want to continue all the chord for another bit - keep all notes held and press the sustain pedal with the foot - 1 time.
Each time you will press sustain - all held notes will expand by 1 beat. - in case you want to change the duration value (step#1) - you will be able to do it while notes are still being held, therefore the next new note enter will expand the held notes duration by the new duration value entered.
- For the development implementation - it could use existing features of repeat the held notes (according to input duration value) and “t” tie notes in the background per each note entry
Benefits of Smart duration input over step entry input
- Composers doesn’t know the duration of each note while composing - some notes are continuing (being held) while other new notes are being played - this way it is being intuitive as playing a piano.
- Creativity Flow - No need to go back and forth between Shift+N to enter notes and then ESC and Note duration value (1-8) to modify notes duration then Shift+N again to continue writing - This is happen so much during creation.
- Creativity Flow - no need to think about logic things like duration and timing - simply stay in the creativity of playing the notes - let the automation do the hard work for you
Benefits of Smart duration input over Real Time input:
- No need to play the best accurate performance - The problem with Real time input is that you must know how to play it exactly on the rhythm -otherwise it will transcribe it wrongly. During Composing it is really not the main focus to be able to “perform” the piece.
- During Composing - the composer doesn’t want to limit his thinking to stay on beat - you want to hold a second - think / feel: “where does the composition want to go from here?”
- It is ruin my creativity flow to Stop the metronome - Press CTRL+Z to undo then re-record each bar.
Much better using CTRL+Z when wrong note (or “composition direction”) is played and continue from there like in step entry (where I continue just from the last note instead of hearing all the last 2 bars again to be able to “perform” the whole bar again in Real-Time.
P.S. in my next video I’ll demonstrate a piano piece where left hand is playing 1/8 arpeggio and right hand is playing the melody with rhythms changes all the time (between 1/4, 1/8, 1/2 naturally as usually melody is changing) - with this new Smart duration it is done so easy - I only set the duration entry once “1/8” at the beginning, then I can play with the left hand and right hand together and each time the melody line is longer I simply hold the note (exactly as I play in real time entry - but without having to force my self to compose so fast as metronome runs).
each time the right hand’s note is held - it expands due to the fact that the left hand is continue to play the 1/8th notes.
so simple it is ridiculous!!! 