Odd Lyric hyphen problem

A problem that may not come up again for me for a while…

From homophonic writing on the first staff to quasi-polyphonic in second.
Notice the missing hyphen at the end of the first. The lyric in the first is actually the same line number as the soprano “lu-ia!” If I set placement to “below” the hyphen of course appears as it should, if I set to above so soprano follows the correct lyric, the hyphen disappears as shown. You’d think I could follow the alto, but that is set to voice one, stem down. A conundrum…

Easy solution: use a non-breaking hyphen (Alt- or Opt-hyphen) with a non-breaking space.

Screenshot 2024-10-07 at 8.26.57 PM
That is an OK solution, but creates a hyphen much larger than the others.

Workaround: select the lyric, Edit Single Lyric, and add the hyphen in the popup.

Better than a workaround, that is a solution I will use in other circumstances. Great little tool there. Thanks!

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Even easier: Just enter all the syllables in the Soprano and move that “-ia!” over with Alt+right arrow. No need to fuss with voices and hyphens at all.

I wouldn’t even bother with the lyric above the staff for this one. When parts share lyrics that closely, where one syllable differs by only a beat, you sometimes see (especially in English scores) a syllable carefully placed halfway between the notes, thus:

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You are correct, that is a cleaner solution. Still glad to have found that “edit single lyric” tool.

I’m having trouble with a missing hyphen (verse 2, just before 1st ending). I can’t figure out how to get to “Edit Single Lyric”.

Select the syllable, then Edit–Lyrics–Edit Single Lyric.

Thanks, @dan_kreider , I’m sorry, but when I click Edit, I don’t see Lyrics as an option. Is there a different Edit I should be looking at? (I’m clicking on Edit at the top, where it says File Edit Write Play, etc.).

Sorry, here:

That did it, thank you!

I use this command enough that I added a jump bar alias of “el” so j el is a very quick and easy way to get into this dialogue.

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Is this still not doable in Dorico 6? I have a similar problem:


Pantoffel is one word that crosses two voices. I can add the hyphen as suggested here, but it’s not positioned automatically, so not very ideal if the layout changes.

For the time being, I think the best way to handle this is to temporarily move the first note (for “Pan-”) into the down-stem voice, and input that lyric against the down-stem voice, then return the first note to the up-stem voice.

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Thanks, that worked well!

I realized this works because the lyric doesn’t follow the change in voice, which allows it to stay in voice 2. I had to delete the lyric because it stayed in voice 1 when I change the note. This is a little odd, I think, but necessary in this case. I think it would be helpful to see which voice the lyric is associated with in the status bar.

That may sometimes be true, but once a lyric has been entered, its location is associated with a position in the timing of the staff rather than with any note.