I’m writing a vocal song that has three verses. Two of them do not use the eighth note; one does. Below is a screenshot. I have not formatted this yet, so it’s a little messy still.
AI tried to convince me this function is labeled Parentheses in Properties:
At the bottom of the window, open the Properties panel (press Ctrl/Cmd+8 if it’s hidden).
In Engrave mode (and in some cases also Write mode), look for the “Brackets” or “Parentheses” property.
Turn on “Parentheses” — this will automatically put round brackets around the notehead.
This option is not in 5.1.8. Any suggestions?
Update: I figured out that a “right click” on the note head and then going >Note heads> “Toggle Round Brackets” does the trick. I apologize I didn’t try this before disturbing anyone. Problem solved!
Another solution might be to Select both noteheads, press O for Force Duration, and then Tie them together. You can change the tie to a dashed one in Properties panel.
In the Properties panel, scroll to the right until you see the “Bracketed Noteheads” section. Activate the property for Bracket Style, then choose Round or Square. (This is exactly what the “Toggle Xxx Brackets” in the right-click menu do.)
As a side note, AI tends to provide generally useless answers about Dorico.
The Properties Panel is pretty useless for some reason. I didn’t dare delete my “post” because I refer back to these. I found out I actually need to click my notehead before anything appears. Sorry.
The properties panel only shows properties that are common to all selected objects.
(This behaviour can be changed to show properties for all selected objects, but I can’t recall how to set it as I find it creates too many options to scroll through in the properties panel!)
Well, yes – you need to select some object before you can see its properties. And as @janus said, by default if you select more than one one object you will only see properties that both objects have.
Your example probably shows a screenshot from Galley view. You will find that if you switch to Page view, Dorico will have formatted it and it will not look messy. I am writing this as a reminder, because it is one of the core features of the software: it does the formatting automatically.
FWIW, I much prefer having all properties shown for all objects. It’s a great ‘quality of life’ improvement, as it cuts out having to filter the thing you want in the selection.
