Recommended placement of dot

Which is the recommended placement of the dot?
(Top: Original old score.)

TIA.

Dorico doesn’t allow you to change the vertical position of rhythm dots at the moment, though it’s something that has been requested before. Dorico’s placement is fine as far as it goes, but you can see why the original edition chose to place the dot for the upper note in the space above, as it allows those two columns to tuck more tightly. I’m not quite so convinced about the highest dot on the down-stem chord, but I guess once you’ve decided to move the dot for the left-hand column up a space, there’s no reason not to do the same for the right-hand one.

Thanks you for feedback. I’ll keep the Dorico layout. I was mostly curious about what is good style.

I and others prefer that rhythm dots go in the space above, even on down-stem secondary voices. This matches the majority of traditional engravings that I have seen, and AFAIK it is only British publishers, specifically OUP, who oppose it. The lack of any option for this has been a tiny thorn in the side for 22 years, since I started using Sibelius.

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I beg to differ. The majority of traditional engraving I have seen most certainly does place the augmentation dot below the note in downstem voices. Have a look at the Beethoven sonatas (Henle), the Mozart sonatas (Neue Mozart Ausgabe) or the Bach Wohltemperierte Klavier (Bärenreiter, Henle, Peters, etc.). These are by no means British publishers and they all shift the dot for downstem voices. I would contend that it usually yields a clearer and less ambiguous result. Have a look at the following example from the first fugue of the first book of the WTC.

Of course there are times when you’ll want the dot in the space below.
That’s why I want an option. It was possible in Finale from the beginning.

I agree with this. I posted an example recently from a violin part which had a dotted half in a high, upper voice and a chord in quarter notes beneath it. Both voices were notated downstem, as was often done, but shifting voice 1 caused its dot to be placed in the space below the note. A helpful forum contributor helped with this by suggesting that I notate the entire chord in voice 2 in quarters, set the notation option to place unisons at the same horizontal position, leave voice 1 with its stem up and then hide the stem in Engrave mode. Being able to move the dot woud have been a lot easier!

Do you know whether Dorico (now 5.1) allows vertical movement of augmentation dots yet? Default behaviour is fine in most cases, but there are times when I want to move them!

It does not yet, I’m afraid. It remains on our wish list for the future.

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