Shape note entry in Dorico Elements

Dorico
1

I know Dorico Elements is targeted at church/worship musicians, but it has removed an important feature for this group of people: the ability to choose a shape note system for the entire project, allowing you to input music with shaped notes.

Some hymn writers really rely on the shape note system (like AIkin 7-shape), and being able to configure this project-wide in Dorico Elements is what they need. Technically they can use shape notes with Dorico Elements, but they have to first enter notes as round notes and then manually change them. Exposing the project-wide setting would allow hymn composers in my circles to “think” in shape notes as they’re writing their music.

For people who are really serious about hymn writing and publishing, I think they’ll eventually upgrade to Dorico Pro and get all of the great features in Engrave mode. But for people just getting started with Dorico and shaped-note hymn writing, it really would make Dorico Elements better (and more competitive with Finale) if they could set a shape note system to use as they input their music.

2

Thanks for the feedback, Adam. We’ll think about whether we can make this available in a future update to Dorico Elements. We could perhaps include a hymnal-style template that would use shape notes by default – that might be the simplest way to achieve it.

3

Yeah, a template project would be just fine. Actually exposing a subset of the engraving options is not necessary.

Which means, in the meantime, I can create a starter project with Dorico Pro and share that with people who are interested in trying Dorico Elements.

4

Any update on this. Now that Dorico 4 is out?
I’m trying to decide which version will work best for me.
Thanks, in advance

5
6

Thanks a lot,
I see it says Dorico Pro 4.3.20.
I was wondering if this exact same feature is available in Dorico Elements 4.
Sorry for not specifying before.

7

One can get to any of the manuals on line via the Resources link in the Dorico Blog site.

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8

@Derrek it’s not possible to change the default notehead in Dorico Elements, because it doesn’t have Engraving Options.

Therefore, @Virgil_Snyder you can still change noteheads to any design available in your project, but you’d just need to change them all manually (rather than switching the Engraving Option).

9

So what I’m gathering:
You need to enter all the notes as round notes and then manually change them to the preset you want (Aikin 7-shape).
Is there a way to select multiple notes and change them at the same time?
I’m upgrading from musecore where you can change one staff/part to shapes at a time.

10

Yes. Select all the notes and right-click>Notehead>… to change to whatever shape you want.

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