Should I Cross grade to Dorico?

[YourMusic.Pro]

I used the EWQL installation center for the update, you could try that.
B.

[fratveno]

@Mike 999

when I went to download the update today, Play 5.0.2 was no longer available. Hopefully, it will shortly be available again after some bugs are resolved.

I hear it has been pulled, but will be back early next week.

[MichaelB]

@Claude Lapalme

Of course, if presently absent features are essential to your work, the cost/benefit ratio is going to be low until those features are developed. However, your crystal ball concerning the future of Dorico is quite different than mine. I’m not a dabbler: I make tens of thousands of dollars every year writing for orchestra, and I now use this software. There was a large number of Finale and Sibelius users who were getting frustrated with the limitations of legacy code, and this new product is exactly what is needed: a notation program which is built from the ground, with a new approach which takes advantage of new technology and built by a team that had the benefit of looking closely at the present limits of the two leading applications. There are many of us doing serious work with Dorico - as is now being featured in Dorico’s blog - and I am quite surprised myself that I am presently using Dorico pretty much exclusively despite the lack of a few features. The thought of going back is quite abhorrent to me atm. Don’t get me wrong: of course I’ll be over the moon when I have figured bass and ossias available to me in Dorico. But now that I have gained fluency, I am working as fast or faster than in Sibelius, and that’s without filters and voice manipulation tools. I can’t even begin to imagine the speed and quality I will output once these features are in place, and they will be. The idea that it is a Gold Standard is indeed a marketing tool; what are they supposed to say? Buy Dorico: it’s pretty good? But in fact, in terms of engraving power and overall approach, it has indeed reached that goal and many users of Finale and Sibelius have written on competing forums that they believe this is the program to go to and that it will blow the competition rather sooner than later. I do believe this also.

Steinberg is in this for the long run. This is a very fine product they know will take time to develop and market. I don’t run the company, but it would be absurd to put the brakes on this and let it go the way of the dodo. There is no “perfect time” to release such a beast; it will either be too early or too late. However, by doing it on the early side, this team has now the advantage of being engaged with the users as it develops new features; something they have done with sincerity, celerity and professionalism during the Sibelius years. I see the same commitment now. So go ahead in expressing what you need. Rant, squirm, be exasperated and critical. I assure you they can take it and will listen to you as they do to all of us. I realise not everyone will have paid for the program and made the money back and more in just a few weeks. I represent a certain user and I know that many others have to budget these things differently since we all have different needs. But don’t dismiss the present users: like Steinberg, we’re here for the long run, and it’s already paid off for many of us. Right now, I am recommending Dorico to everyone I know.

Great post Claude; I agree with you and nothing more I can add.

Thank you.

[ianpartridge]

Excellent post, Claude. I also learnt a new word: celerity!

[claude_g_lapalme]

@ianpartridge

Excellent post, Claude. I also learnt a new word: celerity!

You can always count on a non-native speaker to use words that are fancier than necessary!

[musicmaven]

Well I’m impressed either way, Claude!

[Derrek]

I love celerity, it’s delicious and adds crispness to a salad.

[Romanos]

I was a little leery too. I used the trial and was a little troubled because I was having difficulty accomplishing my goals, however as I look back this was much, much more a “me” issue than a program issue. I simply didn’t know how to accomplish my goals within a totally different framework.

I’m so used to pressing a button for one-click functionality of certain things… Dorico is more powerful than it looks on the surface level but certain things just have to be worked differently until those one-press features are fully baked in. To be clear, I do not think that the lack of one-press features for complicated functions is necessarily a bad thing. It is simply different. There are other very complicated things that Dorico makes very easy that are a royal pain in other programs.

Getting mad at the Dorico team is a little like being mad at Toyota because they don’t offer Fords features yet. Yes, more things need to be baked in as certain features are “standard,” but they have also released two (three?) maintenance upgrades in a few short months since their initial release and each one has made the program both better and more expansive. They have publicly expressed their intent to continue this trend insofar as is reasonable.

I’ve since purchased the crossgrade and I do not regret it in the slightest (especially knowing a few more maintenance updates are on the way). I have produced a very satisfactory piano/vocal score. It is not “perfect-perfect” but it is very, very nice. The default output of this program is miles ahead of Sibelius. I was having some major spacing issues (accidentals-UGH!) in Sibelius and things just “look right” in Dorico. While I may not have some of the features to adjust individual notes just as I want yet, I know it’s coming and the Dorico version still looks better than the Sibelius even after some heavy tweaking in Sibelius.

I think the real genius of Dorico (which has yet to show its full potential) is the engine behind how it “thinks” about music. This is so much more profound (think the Bach multi-voice examples Daniel has shown before, or its ability to intelligently and properly render the same musical data in a totally different time signature!) that once all of the other specific features are added in, Dorico will be awfully hard to beat. You cant expect a new program to compete with something nearing 3 decades old. At least not out of the gate. And yet Dorico still is very close to doing just that. These engineers seriously deserve a pat on the back. Music is SO COMPLEX. They have done an awfully good job.

I disagree with those that say that this is not ready to be considered a “professional” program. Some on the forum have posted about professional work they have already done. There is one particularly impressive post by someone who arranged over 20 charts into one file as individual flows and printed all the parts for a reduced orchestra. He was able to provide a reduced ensemble full scores and parts in a quick and professional manner, all managed by the genius of Dorico. He admits the process wasn’t perfect (no one claims Dorico is perfect yet) but was great nonetheless.

I am wholly in the Dorico camp now and am very excited to see what comes. Features like the page layout options, text and music frames (with professional typography controls!) are things that I will never want to go without again!