Hello All-- I tried searching the forum for “stress” and as you can imagine, it turned up too many results to trawl through
Feature request:
It would be helpful to me with my choir if the stress/unstress markings could be applied to text / lyrics as well. Since these symbols are shared with written-word literature, this would be tremendously helpful when doing choral chant works. I’m training my choir to chant and the only way I can currently use these markings is to notate each word, rather than provide the chanting tone with a string of text that could then have the stress/unstress markings added directly to that for ease and fluidity of reading. (Hopefully that makes sense.). That is much more efficient and musical than every word having its own stemless quarter note or having to add a bajillion text boxes with that character copied from the SMuFL library and converted to music text.
Come to think of it, this could be used at least two different ways to point psalm texts… both as the tick marking for where to change pitches, or to teach text emphasis, depending on how you use it.
On the rare occasions I’ve seen any kind of explicit indication of stress and un-stress marked in texts e.g. for psalm pointing, it’s normally been through the use of underline and/or italics. One of which is easy to do in Dorico at the moment, and the other less so (at least in an actual lyric, of course).
Your idea is not a bad one, but it’s also not likely to be implemented any time soon, I’m afraid.
Another common way to mark stress (especially in Latin, especially in measureless notation or chanting) is by using the accent mark that looks like an acute accent over the letters: muliéribus, laudáte
Randy, true. I use that symbol all the time in non-psalm contexts (Latin hymns) and it hadn’t even occurred to me to just use that in the meantime for the same effect. I have a programmable keyboard and because I write psalm tones so much, I’ve programmed a key to do the alt+space to allow multiple words per note. I can very easily use that accent while I’m typing things in in the meantime and potentially program in the common letter combos too. The advantage of the actual stress/unstress symbols is they are a.) more obvious and b.) editable regardless of font.
Daniel, as always, thanks for taking note. I fancy myself a reasonably patient man and you’ve already helped me these last few days by fixing the 2-up export issue so I’m happy to wait. I just remembered learning about spoken word “meters” in high school and seeing those symbols all over the place which is why the idea popped into my head. I imagine this could also help people who have special scores that involve non-rhythmically specified narrator parts as has been discussed from time to time on the forum.
I’m sure you already know this, but on Mac they are already set up: press Opt+E then type another vowel to get that vowel with an acute accent. (This works across all programs, and with many other characters too: Opt+` for grave accent, Opt+U for umlaut/diaresis, etc.)
If you’re on Windows, it’s fiddlier, as you either have to grab symbols from Character Map, learn ASCII codes, or – as you say – set up your own shortcuts.
This is an excellent use case for Stream Deck, which has been discussed extensively on a different thread. Just a suggestion. It would be quite easy to map all sorts of custom characters with icons to display.
Yes-- I use the Mac shortcut all the time. I just gets exhausting when every other vowel needs an accent in a Latin hymn; hence I may program the vowels to my assignable keys.
I’m very intrigued by the steam deck idea (I know the thread you speak of) however I’m half-way there with the Alesis VI keyboard that I have. I’ve got over 50 midi-assignable buttons and I’ve taken a label-maker to my keyboard and assigned all my favorite presets there. So far I’ve only done the basics but I plan on assigning all 48 shortcuts and a few of the drum pads too. I’ve actually been meaning to start a new thread to show people what I’ve done with the Alesis.
I’ve thought of the same thing, and TBH it’s just as good of a solution for most people. Harder to change key assignments, obviously, and you don’t get cool-looking icons. But I’ve seen other users doing it and it seems to work great.
I really enjoy it TBH. I rely heavily on keyboard input and since my hands are already on the keys, I’m only inches away from shortcut buttons. I made the bottom row closes to the keys my note values so I can enter notes really quickly without even looking at a qwerty kb. You have to tweak a few settings with the Alesis software to get it to play nicely with Dorico- but once you do, you’re home free. I currently have the bank of 48 buttons controlling Dorico while the drum pads control organ stops for Hauptwerk running in the background as my “sound library”. It’s very convenient. I can play around and hear my sounds and then switch to note entry mode to actually enter notes and hit escape when I’m done to go back to formulating ideas. It’s completely seamless.
I just remembered learning about spoken word “meters” in high school and seeing those symbols all over the place which is why the idea popped into my head. I imagine this could also help people who have special scores that involve non-rhythmically specified narrator parts as has been discussed from time to time on the forum.