I was taught that when the Select arrow is highighted, note input is impossible. That seems to match my experience; however, in many Anthony Hughes tutorial videos, he enters notes while this is selected/highlighted.
Am I missing something?
Also, why is it possible to select that and Note Input at the same time?
Just the same as you… and now I wonder what this arrow button is for!
You can switch between select and mouse input with this button. You can change the state of the method (of the button) at the start of Dorico in the preference.
That is true only if pitch before duration is on. If you’re on pitch after duration, it really does nothing. Which can be a little bit surprising. I understand these features have been added in Dorico 5, which could explain the discrepancy…
I never use this mouse-entry mode, but it looks like it works with duration before pitch:
Here I have the Select arrow on. If I turn on note entry, I get the caret but cannot enter notes with the mouse. I did discover that I can enter notes with the keyboard (e.g., typing A or F).
Regarding who told me note entry was impossible, it came from a training video, but I don’t remember which one.
The only reason I ever turn the select arrow on is so I can use Shift+mouse to navigate without accidentally entering notes (although I end up adding or moving notes by mistake anyway). The scroll bars in Windows are ridiculously small and low contrast. Navigating is my #1 problem in Dorico.
Thanks @MarcLarcher and @charles_piano. I don’t know why I would ever use pitch before duration, but clearly some people find it useful. It’s odd that the select arrow works differently in that case.
@Janus That’s interesting. 99% of the time I enter notes with the mouse and with duration before pitch. That doesn’t work for me with the Select arrow on. It doesn’t bother Anthony Hughes in his videos, however. I will rewatch his note entry videos and see if I can figure out what is different.
PItch-before-duration…absolutely essential to so many! The greatest addition to Dorico back in version 3.5.
Many, many of us using Dorico (and being used to using ‘pitch-before-duration’ in Sibelius or Finale) really depend on that method for being in the composing flow.
For example, when composing and actively using a MIDI keyboard and you would like to try various notes/harmonies/etc. before committing to the next pitch or duration you actually want. ‘Pitch-before-duration’ is essential. (…unless you’re ‘Mozartian’ and have it all scored out in your brain already!)
Otherwise…disastrous outcomes when using duration-before-pitch and you’re ‘noodling’ around on various pitches and then you look up at the score and you have a page worth of experimentation having just been notated and having your score look as if a cat just spent a minute walking around your keyboard.
I can see where somebody only doing straight-ahead music copying work or ‘type-setting’ might just use duration-before-pitch…because the actual score is already there for you.
Using Dorico’s pitch-before-duration is even better than ever now, seeing as the ability to input ties, dotted notes, etc. as you compose is very seamless. And it seems as if the caret has almost taken on a mind of it’s own, magically appearing in the best location for your next act of notation (or editing). Fantastic!
The Arrow Key helps for a fast work flow while composing/arranging/editing. Seems pretty flawless in my experience.
(edit addition: I, too, don’t even notice the ‘Arrow’ key most of the time. (…have never even tried using it to input notes!) It’s just ‘on’. I use the ‘escape’ or ‘exit note duration’ if I really want insure that I’m totally out of any ‘input mode’. Otherwise, it’s set in ‘Preferences’ for not being used to input notes. Never need to really worry about it that way.
Agree 100% with everything @cmillar wrote above! I’m not sure why anyone who uses a MIDI keyboard to compose directly into Dorico would use duration-first when there is so much time wasted constantly leaving and restarting the input caret, and the page of nonsense scenario when you forget. Pitch-first is just a much faster way of working for me.
Even in this scenario, with pitch-first I hear the pitch a fraction of a second before it is input so if I misplay the MIDI note, I just don’t hit the duration to input it. With duration-first by the time you hear the note, it has already been input, so you have to go back and edit if you misplayed it. It only takes a couple of edits before any speed advantages for duration-first are negated on a job even when strictly copying from a manuscript.
For composing, the ability to noodle is paramount. But for typing in an existing work, Duration first is much faster. Particularly if you’ve got a run of quavers, for instance.
I seem to remember that there are also some situations where you need to specify a tuplet’s unit before entering the notes, which I think is more awkward using K pitch first.
Just out of curiosity, as I’m sure you have this technique timed perfectly by now, what sort of speed can you input each note before Dorico interprets the notes as simultaneous? Maybe it’s just my keyboard skills too, but I can’t seem to get much under 60 ms with duration-first before getting errors:
This was a clean pass with duration-first and the fastest was 62 ms. Are you down in the 50s? 40s? Just wondering what Dorico’s input speed limit is.
With pitch-first, counting both the MIDI note and numpad duration input, I’m right around 70 ms I guess:
I’ve got 30 years of experience with pitch-first so probably am faster than most at the timing here, but there’s obviously never any issue with the notes being interpreted as simultaneous. Perhaps you’re much faster than my 62 ms times with duration-first, but for me it’s only like 8 ms faster and with pitch-first I can be sure the input is accurate. Just curious what your times are.
99% of the time, I compose by inputting notes with the mouse. I might use a MIDI keyboard if I could overcome the lag (delay).
I’ve never used mouse input for notes ever! If you input middle C-D-E-F-G as eighth notes, then open your application.log file, how long does it take for each note to be input? Just curious what sort of times we are looking at for that, as it seems like it would be quite slow by comparison.
Going back to the original question, the Anthony Hughes tutorials were where I heard that the Select arrow prevents input; but I see now that he said it prevents mouse input. I also have some purchased videos that may be less clear than the official Dorico lessons, but I did not go back to check them.
At other points in the video, Mr. Hughes enters notes with the Select arrow on, but he does not say how he is doing it. I am not sure when I would use the Select arrow, but maybe it is not important.
@benwiggy, I may retry keyboard input if I can overcome the lag. I have a pretty powerful laptop, but when I connect the Akai 25 by USB, there is a significant delay. (I will try this my the larger rack-mount computer. It has more memory, but I think the CPU is roughly equivalent.) As it is, I have a keyboard right behind me. I swivel around and play something, then turn back to put it in Dorico.
Interesting. I had never experimented with that. I’m pretty sure I’ll never use it, but good to know it’s there I guess. (When I don’t have a MIDI keyboard available I sometimes will just type the note names, but often switch to “shadow note” input.)
I’m not sure why that should be. My MIDI keyboards are almost immediate.
Aren’t those the times taken by Dorico to execute the command, not the length of the note?
I can play about 8 notes per second if I’m careful, but there’s a tendency to play legato and overlap each note, and that’s when the clusters occur. But generally, I’m playing 2 or 3 notes per second at most.
