Let’s say I want to transpose all notes and key signatures in this document down a major third, all at the same time. I “Select All,” then open the transpose dialogue, but, with “transpose key signatures” checked, my only options for “Quality” are “minor” and “diatonic”— “major” (third) is not an option:
If I choose just bars 3 and 4 along with the key signature, my options for flavors of third are “diminished, minor, augmented, and diatonic.”
This procedure should, of course, be straightforward—with the whole document selected, I should be able to transpose the C, Db, D and Eb key signatures down a major third to Ab, A, Bb and B respectively, along with all the notes.
Note that if I deselect “Transpose key signatures,” all flavors of thirds become available. So my workaround is to do that, then change the key signatures manually. My hunch is Dorico is having trouble converting flat-based keys to sharp-based keys.
Am I missing something? Or is this a known issue? Feel free to open the Dorico file I’ve attached and see what you think. Thanks!
Right. That was the point I made about flats to sharps, that Dorico is having an issue going from Db major to A major because of the non-existence of Bbb major. It’s such an extremely smart program, it should be able to handle that conversion. This was a no-brainer in Finale, not that I want to go back to Finale, Lord knows… So whether or not it’s a bug or a design flaw, it would be great if this behavior could be fixed.
I understand the logic. But if I choose “Number of Divisions” instead of “Quality,” I’m still unable to transpose all key signatures down by four half-steps—only -3/12 is possible. There’s no “diminished 4th” option either:
I take your point about the fact that Db to A is a diminished 4th, not a flavor of 3rd. But then I should be able to do this in “number of divisions” mode, and that doesn’t work either. I frequently prep a song in more than one key, and my songs frequently have modulations. Accomplishing this was trivial in Finale—Dorico can certainly work this out.
Thanks, Vadian—the issue is that I’m wanting to transpose the entire piece by the same number of half-steps, along with the multiple key signatures the piece contains. So I can’t just go to a neutral C, unfortunately.
And therein lies your problem.
You can easily select your Db section and transpose it a Dim4 to A… But you are asking for different rules to be applied to different sections of your whole piece.
All I’m saying is, I could do it in Finale, I should be able to do it in Dorico.
So my problem is not that I’m asking Dorico to do something impossible, but rather Dorico can’t do this extremely simple thing that Finale could. I’m crazy about Dorico—but this is a design flaw IMHO>
Wow, seriously? I have many flaws, but no one in my entire life has ever claimed I lacked rigor. What I’m suggesting that Dorico be able to do is practical and utterly straightforward, and is entirely compatible with a rigorous approach to music and music theory. Are you claiming that it is unreasonable to ask to be able to transpose key signatures along with notes?
Not at all. Dorico does this perfectly well. Your problem is that you are asking for multiple transpositions in the same action that are implicitly not identical. (That is where the lack of rigour creeps in)
Can you give me a one step solution to what I’m asking for ? If so, I will be grateful. If not, then no, Dorico is not able to do what I’m asking, which is to, in one step, transpose an entire song, including all of the key signatures. it sounds like you’re claiming that that is not a valid goal. I beg to differ.
Understood. I’m a HUGE Dorico fan. All I’m asking for is to able to “transpose keys proportionally”, as in the Finale dialogue I’ve screenshotted below. That way what I’m asking for (and what I’m used to doing in Finale) can be done in one step, not several—I totally get that you can accomplish this in pieces. Look, I virtually never dunk on Dorico—quite the opposite. All I’m saying is that this is an easily attainable goal, and it could only add to Dorico’s usefulness. If the far inferior program Finale can let me transpose an entire piece including proportionally changing the key signatures in one step, why would we NOT want Dorico to allow us to do the same? I’m just saying, I’d love for this feature to be added.
Not categorically, because Dorico will not (eg) transpose to (as we started) Bbb major.
But if the combination of keys that you want to transpose to doesn’t fall outside the limits, Dorico will handle them all very gracefully.
There are edge cases that fail. In those situations, just do as others have suggested and transpose by section. (It is a small price to pay in the long run)
Thanks. What I’m suggesting is an addition to Dorico’s capabilities, which would in no way detract from anything the program can already do. I respect that you feel that’s incompatible with the way Dorico is organized. I respectfully disagree. After all, what is the point of allowing us to transpose by “number of divisions,” and then limit the extent to which we can do that if we want key signatures to come along for the ride? See my reply to Aaron—“that other program” lets you do this in one step, without any unworkable edge cases. I will continue to hope Dorico will one day allow this as well.
I don’t see how that could be it—it would be the same number of half-steps regardless of the instrument transposition, right? Honestly, I think it’s an oversight on Dorico’s part. It’s possible that not that many people would care about this feature. Happens to be very useful for me.
This was a no-brainer in Finale, not that I want to go back to Finale, Lord knows… So whether or not it’s a bug or a design flaw, it would be great if this behavior could be fixed.
