When I import scores from Sibelius using musicxml, I find that I have system spacing problems. Some systems will nearly overlap. If I fiddle with the minimum inter-system spacing setting I can usually find some compromise, but usually I end up with too much space in some places.
I never have these problems when I start from scratch, so I assume there’s some spacing information in the musicxml file. I see various Reset Layout options in Engraving. Is there a way to clear any spacing overrides so the minimums will apply?
Thanks for your replies. Sadly, it seems to be harder to reproduce than I thought. I imported the xml file and the vertical spacing appears to be OK at that point. It seems that in the course of subsequent editing something happens. If I am able to produce a sequence of operations I’ll let you know.
I recall that it is not unusual for me to click/drag staves vertically in Sibelius to fix auto-spacing issues.
Perhaps it should be another topic, but here are some issues that I have when importing:
the instruments have the right names but do not transpose correctly or have the right range. The trumpet comes in as C, not Bb, the saxes do not transpose, and the bass is an octave too low. I use Setup/Change Instrument, in most cases selecting the same instrument it shows (except for trumpet), and then everything works correctly.
open/on cue repeats do not import (see picture). In fact, I find no support for them. Here you see the Sibelius/Dorico views right after importing. Sibelius does not really support them either - just a generic repeat bracket. I add the text to say “open” and “on cue”.
I started with the file I imported and edited, and clicked on “Reset Layout” in Engrave. You can see that the system spacing is inconsistent. The upper half of page 2 is too crowded, unlike the upper half of page 1. The repeat brackets before G are too high. The ones after C are good.
It appears that the [G] label is forcing the position up, but if I drag it to the right, the repeat brackets do not move down.
Note that I had to create chord regions everywhere because otherwise it will show chords in the multi-rest at D. It would be nice to suppress them there so that in Setup I can tell the guitar to show chords everywhere(except multi-rests).
Your “open” and “on cue” were keeping your endings elevated on p. 2 as well as the rehearsal mark. So I incorporated them as the ending text in Properties, and I specified a shorter 2ns ending line to prevent it conflicting with the rehearsal mark.
I also moved your “solo continues” indication a tick to the right in Write mode to let rehearsal mark G descend, but somehow it disappeared after that.
Here is a revision that I hope will help you towards your eventual goal. I don’t have your text font, so I do not know if that will have an effect on what you see. Menina Ilza_altered.dorico (1.7 MB)
The only XML-import boxes I have checked are
Rest Visibility
Text Items
Import other technical…
Combine into single player [cf. TAB]
You don’t have to move text items rhythmically in Write mode to reduce their impact on vertical spacing (and I wouldn’t recommend this as a first choice, because this changes where it occurs in the music and might not work for all layouts).
Instead, deactivate collision avoidance, then move the text item wherever you want.
Thanks, it helps with this situation. Strangely, when I would move the repeat brackets up/down on a part, it would affect the other parts. So it took a while to get it all right. In the end I just shortened the text so it did not collide with the repeat brackets and adjusted them once on the full score. I presume this is because the repeat brackets are system objects. I wish this was someone indicated visually.
By the way, is there an obvious way to recognize whether text was entered with shift-X or shift-alt-X?
Make sure your properties scope is set to “Locally” if you want to keep graphical edits to the current part only.
Yes: select it, and check what’s displayed in the status bar at the bottom left of the window. This is a generally useful place to look for info like what category of notation something is, what pitch a note is, etc.
