NOTATIO

Thanks: that answers my question. I wasn't necessarily promoting an alternative.

Interestingly, Gould's only comment on it is that "Very wide intervals may take a beam centred between the stems in order to save vertical space", unless I've missed something.

John Ruggero wrote: ↑09 Jun 2021, 21:03 Ben, this is way off the topic, but can Dorico now do centered beaming for intervals smaller than a fourth without a workaround?

No.

Regarding Gould's comment on centered beaming:

At present, centered beams are only used in cases where it is almost impossible to avoid it, as in the Brahms op. 119 no.1, or where for wide leaps that would otherwise look absurd and/or, as Gould observes, take up too much space: But in earlier times, centered beams were used to reduce the length of the stems and the space between the staves so that more music could placed on each page. They were found visually pleasing even for smaller intervals. Care was taken that this didn't create reading difficulties, such as beams running through ledger lines. This meant that passages like a series of broken octaves would sometimes change from centered beaming to non-centered mid-stream. This kind of inconsistency bothered neither composer of engraver of that day, but later spelled the death knell of most centered beaming, when engravers began to value regularity above all.

I think that this is a real shame because centered beaming often brings out phrasing and voice leading. For example, in Bach's Invention no. 1, the subject and countersubject are clearly set off at the first statement by a centered beam:
The fact that testitura made continuation of the same beaming less desirable in the next measure didn't seem to bother Bach because he had made his point, and he seems to have been no slave to surface consistency.

Thanks John. I've made a copy of the Bach Inventions in Dorico (for my own keyboard practice), and I shall follow Bach's beaming more closely!

I'm fairly sanguine about the occasional fiddly workaround, given all the other time savings.
Tricks with Notehead Sets, Playing Techniques, Lines, etc, actually afford Dorico a greater degree of flexibility than is often assumed to be possible.

Engraving Bach's Inventions and Sinfonias is the ultimate exercise in centered beaming, as I discovered when I prepared my edition in Finale. I think you may discover difficulties using Dorico because it doesn't yet have the capability to change beam width:
This latter is a great example of how centered beaming can show the multi-voice nature of Bach's melodies. The small fingering slurs suggest notes that may be finger-pedaled.

Someone commented on adjusting the beam widths somewhere: I'm trying to find it. The width did seem to change by itself somewhat as I moved the beam, but .. .we'll see.

Dorico 4 is of course somewhat overdue, and who knows whether that will have more controls over beaming.

And back on topic: Finale 27 is 'only a few hours' away.

Finale's beams also adjust as the angle changes, but sometimes it is not enough for really clear reading of centered beamed groups and the beam width tool must be used.

I think I read that Dorico can't can't beam width globally or locally yet. On the other hand, Dorico can change ledger line width on a note by note basis, something that is not possible in Finale, and one of the features that would draw me to Dorico.

The release of Finale 27 is good for both Finale and Dorico users! Heh heh...

After 5 minutes with Finale 27, I'm annoyed by the low attention to detail in the new UI changes.

The new tool icons are weak, with little contrast.

You can't expand the sidebar of the new character selection dialog, even though some of the names of the groups are very long.

Oh well. I'm locked out, since I can't go beyond OS10.12 right now.

Well ... I'm struggling a bit with figuring out the SMuFL implementation. If I open my default and try to change to a SMuFL font I get:


So I guess I have to start with New Document Without Libraries. Nope, they still have it set to Maestro instead of the SMuFL "Finale Maestro" so that doesn't work either. If I start from the Setup Wizard and select Finale Maestro as the style, I can correctly create a file that can use SMuFL. I can select Bravura as a font for example.

A problem that arises now is that Document Options contains font settings. If I export my Document Options library (and only Doc Options) from my Fin26 template, when I load it into my SMuFL compliant file, the importing action screws up the SMuFL settings (which is not completely unexpected I suppose). I now get something like this when trying to switch to Bravura without the SMuFL warning:


So ... is there any way to get all of my old settings into a new SMuFL compliant template without recreating everything?