User manual

Table Of Contents
Dynamics indicate the loudness of the music, and can be combined with other instructions to
give the performer a detailed understanding of how to perform the music, while also leaving
room for interpretation.
Dynamics can indicate an immediate change in volume or a gradual change over a specied
duration. By default, they are placed below the staff for instruments and above the staff for
voices.
You can add qualifying and expressive text to dynamics that can give stylistic direction context
alongside the volume level, for example, espressivo indicates that a passage is played loudly but
also with expressive feeling.
While almost all expression text is written in italics, dynamics such as and use a bold italic
font.
RELATED LINKS
Input methods for dynamics on page 184
General placement conventions for dynamics on page 434
Types of dynamics
Dorico Elements categorizes dynamics into four groups.
Immediate dynamics
Immediate dynamics apply to the note to which they are attached until the next dynamic
marking, and indicate an immediate change from any previous dynamic. Immediate dynamics
include dynamic symbols, such as or , and qualifying text, such as subito or molto.
Gradual dynamics and hairpins
Gradual dynamics are often shown as hairpins but can also be shown using text. In Dorico
Elements, you can show gradual dynamic text in the following ways:
cresc. or dim.: abbreviated text with no continuation line
cresc... or dim...: abbreviated text with a dotted continuation line
cre-scen-do or di-mi-nuen-do: the full word spread out across the duration of the gradual
dynamic
Gradual dynamics can also have qualifying text, such as poco, molto, poco a poco, and niente.
In Dorico Elements, a hairpin can be shown as messa di voce, which shows a pair of hairpins. In
some cases, this is easier than having separate lines for each half of the pair.
Force/Intensity of attack
These dynamics, such as and , indicate that a note has a stronger attack than is usually
expected for the dynamic, similar to an accent articulation.
Dynamics
433