Dorico Pro 3.5 – Review

Dorico 3.5
Steinberg Media Technologies GmbH
Dorico Pro 3.5 full version: $559.99

Steinberg’s Dorico is remarkably sophisticated and intuitive software for musicians. Composers, arrangers and performers worldwide use Dorico to notate, play back and publish musical scores to the highest professional standards.

MyMac has had nothing but good to say about versions 1, 2 and 3 Refer to those reviews for the “story so far…” of how the dedicated, gifted and energetic team at Steinberg designed and developed this outstanding product from scratch – but built on best computer-based notational practice. The Dorico “phenomenon” now means that this platform has deservedly become the market leader in the field.

Dorico takes a new and intelligent approach to workflows for digital audio… entering, editing, playing and printing music. Beautiful printed scores are the result. Dorico elegantly places the conventions and processes of writing (and arranging) music above and ahead of the (potential) limitations of keyboard and mouse. Reliability, richness of features, flexibility and excellent (technical) support have made Dorico the first choice for those serious about creating and managing scores digitally.

Databases, spreadsheets and even word processors necessarily have constraints… fields, cells, alphabets. By contrast, high-end and flexible music and audio packages must cater for an infinite range of activities by users. You work almost freeform from an essentially blank slate (as with graphics packages). The key to Dorico’s success is that – despite its complexity – Dorico enables musical creativity, rather than allowing it. It is so well conceived and written that it transparently handles what it cannot predict.

Now Dorico 3.5 has just been released. This review examines and evaluates the new features, functionality, improvements and bug fixes.