Paper orientation

Paper orientation is the direction of rectangular paper for viewing and printing. Paper can have either landscape or portrait orientation.

Instrumental parts are most often printed using portrait orientation, as this allows two or three pages to be spread out at a time on most music stands.

Full scores for conductors are also commonly printed using portrait orientation, as this allows more staves to fit on the page than with landscape orientation. However, full scores for small ensembles might use landscape orientation as fewer staves have to fit on the page. Having more horizontal room on the page allows more bars to fit on each page, reducing the number of page turns required.

In Dorico Elements, you can set the orientation of pages independently of the paper orientation; for example, you can print portrait pages on landscape paper. You can also separately set the paper orientation of the odd final page in layouts using the Spreads and 2-up page arrangements.