Can't change instrument

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csansom
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Post by csansom » Thu Feb 25, 2021 6:05 pm

I have a part in my score for Soprano and Tenor sax. It begins on Soprano, then at the appropriate point I used the Change Instrument command to change to Tenor - no problem. But now, further on, I can't make it change back to Soprano - Change Instrument simply doesn't do anything. I'm stuck! Any ideas, anyone?
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zuill
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Post by zuill » Thu Feb 25, 2021 6:51 pm

I've seen this behavior before but not recently. If you can post a misbehaving file, I would be curious as to what might work for a fix.

Zuill
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Bill Stevens
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Post by Bill Stevens » Thu Feb 25, 2021 7:19 pm

If you post your file then I'm sure Zuill can figure out the problem, but another fix would be instead of changing the instrument at a certain measure, select a range of measures and change instrument for those. This should cause the first instrument to reappear after the changed range.

::: Bill
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csansom
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Post by csansom » Fri Feb 26, 2021 3:43 pm

Thanks Bill, but your solution didn’t work either - it just didn’t change it at all. I made sure the range I selected went over a couple of system breaks, so I'd see the changed instrument name in the margin, but no deal.

So, Zuill, thanks for the offer, and here’s the file [NOT - see below]. Where I'm trying to change it is at the end of page 14, last two bars, where I've successfully changed the other soprano to bass clarinet in the part immediately above. Warning: there's some slightly unorthodox stuff in here, so the spacing might be all over the shop!

Oops - it says the file's too big - it's 563.3k. Do you know what the limit is? Anyway, I tried making a copy then removing most of the instruments from the Instruments window, and it all went completely nuts! I tried again and deleted them with the staff tool - same lunacy resulted. Things - bits of systems - are moving about all over the place as I scroll horizontally through the pages. Very weird. However, it seems to be stable enough in scroll view. So let's see if it's still too big... Yes at just under 360k.

I don't know how to recreate this otherwise, because if, say, I lose a lot of the bars before the proposed change it might or might not work, but that's no guarantee that that reflects the behaviour of the whole thing... and it doesn't make the file any smaller. I've tried Data Check -> File Maintenance, which also appears to do nothing.

Is there any way I could send it privately? If not, I'll just resign myself to leaving it as tenor sax and put Sop. 2 as an expression in the margins. Not the first time I've had to do that sort of stuff!
Finale 26.3, MOTU DP 10.11 - iMac Pro (2017), macOS 10.15.7 - Adam A7 monitors - MOTU M4 interface - Studiologic Acuna 88 kbd - Spitfire, Embertone, Sample Modeling, EWQL, NI, IK Multimedia etc. VIs - Finale user since 1990

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zuill
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Post by zuill » Fri Feb 26, 2021 5:05 pm

Put the file in a cloud storage folder,, share it, and then put the link in your post.

Zuill
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csansom
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Post by csansom » Fri Feb 26, 2021 5:10 pm

Duh! Yes, obvious when you know how...

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/5vqzgy7qbvk0 ... j5jua?dl=0
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csansom
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Post by csansom » Fri Feb 26, 2021 5:12 pm

That's the original file, before I tried reducing it, so my description of where the change should be is the same. But another way of describing it is 5 bars after fig. [17], second stave.
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zuill
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Post by zuill » Fri Feb 26, 2021 5:33 pm

It changed for me. Now, I am using Windows, and you are using Mac. I don't think that's the problem, but worth considering.

When this has happened to me in the past, I tried different things and I can't recall if I know what exactly got things working again. I know i tried rebooting. IOO believe I also recreated my preferences. So, you might try those. If that doesn't work, then you might need to send the file to Support for their take on the problem.

Maybe a Mac user will test this file and see what result they get.

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motet
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Post by motet » Fri Feb 26, 2021 5:45 pm

Doesn't change for me with 2014.5 on Windows. It does throw up an error message about Aria versions when I try to change, though.

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zuill
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Post by zuill » Fri Feb 26, 2021 6:00 pm

After reading your post about 2014.5, I decided to try that. It still changed for me.

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motet
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Post by motet » Fri Feb 26, 2021 6:04 pm

Well, that's bizarre. What could the difference be? A Program Option?

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zuill
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Post by zuill » Fri Feb 26, 2021 6:14 pm

Don't know. I even tried (in v26) making the change in the linked part, as well as extracting the part and making the change in the extracted part. Both of those worked.

Zuill
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csansom
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Post by csansom » Sat Feb 27, 2021 9:20 am

It seems I triggered a bit of discussion about this in my absence yesterday evening, so thanks, Zuill and Motet, for testing. In a way it's comforting to know it's not just me!

It's interesting to hear that you made the change OK in the extracted part, Zuill. I just tried that, to no avail. But what do you mean by the 'linked part'? The other soprano (doubling bass clarinet)? I don't quite follow what you're saying.

Otherwise, as I said, I'll resign myself to using an expression in the margin, and in the meantime I'm off to enjoy the glorious weather we have in London for a couple of hours.
Finale 26.3, MOTU DP 10.11 - iMac Pro (2017), macOS 10.15.7 - Adam A7 monitors - MOTU M4 interface - Studiologic Acuna 88 kbd - Spitfire, Embertone, Sample Modeling, EWQL, NI, IK Multimedia etc. VIs - Finale user since 1990

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zuill
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Post by zuill » Sat Feb 27, 2021 2:34 pm

csansom wrote:
Sat Feb 27, 2021 9:20 am
But what do you mean by the 'linked part'? The other soprano (doubling bass clarinet)? I don't quite follow what you're saying.
Document/Edit Part should list all the linked parts. Parts need to be created first before you extract a part. All of your instruments are listed there.

When all else fails, you can create a Staff Style to do the Soprano Sax transposition.

Another thing to try is to change the whole staff back to Soprano Sax, then highlight bars 69-140 and change that to Tenor. See if the Soprano is now still in 141 and beyond.

Zuill
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motet
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Post by motet » Sat Feb 27, 2021 4:07 pm

The staff style can be used to change the staff label as well.

csansom
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Post by csansom » Sat Feb 27, 2021 5:26 pm

Would you believe it? In all my years of using Finale (too many to count), I have never, ever looked at Edit Part - I'd no idea it was there!

I'll try your idea to set it all to soprano, then change the range to tenor, but first I have to solve another problem, about which I'd better start a separate thread (it's about Note Performer).

And as you say, if all else fails there's always staff styles. Thanks again!
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csansom
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Post by csansom » Sat Feb 27, 2021 5:45 pm

Ignore that about NP - I've got rid of it... more or less, though it's still listed in the Human Playback list, which is a bit annoying.

Anyway, I tried making the whole part Soprano and it wouldn't do that - at least not by clearing my existing change to tenor by using Change Instrument at that point. HOWEVER... I deleted the tenor sax from the indented list under Soprano 2 and that worked!

Even better, selecting the appropriate range and setting it to tenor also worked!

So thank you, thank you, thank you!

I think we can consider this thread closed, but it's a strange one, is it not?
Finale 26.3, MOTU DP 10.11 - iMac Pro (2017), macOS 10.15.7 - Adam A7 monitors - MOTU M4 interface - Studiologic Acuna 88 kbd - Spitfire, Embertone, Sample Modeling, EWQL, NI, IK Multimedia etc. VIs - Finale user since 1990

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zuill
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Post by zuill » Sat Feb 27, 2021 5:57 pm

csansom wrote:
Sat Feb 27, 2021 5:45 pm
HOWEVER... I deleted the tenor sax from the indented list under Soprano 2 and that worked!

Even better, selecting the appropriate range and setting it to tenor also worked!
I was going to mention that I also tried that method in the Score Manager. I'm glad our discourse lead to a solution.

Zuill
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csansom
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Post by csansom » Mon Mar 01, 2021 5:45 pm

Having said the thread could be considered closed I thought I'd add this footnote: Having solved the problem in the way outlined above, I found it didn’t automatically translate to the part. When I extracted the part, not only did it not change back from tenor to soprano, but another oddity occurred - and maybe there's some sort of clue here:

In the 'for parts' score I changed the default 'Abbr. Staff Name' to the single letter S for soprano and T for tenor, and elected to show them in the part. However, when I extracted the part the S was fine, but when it changed to tenor sax the Abbr. was T.Sx. (or whatever the default is). Hmm.

Anyway, I very quickly fixed things the same way as before: delete the tenor altogether from the Score Manager, then select the range where the player should be on tenor and doing Change Instrument - and then of course changing the Abbr. in the Score Manager too.

So all is well... sort of. It's still a workaround though.
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zuill
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Post by zuill » Mon Mar 01, 2021 8:54 pm

Question: In the "For Parts" Score, did you unlink the part in the Soprano Sax 2 part in the score Manager?

Zuill
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"When all is said and done, more is said than done."

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