Finale AND Dorico (maybe MuseScore, Notion Sibelius, etc. also)

[motet]

I used Modus Novus in college and still have it!

It might be asking too much to have a repetiteur to play from the full score rather than a piano reduction!

[motet]

(I wasn't implying the composers are lacking skills. Rather, I was speculating that perhaps the ability to read transposed scores is perhaps less common than it once was.)

[Michel R E]

I used Modus Novus in college and still have it!

It might be asking too much to have a repetiteur to play from the full score rather than a piano reduction!

I still have my copy of Modus Novus as well.

and yes, having worked as an accompanist for opera, I could at the time sight read anything you put in front of me. But had you put an orchestral score in front of me I'd have been lost. It is nearly impossible to sight read from a full score if you haven't been working at that for years.
It IS too much to ask a repetiteur to read from a full score.... unless that full score is for piano and another instrument or two.
let's just say I'd have had "choice words" for a composer who showed "disappointment" because I couldn't read from an orchestral score - in C or otherwise.

[Anders Hedelin]

Nice to hear that you know about Modus Novus!
My guess is that scores in C have been favoured along with atonal music. In transposing scores of the old days, I've found that I'm half-reading, half-guessing the notes, based on traditional harmony. When there's no tonal harmony, how could you 'guess' what the horns are up to? I just mean that the process of reading a transposing score of atonal music would be considerably slower than a score in C.

[David Ward]

Full scores of Prokofiev seemed to be published in C while those of Shostakovich are transposing: from the same publisher. Why, I wonder?

As suggested above, conductors seem likely to prefer transposing scores. When my Beyond the Far Haaf for two singers and full orchestra was first performed in a concert in 1992(?) there had not been enough time to prepare a piano reduction vocal score, so the singers were reading from a version of the full score, complete with transpositions. This didn't seem to alarm them as much as it might have done and it all worked out in the end, courtesy of the BBC's generous allowance of rehearsal time. A piano reduction would have been a lot easier for the singers, and of course essential for rehearsing a staged performance with a repetiteur.

The lack of time to prepare a vocal score was, if I'm remembering correctly, largely because of an unexpected time-limited grant of £15,000 from the EEC, as it then was, which made it possible for this piece about a fishing disaster in which 58 men from Shetland drowned to be performed in the community to which it related. (If interested, go to the Sound page on my web-site, where Part 3 of the piece can be heard.)

My apologies for being so frightfully “ROT” (see the post from Anders immediately below) and I too now “promise not to digress like this in the future of this RVT (Really Valuable Thread)” - and yes, it has indeed been really valuable.

[Anders Hedelin]

Full scores of Prokofiev seemed to be published in C while those of Shostakovich are transposing: from the same publisher. Why, I wonder?

Then, neither P. nor S. wrote exactly atonal music.
Possibly Prokofiev for some reason wanted to be more 'modern' in his notation, more Western-oriented as he was, while Shostakovich, brilliant as he was, didn't want to lower himself to that 'modern-Western' level.

Edit: This must be ROT (Really OT). I promise not to digress like this in the future of this RVT (Really Valuable Thread).

[Michel R E]

Something I like about Finale that I can't for the life of me figure out how to do in Dorico:

Finale gives you the option of always having "free" dragging of objects OR always constrain, with a trigger key to cause the opposite action for those times you require it.

Dorico, on the other hand, has a constrain key, except you actually have to start dragging in the direction you need first before it takes effect. I'd like the option to always constrain dragging to whatever the very first direction I start movement in happens to be.

[motet]

Dorico, on the other hand, has a constrain key, except you actually have to start dragging in the direction you need first before it takes effect. I'd like the option to always constrain dragging to whatever the very first direction I start movement in happens to be.

I guess I'm not understanding--those both seem like the same thing to me.

Finale is that way--constrains in the first direction you move--but sometimes I start off the wrong way. I guess I would like two keys, a "constrain to horizontal" key and a "constrain to vertical key," so I couldn't make that mistake.

[Michel R E]

with Dorico, you have to start moving THEN press the constrain key (shift, if I recall correctly).
during that split second of "free movement" (before you press that constrain key) there is a high probability that the item you're moving WILL move off the axis you intended.

[motet]

Ah, I see.

[RMK]

with Dorico, you have to start moving THEN press the constrain key (shift, if I recall correctly).
during that split second of "free movement" (before you press that constrain key) there is a high probability that the item you're moving WILL move off the axis you intended.

But doesn't it snap back to that axis after you apply the shift key?

It does for me.

[Michel R E]

yes, apparently it does.

I guess I prefer Finale's way of locking the constrain.

I tried the Dorico way, and notice that it's not a "real" lock. In the sense that you CAN change axis after beginning movement and the constrain will then switch to the new direction.

[Epeedad]

Hi Folks,

I meant to participate in this thread sooner but got really busy. The trouble with retirement is that you never get a day off! It has been a very interesting discussion.

Here is a quick and dirty video I made last year for the Dorico forum outlining "out of the box" playback of Finale, Notion and Dorico.

https://youtu.be/cPjZqwEvQVQ

I added Dorico with Note Performer for good measure. I would have added Note Performer with Finale but Finale with NP was misbehaving at the time and I didn't want to spend the time chasing it down. This gets to one of the main reasons I switched to Dorico. I was tired of chasing down the small but annoying anomalies that kept cropping up interrupting my workflow. Dorico isn't perfect in that respect but it is a lot better.

Another difference between Finale and Dorico is that while Finale gives ultra-fine control of the visual presentation of the score, Dorico excels in giving great(almost DAW-like) control of MIDI audio playback. This is most useful for my purposes since I make videos of scores to assist people, mainly older amateur choral singers who don't have great reading skills, to learn their parts.

Notion is a very interesting program. While its notation capabilities are more rudimentary, it has several interesting and useful features. It has a "conductor" function that works quite well, allowing you to conduct your score playback. This is useful for working out subtle tempo changes, for instance. It also integrates very well with Studio One (Presonus's DAW). I am working on developing a workflow using Studio One for recording transcription. S1 is integrated with Melodyne and can (among other things) extract MIDI from audio which (with editing , of course) be quantized, notated and sent to Notion for more editing, basic formatting & printing, and MusicXML export.

Chris

[Anders Hedelin]

I use the Special Tools in Finale all the time, when the need to adjust a beam fx appears. I know there are settings for beams etc. in both programs, but I would appreciate some comment on how these manual adjustments work in Dorico.

[Michel R E]

how they work?
you'll have to be more precise.

in Engraver mode, you simply select the item you want to move. In that mode you cannot delete or add items, but anything (well, almost anything) on a page is moveable.

[motet]

Are the angle of beams and distance from noteheads adjustable, for example?

Can you change a tuplet on a case-by-case basis (flip the number and bracket, suppress either or both, etc.)?

All the other stuff the special tools do--stem length, notehead, beam breaker, etc., etc.

[BuonTempi]

Yes to all the above. You can also create S-shaped slurs and other multi-segment slurs.

And there are global options for sub-division/breaking of secondary beams at the beat, which in Finale you have to do individually, AFAIK.

[Michel R E]

all of that is editable, just like in Finale.

the only place I've come across some resistance on the forums and from the development crew, is when you require notation details that might be outside the norm. there IS a bit of an "I know what's best for you" attitude, at times. There's also a tiny bit of "we don't want to do the same thing Sibelius/Finale does". The latter seems counterproductive. If a function works well in a competitor's product, then by all means, implement a similar function in your product. It doesn't mean it has to be identical. it can even be... dare we say it!... better!!

[BuonTempi]

There's also a tiny bit of "we don't want to do the same thing Sibelius/Finale does". The latter seems counterproductive. If a function works well in a competitor's product, then by all means, implement a similar function in your product. It doesn't mean it has to be identical. it can even be... dare we say it!... better!!

Actually, Daniel has pointed to features in Finale that he hopes to include in Dorico. And things like pitch-before-duration note entry were introduced because of Finale users' familiarity. However, when people ask "will you copy this implementation?", his response is "tell me what you want to achieve, and we'll work out the way to do it".

Finale's capabilities are certainly driving Dorico's development. The real question is: will Dorico's capabilities drive Finale's development?

For instance, what are the chances of seeing multi-stave note entry in Finale, so that chords are distributed across more than one staff?

[Zoots]

Finale's capabilities are certainly driving Dorico's development. The real question is: will Dorico's capabilities drive Finale's development?

For instance, what are the chances of seeing multi-stave note entry in Finale, so that chords are distributed across more than one staff?

I think the "Dead Horse" thread answered that.

[John Ruggero]

I think that Michel has performed a great service through these scouting reports about Dorico. In my opinion, anyone who does mainly nuts and bolts engraving and needs more automatic capabilities than Finale has would probably do well to move to Dorico. And there is a simple way to experience the program: take a 30-day trial run.

I did two trials. Despite capabilities that I would love to be able to use, I felt imprisoned by the program, was stymied by what it can't do, and came back to Finale with relief. I will probably buy Dorico 4, if only to keep up with its promising development.

[PeterF]

I've decided to download Dorico 3.5 Pro for the 30-day trial after reading this thread. I like being in the notation game. I noticed online that "Encore" is still for sale. Does anyone still use it? I remember trying to decide between Encore and Finale back in 1996... I chose Finale.

These days, I mainly do ukulele melody/TABs and vocal/piano scores in Sibelius Ultimate (2021). I have the latest Finale 27 and Guitar Pro 7.5.

I prefer to edit MIDI in Finale. I hate it in Sibelius. I don't like the note entry in Sibelius either. From what I've been reading, Dorico seems to be more Finale-like with note entry (insert mode) and has a MIDI sequencer built-in. That is very interesting to me. I've been waiting for something like that for a long time... a good quality mix of the two: notation and a MIDI editing sequencer.

I plan on doing some ukulele melody line/TAB tutorials on YouTube for each of the programs based on their set-up wizards or templates and how to get up and going fast. This is all fun stuff.

Pete

[dankreider]

Hi Pete, that’s great. Don’t hesitate to get help on the Steinberg forum if you get the least bit stuck. Dorico is completely different from Finale, in my opinion, and requires a re-wiring of the brain.

[PeterF]

Hi Pete, that’s great. Don’t hesitate to get help on the Steinberg forum if you get the least bit stuck. Dorico is completely different from Finale, in my opinion, and requires a re-wiring of the brain.

Danke/Thanks D.

I will check out the Steinberg forum once I delve into Dorico. Someone wrote over a year ago on the main Hawaii ukulele forum that the free Dorico SE could do ukulele sheet music. They never wrote me back but I want to look into this seriously now. I just downloaded tonight and installed the Pro version and the comparison chart was vague about fretboards and TAB and might be a question best posed in the Steinberg forums. Not sure what "limited" means for fretboards.

https://www.steinberg.net/dorico/compare-editions/

Anyway, I will check out the big guns first... the main 3.5 Pro version.

Pete

[BuonTempi]

I noticed online that "Encore" is still for sale. Does anyone still use it? I remember trying to decide between Encore and Finale back in 1996... I chose Finale.

Encore has been superseded by Overture, which is Don William's new evolution of his work. I tried it once and the slurs were hideous, for starters. Given the difficulty of the task, there are a surprising number of notation products out there, all fighting for a tiny fraction of a niche market. NoteAbility Pro is another (Mac only) that's been going since the early 90s, written by a one-man shop.

It's hard for anyone to compete against MuseScore, which is already widespread in education (because it suits the budget of both faculty and student). It has limitations, but -- like Finale -- if you know what good results should look like, then you can get a long way. It is also being developed fruitfully, with a current focus on engraving quality and playback.

Against that, any paid-for app has to justify its price; and for commercial work, that means speed. One of Dorico's main attractions is being able to knock out finished scores and parts quickly.