…the old days…

It’s interesting how we get so entrenched in one way of doing things. We become hardened (maybe even defensive?) against change, preferring the comfort of what we know. This is the point of an article referred to on the excellent Sibelius Blog. (By the way, if anyone knows of a Finale blog that is similar, please let me know in the comments field.) We think Finale is best or Sibelius is best, depending on which one we happen to use. We think this way about our computers (Mac or PC?), our cars (foreign or domestic?), our wines (red or white?) and so on.

But this way of thinking prevents us from learning and growing; we don’t try new things — we don’t even consider it. Even within that very software program we use everyday we become inured to change, entrenched in our way of doing things, and we gloss over helpful new features.

Of course the parallels to composition need hardly be spelled out by me. We should all engage in a little relearning every now and then. I highly recommend this blog entry.

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Daniel Spreadbury of Sibelius

That this is so — or has been so — is pretty much admitted in a remarkably honest blog posting by Daniel Spreadbury, ¬†who happens to be the Senior Project Manager at Sibelius. As I come to Sibelius from Finale, my own particular complaint has always been about slurs. About slurs Mr. Spreadbury writes:

…it turns out that sometimes you simply need the full control afforded by all of the cubic B√©zier‚Äôs control points, so the first thing we set out to do in Sibelius 6 is provide access to all of those control points. Slurs now show six handles, all of which can be manipulated with either the mouse or the keyboard, and numerically using the Properties window. Furthermore, we made it possible to adjust the positions of each of these control points separately for slurs that cross a system or page break.

Finale users will recognize what this means — Sibelius now handles slurs much as Finale does.

Mr. Spreadbury addresses other factors in the development of Sibelius 6 as well in his blog post on “The Story Behind Sibelius 6.” For me, Sibelius 6 now represents the ideal balance between simplicity and powerful composition notation. It’s hard to imagine that Finale is capable of doing something that Sibelius can not — and Sibelius handles matters much more intuitively. I highly recommend this software.

It’s interesting, too, that Sibelius is willing to address its software challenges in a public venue such as this. Be sure to read the entire blog entry here.

The post Sibelius explains its slurs appeared first on Richard D. Russell.

Learn about Sibelius by clicking here and about Finale by clicking here.

What’s your opinion on these notation programs?

The post Finale 2010, Sibelius 6 appeared first on Richard D. Russell.