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I'm sure this is not the proper forum for this question, but I couldn't find anyplace that would fit for this question. Besides, with the vast knowledge of the Kronos users here, I'm sure someone would be in a position of knowledge on this subject.

I would like to create orchestral music for a symphony orchestra. I have it narrowed down to 2 software programs which would be capable of doing this: Finale 2012 and Sibelius 7.

Does anyone have any experience with these who could make a recommendation? Or might there be another notation program that I may have overlooked?

Thanks in advance, everyone!!

Finale and Sibelius are the two major players in notation software.

You couldn't go wrong with either one.

Finale seems to be slightly more popular in the U.S. while Sibelius is more popular in Europe.

Sibelius is owned by Avid, who also own Pro Tools.

You can download a demo versions of both products.

MartinHines wrote:Finale and Sibelius are the two major players in notation software.

You couldn't go wrong with either one.

Finale seems to be slightly more popular in the U.S. while Sibelius is more popular in Europe.

Sibelius is owned by Avid, who also own Pro Tools.

You can download a demo versions of both products.

Thanks for the reply! I have the demo version of Finale, and just downloaded the demo version of Sibelius. So far, Finale does everything I'm looking for, just wondering if someone had any additional input as I'm sure I'll run into snags with either one down the road... just a matter of which one is more problem-free. As for support, I've contacted both support departments, Finale seems much more responsive, quicker, and more helpful.

Thanks so much for your input!!! Wasn't aware that Finale was more popular in the US... and I'm in the US!!!!!

I would go with Sibelius. I find it much more intuitive and I have been using it for years with good results. I have heard that Finale has gotten a lot better, but I still have scars from using version 1.0. I think Sibelius is certainly one of the best notation programs I have ever used.

+1 for Sibelius and its intuitive approach. I also haven't used the last two or three versions of Finale but remember having to switch constantly between tools instead of just being able to click on stuff and have it work.
That said, Finale is equally powerful at least so if the workflow is alright for you...

Does finale also play articulations and dynamics and stuff? I know a friend of a friend who actually uses Sibelius with VSL to. sequence all his orchestral part. even though he is a Logic user 99% of the time, just because it sounds a lot better (read, is easier to make it sound the way he wants).

+1 Sibelius for range of tools, ease of capturing ideas (realtime or through importing SMF files).

Have used Finale as well but I alwasy found Sibelius easier and more powerful

cello wrote:+1 Sibelius for range of tools, ease of capturing ideas (realtime or through importing SMF files).

Have used Finale as well but I alwasy found Sibelius easier and more powerful

Are those programs able to pull out drum-type notation for drummers, from MIDI file?

I use Sibelius and find it OK. Each version improves it greatly; though I do still find it tricky. But my issues are probably more the nature of correct and detailed scoring than any flaws / shortcomings with Sibelius. Overall, it's a fabulously featured package.

A few other points to take on board:

1. As mentioned Sibelius is now owned by AVID; and this is an exciting connection. Already in Sibelius 7 (the latest Sibelius 7 - I believe it was at version 7 in an earlier life!!) it has significant orchestral sample playback improvements - and one could envisage the connection between Sibelius, Protools and Sample Playback becoming ever more integrated in the future for rapid media-type orchestral arrangements. So this is a reason to definitely look towards Sibelius.

2. Avid Scorch for iPad, by AVID / Sibelius is stunning. you can load scores onto Scorch and use it like a music stand. But it has other features such as automatic playback - and access to a vast Store - so for music study - especially of Piano and Big-Band / Jazz arrangements - Avid Scorch is revolutionary. It can also play Sibelius derived scores, so its close association with Sibelius is every exciting and points to a great future in this regard.



That said, though I’ve never used Finale, those who do use it swear by it. It certainly matured earlier than Sibelius and probably still has the edge in terms of providing notation to various avant-garde, contemporary-classical and across-the-world ethnic classical genres. Apparently it's quite sophisticated in those ways.

Another thing to bare in mind is that Finale has been traditionally used by IRCAM (Centre for research into computer acoustics in Paris) and hence is tightly interface-able to their various softwares. And given that IRCAM are making many of their softwares more commercially available (to Ableton Live and though FLUX Ircam Tools as examples) - and that they are all based on Cycling 74 MAX which is now also integrate-able into Ableton - one can envisage exciting cross connections among Finale, Ableton, Cycling 74 and IRCAM in the future.


You should note that Sibleius is particularly poor at accepting MIDI files and placing them in score. In particular; is does not cope with various instruments and their ranges very well and creates ludicrous amounts of ledger lines and so on. I haven't had time to delve into this too much - but I believe there are newish workarounds particularly in the latest version of Sibelius 7 - and use of XML for example. So if you are hoping to record keyboard performances live as MIDI and transfer them into Sibelius, you'll have a lot of tidying up to do and you need to think about this and look to apps that record MIDI to notation better and then use XML for the notes transfer rather than straight MIDI. For MIDI improvisations I tend to use Logic Pro - its Score Editor is far more tightly coupled to its MIDI sequencer so is quite OK (but far from perfect) at capturing MIDI performances and storing them as Notation.


Currently I'm trying to devise new methods to do this - centered on the iPad - where I'll use the iPad with a scoring package such as NOTION or Symphony Pro (two quite good notation packages for iPad) and either enter notes into those via touch screen or play them in from keyboard and then transfer them into Sibelius via XML - but iPad Notation packages are only now beginning to mature and as indicated above - Sibelius is getting better at offering rapid note entering options and alternatives in its own right.


Finally - note that for media-type orchestral work the norm is to record the performance / composition into MIDI tracks in a standard DAW such as Protools or Logic and then copy that MIDI performance into Sibelius and then "fix it up" - requiring a lot of note movement and phrasing and articulation additions. On the other hand, if you are writing a concert piece, you are likely largely conceiving the piece in your head so you're probably going to sketch is on score paper first and then manually enter notes into Sibelius. Broadly, these are the two approaches adopted by most, depending on whether its media-orchestral or concert piece orchestral work you’re doing (or course your own personal approach is always the best for you, but be aware that you will need to be patient and develop a system that works well for you).

Kevin

Wow, thanks everyone for your input with this! You guys are awesome!!

Having barely scratched the surface with either of the demos, I prefer the Sibelius interface right off the bat! Seems with Sibelius, I may not even have to crack open the user manual unless I'm in a bind. Finale also appears to do what I want, but its more work getting used to its interface.

Bottom line though, I'll be inputting notes via MIDI keyboard in realtime. Someone mentioned Sibelius wasn't so great at capturing realtime MIDI? I'm wondering if its Sibelius or other factors (CPU, bus speed, disc access & read/write speeds, etc). I'll continue evaluating both (they each have 30-day evaluation periods) and then make a more informed decision on which way to go.

Thanks again to everyone for your help & comments!

I think Kevin mentioned about issues capturing realtime midi.

I have to disagree with Kevin on this however! This is exactly how I use Sibelius (to play realtime and notate what I play) and Sibelius works pefectly (for me). I've had no issues at all. I don't have a high-end PC either - it's a good spec for a 3 year old machine but is really quite standard.

If I'm being completely honest however, I found it tricky to set-up with the OASYS but once it was set-up it worked great. The Jupiter 80 however worked the very first time I hooked it up to Sibelius. Don't know why there should have been a difference but there was.

I think a bit more clarification is needed on what I mean by the recording of MIDI from keyboard:

Sibelius will indeed take in all MIDI note events sent to it, no problem - there is no technical or speed issue here. The issue is interpreting the MIDI data.

In the scenario used by media composers - as in - playing your performance into a standard DAW such as Protools and Logic with individual MIDI tracks assigned to different orchestral instruments of your sample library - capturing the natural MIDI performance from Keyboard into Protools and Logic is fine - and all MIDI data is recorded onto separate tracks (as well as you can play).

However - for reasons to do with lack of mapping from Protools and Logic MIDI tracks to Staves in Sibelius, transposing issues and so on, any Protools or Logic Multitrack session imported into Sibelius as MIDI will be rendered with many incorrect staves - with many of the staves showing the wrong Clef and the notes with ledger lines (for example a Bass Trombone played into Logic appearing on a Sibelius stave with a Treble Clef and rendered as ledger lines many octaves below). It is this sort of mis-translation that is very common.


Why is this important to you - because - if you are composing at keyboard as you propose - but want real orchestral pieces (as distinct gtom cheesy synth-orchestra pieces) - you will likely eventually want to record into a DAW on MIDI tracks with your sample library as plugins - you will not compose straight into Sibelius. Hence - such a MIDI translation of DAW MIDI Multitrack to Sibelius Score translation will become an issue. And - most especially if you are composing to picture - you will definitely need a DAW to manage the quicktime properly, to set up tempo maps and so on (yes Sibelius can do these but it lags in sophostiaction and nobody uses it for this, yet).


Now, if you are going to record straight into Sibelius - then such a translation is not an issue - though unless you have stunning timing, your performance into Sibelius will still be metrically all over the place and will need a lot of timing corrections (such corrections are also far easier to correct in Logic and Protools with their sophosticated quantise and MIDI editor capabilities). And as said - if you are composing to picture - you want to do that in Logic or Protools - and not Sibelius. And - it's not clear to me that Sibelius can handle vast sample libraries well either (yet!).

In a nutshell - if you are doing orchestral composing via MIDI performances - and especially to picture - you want to record your MIDI performance into a DAW as MIDI, not straight into Sibelius. And hence the translation problems are the issue.

Many orchestrators these days spend a lot of time fixing such DAW MIDI multitrack sessions imported into the likes of Sibelius - fixing Clefs, ledger lines, timings, and adding articulations, phrasing and dynamics - this is now common practice.

Where Sibelisu IS good - is if you already have a score on paper, you can play the score in - like a step sequencer - but using your keyboard to enter the notes - on a stave by stave basis - i.e. - one stave at a time.

But my broad point is valid - if you are expecting Sibelius to simply record what you play in realtime on a keyboard and expect to see sophisticated scores emerge - you will not achieve this. It is a lengthy and complicated process.

And - you need to think about - what are you expecting to record? straight from keyboard For example, are you expecting to record Strings as 'Strings' on Piano Treble and Bass clefs - or as Violin 1,2, Viola, Cello and Bass? All of this and a myriad of similar issues arise.

If you are genuinely looking to compose authentic orchestral music - with capable orchestration - then the issue is NOT Sibelius or Finale - the issue is your capacity to orchestrate or to think compositionally via orchestra - and you should largely look at Sibelius as the final step in the composition process - largely as the software to produce a score for the conductor and parts for the musicians. Beyond that, Sibelius is actually not needed - and you would be better recommended investing in excellent sample packages and record into a DAW MIDI Multitrack; and then separately give some thought and study into Orchestration. Remember - Sibelius is largely just a graphical rendering environment - it is not a compositional tool in the purist sense and has not reached a maturity yet to capture live and 'organic' keyboard performances as orchestral sessions - or arguably to allow traditional concert composers to 'think and compose' in the same way as they might do at an acoustic piano and 8-stave sketch score paper. It is getting better in all of these ways - but it is far from complete in these ways.

Kevin.

Kevin, an acquaintance of mine actually swears by using Sibelius over Logic (his regular DAW of choice for everything else) for orchestral sequencing/scoring. And it's not because he wants the notation, often there is hardly any need at all. It's because in Sibelius it's apparently easier to get realistic dynamics and articulation using VSL and the like. I have little personal experience in this, but he's a pro musician as well and writes this stuff commercially. Do you know of anyone doing the same and the main advantages/disadvantages?

SanderXpander,

This is excellent to hear. I don't think the issues I mention are scare mongering - they are real every day experience and I wanted to point out to the poster that it's not Sibleius per say that delivers the orchestral piece (and that tere are technical issues and most users follow the route I mention).

However - I did flag - and you have confirmed - that there are exciting prosepcts ahead (and seemingly arriving now) where AVID Sibelius are looking to bridge the gap and make the process more seamless by linking articulations and dynamics between sampe packages and scoring packages.


Though I recently purchased Sibleius 7 I haven;t installed it yet - mut from memory I think the on-board samples in Sibelius 7 are VSL derived - and if so this is a possible very exciting development between AVID/Sibelius and VSL in particular. However - such articulation linkage will not be maintained with any other sample packages!


Kevin.

Great detail SanderXpander and Kevin - interesting thread!

I have Sib7 and yes, samples are VSL based.

Thanks too for your clarification Kevin as I now see exactly where you are coming from.

I have occasion to use the step keyboard inputting, the realime playing input and the old-fashioned mouse input - all depends on what I'm working on.

Orchestral/string quartet notation is the most demanding of my use of Sib7. Dynamics/articulation I tend to think about after notation input - and I do it all manually.

SanderXpander wrote:Kevin, an acquaintance of mine actually swears by using Sibelius over Logic (his regular DAW of choice for everything else) for orchestral sequencing/scoring. And it's not because he wants the notation, often there is hardly any need at all. It's because in Sibelius it's apparently easier to get realistic dynamics and articulation using VSL and the like. I have little personal experience in this, but he's a pro musician as well and writes this stuff commercially. Do you know of anyone doing the same and the main advantages/disadvantages?

I've used notation softwares since early 1990s on daily basis. I've worked as an editor for various publishing companies and composers for years, so I know these softwares real well. They are no substitute for a DAW, just as a DAW is not a substitute for Finale/Sibelius. The sample pack that comes with Sibelius is not really intended for creating high quality mock-up tracks. You would still have to export the session as midi, and do the rest of the work in Pro tools or whatever.
If the intention is to produce legible sheet music for performing musicians, then you dont' even have to leave the music notation environment. Nowadays, it's customary to send a stereo audio track of the arrangement to a conductor ... . You could totally use these samples to render the score and all that, but it's not possible to use these softwares to create a professionally produced audio track ready to be used for Radio/TV..etc.