This may be a Sibelius question but how can I adjust my settings to create a more defined difference between the accent and tap levels w/ my VD2 sounds? Right now, my playback sounds like the accent to tap level is about 9"; to 6";

I would like to keep my accents at the current velocity settings but lower the volume of the unaccented notes so it sounds more like a 9"; to 3"; level.

I'm using Sibelius 3.1.3 if it matters.

Easiest way I've found is to use the ";live playback"; feature of Sibelius 3.

In the ";play"; menu, be sure ";live playback"; is checked.

Control click (cmd-click on mac) the unaccented notes so that they're selected.

In the ";playback"; portion of the properties window, there's a ";live playback"; check box. Check that, and set the value to around 66 or so. This should ";lower the heights"; a bit to give a better rendition of accent-to-tap contrast.

Alternately, if you select View>Live Playback Velocities, you'll see a blue slider above each note that's had a live playback value setting made. You can click on these sliders and drag up or down essentially like volume sliders. Visually, this is pretty slick, though it's not a fast way to do several notes at once as described above.

Or you can ";draw"; values over these sliders by holding down the SHIFT key, then dragging left to right with your mouse over the blue velocity sliders. Probably not as precise as you may be looking for, but still a Sibelius feature that's not well known.

Hope this helps.

BTW, to the best of my knowledge, there is nowhere you can set a ";default"; setting for accent/tap ratio definitions in Sibelius. Basically, accents will add a percentage greater value on top of the notes that are currently existing at the currently designated dynamic marking (which also sets velocity).

You can however change the default velocity settings of the actual expression marks (mf, ff, etc) via Play>Dictionary>Staff settings. Keep in mind however that this will be global and will not just affect drumline dynamics, but front ensemble and wind dynamics (expression text) as well.

hanks, I'll have to give that a try when I get a chance. I was playing around with the Live Playback settings but I didn't get it to work right. It must be because I forgot to select a specific note before making the changes.