I have read several posts about how to perform a keyswitch and have had no luck what so ever.  I am using VDL2 with Finale 2008.  I have tried the grace not keyswitch both on and off and it does not switch from puffs to hards.  I am at a loss as what to do because Jim gave very specific guidelines on how to get it to work but it just doesn't happen for me.  Is there something in the setup in general that I might be missing that would cause it not to work?

Thanks in advance
Alan Goff

If you look at the percussion map for whatever instrument you are using, you will notice that (usually at the top of the percussion map key, i think) there are actual notes in the map that you can input into the score to do the keyswitches (from puffy mallets to hard felt, etc.).  You get there using the Staff Tool (Edit Staff Attributes).  My experience is that the note shows up as a stem without a notehead, but you can change that in the percussion map to whatever you like.  You can input the note using either of the methods (Simple or Speedy) but its easiset with a midi keyboard or VM midi keyboard.  I believe that you can also put the note in any layer and it will work for all the layers (not 100% on this but its easy to test).  You can hide the ";keyswitch note"; this way.

This is the easiest way I have found to effect keyswitching with Finale.

Todd     

I forgot to say that the technique I described assumes you are using the Finale 2008 template for VDL 2.5.

Todd

Hey agoff,

As toddski said, you can enter a keyswitch easially by entering the actual note that triggers the keyswitch then hide the note.  You can also do this with an expression, so you can use the text at the same time (such as ";Puffies";).

1) Create a new expression with the Expression Tool

2) Navigate to the Playback Tab in the Expression Designer

3) Change the Type to ���Dump�۪

4) We are sending 3 sets of values for the MIDI protocol message (Note-On, Key, and Velocity), so you want to enter a ���3�۪ in the ���Number of Units�۪ field (see image 1)

5) Under the first Data field, we want to enter a Note-On command, which is  ���$90�۪ (see image 1)

6) In the second Data field, we will enter the MIDI note we want to send.  The note can be found by checking the KS instrument in the Aria/Kontakt Player.  (See image 2)

The note we are using is highlighted red in the image below (D0), and activating that note will give us a puffy mallet sound.  This website has a good table for what MIDI Note Numbers correspond to which MIDI pitches -  http://www.somascape.org/midi/help/notes.html

7. The MIDI Note Number for D0  is $1A.

8. The third Data field is a velocity parameter to the Note-On signal, so we want to place a $40, which means no velocity. (see image 1)

9. Press OK and OK, then press Assign.

10.  Follow the same steps to switch back to normal mallets, except change the second value field to the appropriate MIDI Note Number.

This is a bit more intensive then entering the note, but if you save your expressions library (File Menu -> Save Library) you can import them into any score and already have text expressions created for the command.

Thanks alot for the help.  It is nice to actually post somthing on a board and get an answer that helps.  I never got the keyswitch to work via the first recommendation but the expression did the trick.

Thanks
Alan

Are you trying to do the KS on a tenor staff?

If so, the maps are missing the Playback Note numbers in the quad map (see image 1), so the KS won't happen on playback if you enter the notes manually.

Change the values to 24 and 26 (see image 2), and they should work.