Hello all,

I'm curious to know the advantages/disadvantages anyone has experienced by using the ";Change Instrument"; function in Finale 2012 instead of changing instruments thru the ";Expressions"; tool.

I write primarily for percussion ensemble with other solo instruments, so most often the percussion parts will involve multiple percussion setups, and I'm interested to get the feedback from those who have had good/less than stellar success, etc.

Thanks,

Dave

Advantage - everything can be accomplished within the Score Manager when working with percussion instruments of similar types, meaning pitched to pitched or non-pitched to non-pitched, very easily. Even pitched to non-pitched is simple, only requiring the assignment of the percussion midi map and layout.

The only snag is if you wish to move from pitched to non-pitched within a measure. Partial measures don't function as expected in this situation.

Thanks for the input.

As usual, I should try this on a simple project first...right?

In my initial experimentation with the ";Change Instrument"; function I've found that it is OK as long as I am changing to an instrument in a different category in VDL.

For example, changing from Concert Toms to Concert Bass Drum (both in the Pit Cymbals Drums Gongs category of VDL 2.5.5) didn't work.  But moving from Concert Toms to Slapstick (in different categories) worked fabulously.

I also wonder if part of the problem is that when I use the Change Instrument function the VDL library isn't available as a choice, but I was able to work around that in the Score Manager. 

Do I need to load a library or something?

Or did I just do something wrong?

No, you didn't do anything wrong. You just missed a step. Once you've selected the instrument to be changed to, you still must make certain that it is set up for that VDL instrument. Check the Device settings, midi channel, and then the percussion midi map followed by the percussion layout.

Ted,

Just a quick note to thank you for your patience and detailed responses.

I started a new piece and decided to go the change instruments route exclusively.  So far it's working perfectly and I'm feeling that with a little more use, it will become my preferred method of handling such details in the future.

Thanks again,