As you have noted, every solution to this issue is a workaround. But maintaining a score that contains both a combined staff for the score and separated staves for the parts seems like an attractive option. Whether you create the separated staves first and combine them or create the combine staff first and separate them seems like it would be entirely dependent on musical context. There may be passages where they have to be separate anyway, in which case you could dispense with the score staff entirely.
This is all to suggest that while you have named plugins that can make this approach easier, I would not be looking for a one-size-fits-all solution. I would approach it section by section. Having said that, I personally still maintain two files. One file contains the score and all non-combined parts. The other contains just the decombined parts. But moving to a single file with duplicate staves does seem like a good idea. The only downside I can see is if the file is big enough to be anywhere close the 32767 frame limit. If 20-30 staves becomes 40-50, a dense piece of several hundred measures could potentially hit it. A frame is an internal Finale data structure that holds music for 1 layer in 1 bar in 1 staff. 32767 is the maximum positive value in a signed 16-bit integer. This limit is a holdover from Finale having been developed in the 1980s. "Why haven't they fixed this?" you might well ask. I have no idea, but I would guess it must be a really painful and risky change to the code base. To me it is outrageous that they have not activated Special Tools for voiced parts. That limitation existed because when voiced parts were introduced, Special Tool edits could not be unlinked. But now that they can, I don't understand why voiced parts can't use them. On Mon, Mar 4, 2019 at 4:26 AM Christopher Smith < [email protected]> wrote: > Hi Doug, > > Your method of single instruments to create the score, then combining them > afterward, is what I do generally. > > To solve the doubled expression/articulation problem (which of course is > WAY worse in V26 with stacked articulations!) I set the filter to copy only > expressions and articulations, and copy over from one of the source staves. > It’s a pain, and it is far from perfect, but it’s what I do. > > Christopher > > > > On Mar 3, 2019, at 11:51 PM, Doug Walter <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > I know the topic of trying to use voiced parts (all but useless to me as > it stands) has been covered and I’ve tried all the workarounds at various > times and know the issues, so I’m not asking about that. The TGTools > plug-in “Smart Explosion of multi-part staves…” often yields better > results, but it’s still not the close-to-100% solution I’m looking for. > I’ve also had some success with the JW Staff Polyphony plug-in. To be > clear, this is not just to make the score look good; I want to retain the > convenience of linked parts so I don’t have to go back to extracting > individual parts, etc. > > > > So after years of trying every method I can think of, I thought I’d > approach it from the other direction this time in an orchestral score I’m > working on. This time I set the score up with each woodwind and brass > instrument on its own line, which of course would necessitate the use of a > microscope to read the score even on 11 x 17 paper at the reduction > necessary to fit all the staves on each page. But my hope is that by using > the JW Staff Polyphony plug-in to combine 2 staves into 1 where possible > (Flute 1/2, Clarinet 1/2, etc.) and then hiding the staves with individual > parts in the score, it might be less tedious. It seems to be promising, but > I still end up with double sets of expressions - dynamics, for instance. > > > > I can make all this work one way or another and have many times, but I’m > writing in case there is a plug-in I haven’t yet explored out there, or in > case someone knows a way to set the ones I’m using to yield results that > don’t require as much “clean-up” afterwards. BTW, the “old way” - creating > 2-part staves and exploding them later - has been tried both with and > without using separate layers, and I’ve discovered some of those pitfalls > as well. > > > > Thanks for any approaches I may not have thought of, > > > > Doug > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > Finale mailing list > > [email protected] > > https://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale > > > > To unsubscribe from finale send a message to: > > [email protected] > > > _______________________________________________ > Finale mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale > > To unsubscribe from finale send a message to: > [email protected] _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [email protected] https://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale To unsubscribe from finale send a message to: [email protected]
