Nearly a year after the first release of the popular Scoring Express suites for Finale and Dorico, we’re pleased to finally announce the immediate availability of the Scoring Express Jazz package of templates and libraries for Finale.

Scoring Express for Finale – Jazz
Scoring Express is a collection of professional templates for Sibelius, Dorico, and Finale, based on the same templates we use at NYC Music Services, an industry-leading music preparer.
Scoring Express for Finale – Jazz is on par with the versions already available for Sibelius and Dorico, and includes 11 professional Finale templates for stand-alone use, plus corresponding manuscript papers, document styles, and libraries, so you can use Scoring Express to start a new score from scratch or beautify an existing score.
Included are four big band templates — one each for portrait and landscape page orientation, and again for an engraved and handwritten styles. There are also four lead sheet templates — an engraved “serif” look, an engraved “sans serif” look, a handwritten look, and one that approximates the style of The New Real Book. Finally (Finale?) there are three piano-vocal templates — serif, sans-serif, and handwritten.

These rely on a bevy of fonts that are all automatically installed with all Scoring Express for Finale packages. Fully SMuFL-compatible, and optimized for Finale 27+, these templates rely upon Bravura as the main “engraved” style music font and Petaluma as the main “handwritten” style music font, as we aim to achieve as consistent a result as possible across Dorico, Finale, and Sibelius (the latter with the derivative non-SMuFL Norfolk and Pori music fonts, respectively).
Included are 122 chord suffixes (33 more than the first release of Scoring Express for Finale), and now available in three fonts: Norfolk (serif), Norfolk Sans (sans-serif), and Pori (handwritten). If you know anything about Finale, you know that creating chord symbols can be intimidating, so with these new suffix libraries, the hope is that it eases the path towards getting great-looking results right away.

Of course, all of the expressions, articulations, smart lines and more, have been updated as well:
There’s lots more in this exciting addition to Scoring Express. Full credit goes to Joseph Trefler, once again, for his careful attention to detail in bringing these to fruition. No item was too small to finesse.
He’s also lent one of his very own compositions, “Christmas in New York,” for use as an example. When you install a Scoring Express Jazz package, in addition to lead sheet and piano-vocal examples, you’ll now find a file containing Joseph’s full big band score and complete set of parts.

The introduction of Scoring Express for Finale – Jazz means that we can finally offer a bundle that’s on par with the Sibelius and Dorico versions. More details below.
Updates to all templates
All of the other templates in the Scoring Express line have been updated, with some fixes and new features. For starters, the “Christmas in New York” big band example score is also included with the Sibelius – Jazz and Dorico – Jazz packages.
Among some of the other highlights: The Finale templates see a few more staff styles added; the inclusion of a new text font, Archivo and Archivo Narrow, and better spacing for multirests in the Theatre & Studio templates.
As before, Leo Nicholson and Joseph Trefler worked tirelessly behind the scenes to get these updates ready to roll.
Availability
The Scoring Express packages for Sibelius, Dorico, and Finale are all available now at Notation Central. Pricing is as follows:
Scoring Express for Sibelius
- Scoring Express for Sibelius – Chamber: $64.99
- Scoring Express for Sibelius – Jazz: $64.99
- Scoring Express for Sibelius – Theatre & Studio: $74.99
- Scoring Express for Sibelius – Bundle (Chamber, Jazz, and Theatre & Studio): $159.99 — a $45 savings!
Scoring Express for Dorico
- Scoring Express for Dorico – Chamber: $64.99
- Scoring Express for Dorico – Jazz: $64.99
- Scoring Express for Dorico – Theatre & Studio: $74.99
- Scoring Express for Dorico – Bundle (Chamber, Jazz, and Theatre & Studio): $159.99 — a $45 savings!
Scoring Express for Finale
- Scoring Express for Finale – Chamber: $64.99
- Scoring Express for Finale – Jazz: $64.99
- Scoring Express for Finale – Theatre & Studio: $74.99
- Scoring Express for Finale – Bundle (Chamber, Jazz, and Theatre & Studio): $159.99 — a $45 savings!
Updating
If you already have Scoring Express for Sibelius, simply log into your account at Notation Central and download the latest update for your product(s) for free.
If you’re registered user of both Scoring Express for Finale – Chamber and Scoring Express for Finale – Theatre & Studio as of May 16, you’re eligible to get Scoring Express for Finale – Jazz for just $20, to complete the “bundle”. Simply log into your account at Notation Central, add Scoring Express for Finale – Jazz to your cart, and begin the checkout process to see the savings applied.