This video series is part of Conquering Finale, a regular feature on Scoring Notes, with new installments released periodically.
Introduction to note entry
Before we get into the details of note entry, I will offer advice and wax philosophical about the three different ways to enter notes and rests in Finale: Simple Entry, Speedy Entry and Hyperscribe.
To help with Simple and Speedy Entry please download the Finale Quick Reference Card for Mac or Windows which will provide a full list of keystrokes for those tools.
Speeding up Speedy Entry
Lesson 1: Speedy Entry Basics
Covered in this video:
- Navigating the Speedy Entry frame
- Entering notes and rests with a MIDI device
- Entering notes and rests without a MIDI device
- Entering ties, tuplets, grace notes and chromatic alterations
- Insert Mode
Lesson 2: Layers and Voices
There are 4 “Layers” and 2 “Voices” available in Finale, giving you a theoretical total of 8 independent lines of music that can appear in any measure of music. Learn how they function, how to navigate between them and how to use them in Speedy Entry.
Lesson 3: Tuplets
This is a deeper dive into creating tuplets in Speedy Entry. Understand how Finale defines tuplets by default when launched from Speedy Entry, and learn how to create more complex rhythms within tuplets — and even tuplets within tuplets. Finally, there’s a discussion about tuplets in compound meters!
Lesson 4: Intermediate Speedy Entry
This is an exhaustive look at manipulating entries inside the Speedy Entry frame. Covered in this video is Moving, adding, deleting and hiding notes and rests, as well as modifying ties, accidentals, courtesy accidentals, enharmonics, stems and beams.
Lesson 5: Advanced Speedy Entry
Un-slashed grace notes, restoring defaults for ties, stems and beams and all of the other settings and options in the Speedy menu.
Lesson 6: Percussion
Percussion entry in Speedy Entry is rather novel using a MIDI keyboard as long as you know where each sound is on the keyboard. I’ll show you a couple of tricks for figuring that out if you need to. Entering notes without a MIDI keyboard becomes a little trickier in Speedy Entry. It works really well for one-line parts that only have one or two sounds in the Percussion Layout, but for more complex Layouts with many sounds, (like a drum set), it becomes a little trickier. This video will explore all of these scenarios so you can become more comfortable entering percussion in Speedy Entry.
Listen to the podcast episode
On the Scoring Notes podcast, David MacDonald and Philip Rothman talk with Jason Loffredo about preparing music for the world of musical theatre and his Conquering Finale video tutorial series, which can help you better master that sophisticated software, whether you’re a new or long-time user. Listen now:
