9.11.2006

A Puzzle for Finale geeks

I assigned the second movement to Francis Poulenc's Mouvement Perpétual to my Computer and Music students last week. The piece is simple for the most part until you get to the last measure:


I knew this was going to be trouble, but I also knew that nothing is impossible with Finale, (I wouldn't make that claim with Sibelius). Some of the difficulties were foreseen, such as the missing 32nd note, but there were some other surprising complications. For instance, the glissando word by itself does not come standard in smart shapes, and the cross-staved notes were a little tricky. But I got it, in under an hour. Test your chops, see how fast you can do it... Or just follow the instructions below:


1. Speedy Entry:
Speedy entry menu: check for extra notes to off
top staff 32 note D, 32nd note D octave up, dotted eighth rest (hidden), another 32nd note (high D) double dotted eighth rest
hide the dotted eighth rest (H), flip the high D (L)
bottom staff octave up, quarter, quarter, 32nd rest, double dotted eighth rest, quarter rest
2. Note Mover
note mover menu, choose "cross staff"
throw the a-flat down to the bottom staff
3. Special Tools -
reverse stem: flip the note on its stem in the second group of 32nds
beam angle: tweak the beams on both 32nd note sets
note shape: choose 202 for the note shape on the second 32nd note to hide it.
custom stem: choose 66 to hide the stem
4. Clef tool
double click in the bottom staff
choose create movable mid-measure clef
5. Smart Tools
option click the custom smart tool
duplicate the glissando with the wavy line
edit your duplicate
in the "Line Style" "Character" box, delete the tilda (~)
draw the glissando and tweak the placement
add the 8va's
6. add the breath marks using the Articulation tool (#36)
7. Tweak the spacing using Speedy entry and/or the Measure tool

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I am sorry to say that. But this is awfully hard. They way that you have it it is even hard to recognize to determine the measure meter which is 4/4!!!

mouvements perpétuels
You could enter it like this much faster!

http://www.sheetmusicplus.com/store/smp_inside.html?item=3708762&cart=339849665820720304&page=02

Anonymous said...
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