Tutorial: Finale Playback

Finale is located in the "Audio & MIDI" (orange) folder on the dock

This tutorial will explore the three different options that you have to playback sound from Finale.

Before continuing on, please check your Audio MIDI Setup to make sure that it is set up correctly.

1. Finale Internal Playback: (Beginner) This is the easiest way to set up Finale Playback, but it tends to have less than desirable instrument sounds.
1. From the "MIDI" menu on the toolbar at the top of the screen, select "MIDI Setup..."
2. Under the "Input Device" column, select "Studio 900". You can leave the "Output Device" as none. Press OK.




3. Select "MIDI Thru..." from the "MIDI" menu on the toolbar.
4. Make sure it is checked and looks like the following:
   
   
   
   Then click OK
5. Under "MIDI", move your mouse over "Internal Playback Speaker". "SmartMusic SoftSynth Playback" should be checked.




6. Whatever the name of your staff is, Finale will automatically allocate the correct instrument during playback.
   EX: If you have piano, violin and clarinet staffs, Finale will allocate each staff to sound as the appropriate instrument.


2. Kurweil K2500 Sampler: (Moderate) This is same way that the earlier version of finale was setup in the music technology lab.
1. Select "MIDI Setup..." from the "MIDI" menu in the toolbar.
2. In the "Output Device" column, in the first row (Finale Channel 1-16), click on the drop down menu and select K2500. Click OK.
3. In the "MIDI" menu, turn off "Internal Speaker Playback".
   
   
   
   
4. Assign instruments / sounds.
   1. If you do not see your instrument list window when you open Finale, select 'instrument list' from the Window menu.
      
      
      
      
   2. Listed here are all the instruments that you have selected for your piece.
   3. The first column lists the staff titles according to your instrumentation selection from the setup wizard.
   4. Play/Solo
      • The second column, labeled 'P,' stands for play. If you uncheck the green square, that instrument/staff will not play.
      • The third column, labeled 'S', stands for solo. If you click in one of these boxes, a yellow circle will appear meaning only that instrument/stave will be played.
   5. Listed under the instrument column are the categories of the instruments you have selected (as well as the new instrument and No instrument options).
      • Recall how to change channels and instrument sample using the K2500.
      • MAKE SURE YOU ARE ON THE CORRECT CORRESPONDING CHANNEL. If you're listening to channel 1 and want to change it, make sure you are changing channel 1 and not another channel.
      • Change the numbers under the channel column appropriately. Associate a different type of instrument with a different channel to give it a different sound.
        
        
        
        
   6. Choosing a sound
      • Let's say you no longer want your piano to sound as a piano but a string section. Find a string option on the K2500: eg 114 Silk Strings.
      • Double click the empty square under the "B" column in the instrument list window.
        (Unfortunately, the labels on the instruments in the 'GM' column are not correct and the corresponding numbers in the 'prog' column are incorrect as well. They are 1 off.)
      • In the "Instrument Definition" window, click on the drop down menu next to "Patch". Select "Bank Select 0, Program Change".
      • Under "Bank Select 0" you would enter a "1" (or whatever number was the hundred's digit).
      • Under "Program" enter "15" (remember they are 1 off)
      • Click OK. The offset is automatically figured in. The number you now see under "Program Change" will be 1 higher than the instrument you want - don't be alarmed. You should be all set now. Click OK again. The new sound doesn't take effect until the next time you play your piece using the playback controls.
      • You can change around the sounds using the K2500 but as soon as you hit the playback button, the sound will resort back to the original one you programmed in.
5. Now if you press "Stop" then "Play" in the "playback controls", all the instruments will reset on the K2500 to what you've programed them to be.


3. GPO Studio: (Advanced) This is most complicated way to get playback from Finale, but it sounds the best.
1. If Finale is already open, quit out of it.
2. Open "GPO Studio" located in the "Audio & MIDI" folder on the dock. This may take a few moments to load so please be patient.
3. Once "GPO Studio" has been launched, open Finale.
4. If the following window appears, do not panic, simply press ok and continue on with the tutorial





5. If the "Setup Wizard" appeared, then please skip to the next step.
   If it did not, please note that Finale is still open. You can tell it is open if there is a small black triangle beneath the blue "F" on the dock. Click on that "F" and you'll notice that it says "Finale 2004" in the upper left corner.
6. In the "MIDI" menu, select "MIDI Setup..."
7. If "none" is listed in the "Output Device" column, then click in the first row and select "GPO Studio: 1". In the cell beneath that, select "GPO Studio: 2", etc...
8. If "GPO Studio: 1" appears italicized in the "Output Device" column, simply click on each cell and select the unitalicized option. Do this for each cell beneath the "Output Device" column.





9. Under the "MIDI" menu, be sure that "Internal Speaker Playback" is OFF.





10. If you have not opened a document or started a new one yet, you can do so now. You can create a new document using the "Setup Wizard" by clicking on the "File" menu, New > Document with Setup Wizard, or by holding down the "apple" key (located on each side of the spacebar) and pressing "N".



At this point it is suggested that you read the "Garritan Personal Orchestra and GPO Studio" tutorial to become familiar with how that program works.



11. Open the "Instrument List" from the "Window" menu. Click in the top box under the "B" column. In our example, this happens to be a piano, but it will depend on how your score is setup.
12. Notice the channel number directly beneath the instrument name. "Channel 1" is paired with "GPO Studio: 1-1". If you had a second instrument in your score, that would be on "Channel 2" which is paired with "GPO Studio: 1-2", and so on.
    
    
    
    NOTE: Only the first 8 channels of each Studio work (Channels 1-8, 17-24, 33-40, 49-56) because there are only 8 cells per "GPO Studio Player". If you have more than 8 instruments, then you will have to open "Player 2" in "GPO Studio" and then select "GPO Studio: 2-1" which will then show up as "Channel 17".
13. In the case of our example, where our first instrument is a piano, you would load a "Steinway Piano" (or whatever type of piano you chose) into the first cell of "Player 1".
14. When you have multiple instruments, be aware that you can adjust the individual volumes in order to obtain the desired mix.
15. Saving: Note that you need to save your "Player" settings as a ".gpo" file as well as your Finale document. Be sure to save them in the same place so that you don't loose them. If you do not save your "Player" settings, you'll have to reload all the instruments next time you'd like to play the piece through GPO Studio.







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