The switch from vienna instruments to Synchron

[Music Paul]

The switch from Finale to Dorico 5 pro and Vl series to Synchron-ized is a heavy burden for me.
What strikes me is that a lot is explained how good and the many possibilities Synchron has.
But how to set the keyswitches step by step is not discussed.
I am an old finale / VI user, that worked fine for me, now switched to dorico 5 pro and Synchron player
a lot of steps I have to make to get the orchestra to play different articulations.
Maybe I'm missing something simple. Who has a step by step tip with a simple music example. ?
Or is sibelius a better choice?

[mducharme]

A lot of steps? You add the symbols to the music and they play. You write pizz. you hear pizz., you write col legno, you hear col legno, etc.

You don't have to trigger any keyswitches manually, it's all automatic.

The steps are, you use the Dorico Wizard in the Vienna Assistant and save your playback template. Then go into your file in Dorico and apply the VSL playback template in the play menu (the one you just created in the Dorico wizard). Hit play and you hear it play back with the techniques you have assigned in the score.

[Music Paul]

@mducharme said:

A lot of steps? You add the symbols to the music and they play. You write pizz. you hear pizz., you write col legno, you hear col legno, etc.

You don't have to trigger any keyswitches manually, it's all automatic.

The steps are, you use the Dorico Wizard in the Vienna Assistant and save your playback template. Then go into your file in Dorico and apply the VSL playback template in the play menu (the one you just created in the Dorico wizard). Hit play and you hear it play back with the techniques you have assigned in the score.

Thanks for your advice

[RaPaSa]

Maybe this tutorial can also help you when you want to stick to key switches (glissando example):

[mducharme]

Yeah you *can* use MIDI trigger regions to trigger keyswitches manually, but it is generally not necessary and makes it less user friendly (who wants to have to remember keyswitches when you can use a word like "slow octave gliss." instead?). The only reason that example uses the keyswitches to trigger the glissandi is that the default map doesn't give you a way to trigger those, and keyswitches gives you a way to do this without editing the map. But in this case, what I would do is make a duplicate copy of the VSL map with my initials in front, add my custom techniques to that map, and use it instead of the regular VSL one. Then I can actually write "slow octave gliss" instead of having to memorize keyswitches or have a text file open that shows me what keyswitches are there.

[DirkMM]

@mducharme said:

Yeah you *can* use MIDI trigger regions to trigger keyswitches manually, but it is generally not necessary and makes it less user friendly (who wants to have to remember keyswitches when you can use a word like "slow octave gliss." instead?). The only reason that example uses the keyswitches to trigger the glissandi is that the default map doesn't give you a way to trigger those, and keyswitches gives you a way to do this without editing the map. But in this case, what I would do is make a duplicate copy of the VSL map with my initials in front, add my custom techniques to that map, and use it instead of the regular VSL one. Then I can actually write "slow octave gliss" instead of having to memorize keyswitches or have a text file open that shows me what keyswitches are there.

My situation is somewhat comparable to Music Paul's, but I wanna make the switch from Cubase Pro to Dorico, using Vienna Synchron instruments. I'm just starting, experiencing a lot of difficulties. As far as now, I get the sound to respond to dynamic marks and articulations, but there are severe differences in playing volume, even with the simplest score. Example Using Duality Strings Violins 1, I write quarter notes in legato (a slur in the score) and then eighth notes alternating with eighth rests. In the Synchron Player, I see the setting move from Perf. legato/normal, to Short nits/Detache. The last ones are incredibly louder than the legato, while when playing such a score every musician would stay in the same volume range, like keep everything in mf instead of going from p to ff (that's how much the difference is. I wonder what the reason could be and, more important, how can i avoid this unwanted effect. Any suggestions?

[DirkMM]

@mducharme said:

A lot of steps? You add the symbols to the music and they play. You write pizz. you hear pizz., you write col legno, you hear col legno, etc.

You don't have to trigger any keyswitches manually, it's all automatic.

The steps are, you use the Dorico Wizard in the Vienna Assistant and save your playback template. Then go into your file in Dorico and apply the VSL playback template in the play menu (the one you just created in the Dorico wizard). Hit play and you hear it play back with the techniques you have assigned in the score.

My situation is somewhat comparable to Paul, but I come from Cubase Pro. Just started Dorico. As far as now, I succeed using the VSL expression map for Duality strings Violin 1. But I experience a very big unnatural difference in playing volume between long notes and legato on the one hand and short notes on the other hand. A simple score with legato quarter notes and then eight notes with eight rests between them would be played at a pretty uniform volume. Instead what I here is that the short notes are in ff and the rest in p. Any suggestions what I can do to level this?

[mducharme]

@DirkMM Can you upload a simple Dorico file that shows this problem and I'll have a look? I have Duality Strings too, so I should be able to open it.

[DirkMM]

Download "Demo scales.rar"

@mducharme said:

@DirkMM Can you upload a simple Dorico file that shows this problem and I'll have a look? I have Duality Strings too, so I should be able to open it.

Thanks for your fast reply, mducharme. This is a simple demo that I quickly made for you. Duality Strings Violin 1 are used. I added a few dynamics in the score, just to make clear what works, and in what way. Almost nothing sounds like I would play it, when I had this score before me. This is so confusing to me. I hope you can clear the fog. ☺

[mducharme]

@DirkMM I had a look and the problem is caused by the fact that you are for some reason overriding the velocity for every single note to the maximum value of 127. Here I've selected the first note and gone into the properties panel where you can see the override:

It's unusual to override the velocity like this on all notes. You can clear it from all the notes at once by selecting the whole lot and going into the Play menu and choosing "Reset Playback Overrides" near the bottom. I'm not entirely sure why you did this to begin with though.

[DirkMM]

@mducharme said:

@DirkMM I had a look and the problem is caused by the fact that you are for some reason overriding the velocity for every single note to the maximum value of 127. Here I've selected the first note and gone into the properties panel where you can see the override:

It's unusual to override the velocity like this on all notes. You can clear it from all the notes at once by selecting the whole lot and going into the Play menu and choosing "Reset Playback Overrides" near the bottom. I'm not entirely sure why you did this to begin with though.

I overrode the velocities in the process of trying out everything possible, just to see where it would bring me. And afterwards, I forgot about this. ☺ But, apart from that, the issues are there indeed. I created a new Dorico Project, to illustrate everything. And I just launched a new topic about this, called:

Inconsistencies in the Expression Maps (VSL in Dorico Pro 5)

I hope you'll find the time to check it out. I guess there's sill >99% of Dorico, that I still need to learn, and of manipulating VSL Expression Maps as well. But the issues that I show are eminent and can't be denied, I guess...