# R.I.P. Sibelius 1993-2012?



## ScoringFilm

On July 2, 2012, Avid Technology announced it is divesting its consumer businesses and streamlining operations. The company will focus on its Media Enterprise and Post & Professional division. Avid will continue to develop and sell their Pro Tools® line of software and hardware, as well as some associated I/O devices such as Mbox and Fast Track.

The company’s “facility footprint” is also being reduced. The Sibelius headquarters in the UK will be closed.

As part of the restructuring, Avid will reduce the number of its permanent employees base by approximately 20%. As part of the transactions, certain employees of Avid will transfer to each acquiring company.

The company’s consumer audio products are being sold to inMusic, the parent company of Akai Professional, Alesis and Numark.

On December 12, 2011, one employee of Avid wrote an anonymous review on the website Glass Door prophetically entitled “Stay Away and / or Plan Your Exit Strategy“:

“To the Board of Directors: employees assume you are looking to dissolve Avid and sell the company off in bits and pieces. It’s been rumored for years, it’s the buzz throughout the industry right now thanks to the mess you’ve allowed to happen internally…”

This is a sad day for the excellent team of employees at Sibelius, many of whom have been with the company since it was founded in 1993 by Ben and Jonathan Finn.

The implications of how this will ultimately affect these employees and also end users of Sibelius are not yet clear.

Sibelius was purchased by Avid in 2006 for $23m cash (£12.2m).

Taken from:

http://www.rpmseattle.com/of_note/sibel ... usinesses/


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## jamwerks

*Re: Sibelius UK to close*

So is Sibelius considered part of the "consumer business" by Avid, and thus being sold to InMusic? Not at all clear to me by the statement.

This whole Avid streamlining is bad news for pro audio. :shock:


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## windshore

It's incredible that the stock holders or board doesn't replace all the senior management. They've been in desperate shape for a long time and all these moves make it clear that they are just trying to avoid bankruptcy. Unlike Logic where the score editor is deeply integrated into the DAW, PT never really tried to appeal to musicians who read music. It was made for engineers who used to use tape decks. 

The strategy for Sib is a mess. The upgrade to 7 cost them millions and virtually nobody likes it. Spreabury who's in charge is insular and defensive about what he's done to the program and a lot of the strategy for Sib has been the consumer market. It really wouldn't be surprising if Avid sells Sib, then maybe licenses a proprietary version to include with PT. 

Thanks for posting. This is not good for the industry at least in the short-term.

What a mess.


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## BopEuph

I know Finale users are worried, since Sibelius used to be MakeMusic's biggest driving factor towards improvement. Though, I'm hopeful that maybe they'll slow down annual updates and actually work on bugs over the years instead.


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## synergy543

*Re: Sibelius UK to close*

The title of this thread is a bit misleading as it seems the situation is a bit more dire than just an office closing. The situation should draw the concerned attention of all Sibelius users. The following quote by Derek Williams posted on rpm music sums up the extremely sad state of the situation (also somewhat of a euphamism as this may be more akin to an obituary for Sibelius since traditionally software products don't survive in a healthy state when bounced from company to company.)

Sibelius 
RIP 1993-2012?

----------------------------------------

Derek Williams on 07/06/2012 at 4:40 pm said:

Sibelius UK is the only office left on planet Earth. They just sacked the development team. Sibelius used to be active in US, Japan and Australia in addition to its UK home. Since the takeover by Avid, these offices have one by one closed, and the staff decimated. Now they have knocked off the last post. It’s clear they intend to retire the product. Once again I will be faced with learning yet another application, or keeping a fourth computer just to keep Sibelius projects alive.

This is a replay of old history, The application Composers’ Mosaic was left to die on the roadside by its progenitors, Mark of the Unicorn, leaving me in the lurch with hundreds of scores that no longer work in the current Apple flagship OS X. Likewise the Opcode company, deliberately assassinated by its purchasers, Gibson Guitars, and the roadkill was never taken over and so all those libraries and projects now lie fallow unless one is prepared to do what I was forced to, keep three computers with different OS for every time one needs to revisit those commissions. In neither case did the companies admit they were retiring their own products.

As for what Avid says, that public posturing is entirely to be expected. I clearly recall a certain US president saying “read my lips, no new taxes”.
I can only hope that Avid opt for a public sale, or separate a float for a standalone Sibelius corp so a consortium of investors with conscience and imagination can wrest it loose from them.

And as for Avid optimising their resources, how optimal is CEO Gary Greenfield’s salary increase from $1.2 million in 2009 to a staggering $4.8 million in 2011? Paying one man an extra $3.6 million to preside over the destruction of a conspicuously successful UK enterprise, with all the human costs inflicted upon its unquestionably loyal employees is beyond sickening. If Mr Greenfield could only learn to live within his means, that might start setting a better example to others struggling to live within theirs.


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## jamwerks

*Re: Sibelius UK to close*

Seems Sibelius is a flourishing sw with around or over 50% of the notation market.

To an investor, Sibelius is probaly worth more now, than the $23m that Avid paid a few years back. If Avid has laid off all the developers, seems obvious that they'll be selling. But with such a hugh user base, I can't imagine a fate similar to that of Mark of the Unicorn. Probably just a few-month pause in development until a new buyer comes along. And he would probably want the old development team back.

Feature wise, Sibelius is probably a couple of years "ahead" of Finale (Sibelius is already 64 bit, magnetic layout, etc) anyway. So it should be able to survive a short pause.

Incidentally, Finale has recently declared that they won't be putting out a new version this summer (as they usually did). So nothing new coming from them in the near future either. IMO Finale is probably being rewritten for 64 bit.


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## ScoringFilm

*Re: Sibelius UK to close*



synergy543 @ 7/7/2012 said:


> The title of this thread is a bit misleading


Re-named to reflect the more serious nature of the issue!



windshore @ 7/7/2012 said:


> The upgrade to 7 cost them millions and virtually nobody likes it. Spreabury who's in charge is insular and defensive about what he's done to the program.
> What a mess.


Sort of agreed; I don't like it, however I'm sure many do!

Justin


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## synergy543

*Re: Sibelius UK to close*

Jamwerks, let's hope you're right. However months of downtime in software are like dog years (they take their toll rapidly) and Sibelius 7 is in the unfortunate situation of having already taken a few steps backwards recently. The closing of the very last Sibelius office in existence and firing the existing staff doesn't bode well for the future of the software regardless of how its resurrection may be attempted. The history of the outcome of software that has been down this path doesn't bode well for Sibelius. Can you name one piece of software that survived, in more than a lifeless form, after several corporate hacky sack games?

Another post by Derek Williams on the Sibelius forum sums this up more elegantly than I ever could:
---------------------
Posted by Derek Williams - 06 Jul 01:51
I wrote a letter to Gary Greenfield ([email protected]), the CEO apparently responsible for handing down this decision and received a quick response pledging support for Sibelius, however, it's hard to see how sacking the development staff and closing the development office can in any way substantiate this. I think perhaps a few people have written to him about this by now. 

It's reductio ad absurdum logic: reduce staff by 10% creates 10% efficiency saving, so they reason that sacking 100% of staff ispo facto creates 100% efficiency. Reminds me of the tongue-in-cheek Infinite Undo description in the Sibelius manual, if you go beyond the maximum level, "you can even Undo back to before you bought Sibelius". 

Not understanding the humour, it seems Avid took this literally, and are literally Undoing Sibelius.

---------------------


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## ScoringFilm

One long term Sibelius team member said “this is heartbreaking, it took us 15 years to build this business and it took Avid 15 months to wreck it.”

http://www.pro-tools-expert.com/home-pa ... ffice.html

More news:

http://www.artsjournal.com/slippeddisc/2012/07/breaking-disaster-sibelius-to-shut-down.html (http://www.artsjournal.com/slippeddisc/ ... -down.html)


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## dcoscina

Like George Kennedy said in the movie Thunderbolt and Lightfoot: "fuk a duck".


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## StrangeCat

Avid trying to survive in this crazy world. Get rid of Sibelius is probably not one of the survival tactics.

God Sibelius 7 drives me absolutely crazy! I will do a few classical piano pieces in it maybe a quartet but that's about it. 
Paper on piano nice nice and easy, no fuss, written in stone the moment the pen it's the page.

Still Sibelius is very useful I mean extremely useful. I doubt it's going to completely go away.
I mean those of us who have Sibelius 7 and use it will still use it.


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## José Herring

It's sad what is happening to professional music applications. I'm really worried.


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## BopEuph

Well, as long as there is a need for sheet music (which is still a lucrative business, from what I see), then there will always be notation programs.

Worse comes to worse, we can all go back to old school engraving. 

I am still curious to see how this will affect notation programs all around.


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## rJames

josejherring @ Sat Jul 07 said:


> It's sad what is happening to professional music applications. I'm really worried.



Yes. It seems that money is the sole motivator in today's world.

I get that public companies serve their shareholders. But it is sad that in order to grow a stock value every company has to show improved profit.

If you can't increase sales, you have to cut costs. Usually at the expense of the rank and file workers.

And we wonder why there is a world-wide financial crisis. The good news is that when the third world join the crisis, there will be no where to outsource jobs to.


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## José Herring

Agreed. 

It's a shame. There's very little pride in what gets done and the people running these companies have no personal connection with the products they make.

One wonders why a company like Avid would buy Sibelius in the first place. I doubt the CEO of Avid knows how to write and read music. So its just a business decision for them. No personal stake in it.


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## Nick Batzdorf

The other side to this is that it's become increasingly difficult for larger software companies - like 50+ employees - to survive independently in our industry. Emagic, Steinberg, Sonar, Sibelius...they all needed to be sold. At least that's what it looks like to me.

Avid probably bought Sibelius for the same reason they bought M-Audio: to have stuff to sell to schools.

Long live music education! That and a lot of things didn't work out for Avid, but it's the only hope for civilization, i'nit.


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## kdm

*Re: Sibelius UK to close*



jamwerks @ Sat Jul 07 said:


> To an investor, Sibelius is probaly worth more now, than the $23m that Avid paid a few years back. If Avid has laid off all the developers, seems obvious that they'll be selling.



I could be wrong, but I seriously doubt Sibelius will be sold as a company and product line if they laid off the developers. It's worthless without the developers to continue it as it was, and bringing new devs up to speed is very costly and time-consuming. The only other alternative is that Avid simply bought it for the base code and is moving what development they need to Kiev where most of the ProTools/software development is handled. Either way, it does look like the end of the line for Sibelius and pro notation. 

The Sibelius integration in ProTools has had serious bugs since day 1, and not one fix or addition since then. I'm not holding my breath that Avid will even continue to offer notation in ProTools at all.

Digidesign was better off without Avid, not to mention Sibelius and Wizoo. Avid is single handedly dismantling it's own product line. At this rate they'll have the most successful DAW in the industry, ProTools, in the trash bin inside of 2 years. 

The top level management needs a swift kick out the door with no severance.


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## Synesthesia

josejherring @ Sat Jul 07 said:


> It's sad what is happening to professional music applications. I'm really worried.



+1

This is exactly how I am feeling.


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## noiseboyuk

I am pretty bewlidered by what is going on at Avid. Their statement says that they are selling the consumer divisions. The only conclusion is that therefore they want to focus on their professional ones. Yet Sibelius is a professional product. Can anyone take a stab at explaining this from Avid's perspective? Is the logic that Sibelius is now as mature as it can ever be so it'll just keep raking in profits for them with no further development work? I'm struggling to come up with another explanation.


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## FriFlo

They already implemented some of sibelius engine into protools, so now they have sucked all out of the program they needed? I am also really worried, as I love Sibelius ...


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## BopEuph

Here's a theory:

All of the local band and orchestra stores in Florida that I've visited cater more to the school musician than they do the professional. Most of the instruments are student grade or entry-level pro, the repair guys are usually mediocre at best, and the music is usually technique books or simple solos.

The reason this is the case, and why I have to search far and wide for a good brass repairman, a good luthier, and order scores online, is because the majority of income in this market is in grade schools. I use Finale, and much of the development of Finale comes from what schools need (SmartMusic, assignment exercises, etc.). Even though a large chunk of pro composers, orchestrators and arrangers, and copyists use Sibelius, most of the user base for such a product comes from the "Music Production" or "MIDI" classes at the local college or high school of the arts.

I may be wrong on the theory, but I do know that for every one of me, who uses Finale to keep food in my pantry, there's a hundred other musicians in town that have it on their computer, and don't use it because "Finale/Sibelius doesn't really know notation, and it's better to do with pen and paper." And 99% of the time I meet someone that says they use Finale, I realize within the first few sentences of talking to them about it, they really don't know how to even create a quality-looking scale sheet.

This is how I think Avid could see Sibelius as a consumer product rather than a professional one.


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## Robin

I'm massively worried about the development at Avid considering that Sibelius is my main work tool.

Since Avid bought the software, there have been a few changes to the software and its periphery that have been quite irritating and annoying.

I remember how the pricey phone support that has been introduced since Avid took over has annnoyed many users.

Also, I'm under the impression that the version transition from Sib6 to Sib7 was highly influenced by Avid wanting the Software to become more "consumer friendly" (e.g. the ribbon with its slightly infantile pictures). I can see how that turned off many pro users and while I got used to the ribbon quite quickly, I can also understand that this change has annoyed many longtime pro users.

Seeing the UK office close is very worrying as I always enjoyed seeing all that devotion and passion the team has put into this Software.

I want to especially mention Daniel Spreadbury here as he has been mentioned above already who in my opinion was doing (and still does) a fantastic job over at the Sibelius forum, being patient even with the noobiest questions. Even if some people might not be happy with the decisions he (?) took for Sibelius, he has been there for a long time and the impression that you get from windshore's post above that he's responsible for developing the software into the wrong direction is in my opinion very unfair.

Robin


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## rayinstirling

Nick Batzdorf @ Sat Jul 07 said:


> Long live music education! That and a lot of things didn't work out for Avid, but it's the only hope for civilization, i'nit.



I fear you're right Nick,
our world is full wannabes being taught by never could be's who actually refer to teaching as being in the "music business". Not a means to an end but actually, THE END.
Thank goodness for "day jobs"


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## BopEuph

rayinstirling @ Sun Jul 08 said:


> ,
> our world is full wannabes being taught by never could be's who actually refer to teaching as being in the "music business". Not a means to an end but actually, THE END.
> Thank goodness for "day jobs"



There's this bassist here in town that used to be the busiest bassist in NYC in the 50s, mainly because he was one of the few that actually learned the P-Bass when it came out. When we first met, he said "so, Nick, do you play well?"

I said "yeah, I got my degree in jazz studies at UNF."

His reply was "don't give me that ****, can you PLAY!"

When we talked about my studies, this is the advice he gave me:

"Take music professors' lessons with a grain of salt. Most of them are musicians who couldn't get a gig."


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## BopEuph

I guess should amend to that that I have a great respect for education. I use everything college gave me. Some of the guys that went to my school, I'm still amazed that they don't know things that we learned in, say, MIDI class...especially since the knowledge from that single semester course ended up paying my way through college, and is paying my rent during the summer when the live music scene dies like it does in Florida.

I have learned a lot of things about education, though:

ANYBODY can get that piece of paper. Some professors with a doctorate in music education still seemed to be clueless musically.

Some of the best musicians I've met never went to college. And some of the other great musicians did. Depends on your personal needs.

I learned more in the first year out of college than I did in the years IN college. I still think the foundation I was given in college was a major catalyst for that learning, though.

Some music professors are great musicians, like Pat Metheny (not teaching anymore, I think), Janos Starker (retired), Ed Calle (heard he's not the best teacher, though), Wynton Marsalis, etc. But these guys are still not the norm in the music education world.

If you want to take this form of education seriously, you have to go the extra mile.

I guess I'm a strange one, though; I'm a music scholar who doesn't put too much faith in the piece of paper I have, but the learning and work I put into it. It's what you learn, not the certificates you're given, especially in the music business.


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## ScoringFilm

I sent a very direct email to the CEO of Avid (Gary Greenfield) and, to be fair to him, this was his reply:



> I appreciate reaching out and sharing your thoughts. Our Professional Audio Products & Solutions team has been carefully listening to feedback in the Sibelius community. In fact, we’ve noticed, many questions about Finsbury Park and how that impacts the Sibelius product family. Our VP of Audio Products & Solutions, Martin Kloiber, has begun an outreach to the Sibelius community that we’re looking forward to continuing for quite some time. Martin’s note is posted on our Avid Inside Out blog which you can read, and we hope you add your feedback to:
> 
> http://community.avid.com/blogs/avid/ar ... unity.aspx
> 
> Thanks for being such a passionate Sibelius customer.
> 
> Gary



Please add your opinions to the above blog and hopefully stave-off (forgive the pun) the inevitable.

Justin


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## BopEuph

This is what I get when clicking the link:

Server Error in '/' Application.
The resource cannot be found.
Description: HTTP 404. The resource you are looking for (or one of its dependencies) could have been removed, had its name changed, or is temporarily unavailable. Please review the following URL and make sure that it is spelled correctly.

Requested URL: /blogs/avid/archive/2012/07/07/sibelius-community.aspx.

Version Information: Microsoft .NET Framework Version:2.0.50727.4223; ASP.NET Version:2.0.50727.4223


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## ScoringFilm

Link now corrected (it had a dot too many!)


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## BopEuph

Ah, I thought it was one of the backslashes. Working now.


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## StrangeCat

Loaded up Sibelius 7 for the @##$ of it and I forgot how much I can't stand the interface!

I think the best one was Sibelius 3.1.1 I also happen to be one of the very first purchasers of Sibelius. 

Was a funny reaction when you upgraded on the phone.


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## synergy543

I thought this comment by Derek Williams on the AVID Feedback page was so apt that it should be reposted here. Please read it carefully as his advice and warning should be of utmost concern to all Sibelius users:

Derek Williams
Collapse
It is not me the consumer, but the development team that has made Sibelius great. Its success among the great composers of Hollywood, theatre, symphony and pop as the world's most intuitive and popular scorewriter results from their unequivocal commitment and unique talent. Shutting down the nerve centre of this confluence of genetic brilliance is an act of such banality, expedience, corporate vandalism and rank stupidity, that by this act, Avid has proven itself unworthy to marshal such a resource into the future.

While the board of Avid has been busy shutting down Sibelius, with all that connotes for the staff in human terms, its CEO has meantime quadrupled his salary without a scintilla of prudence or frugality. There is only one conclusion to be drawn. This board are nothing but corporate raiders, feathering their own pockets while presiding over the destruction of one of the greatest software accomplishments the world has ever known. Their blandishments and appeasements are to be entirely disbelieved, like the mendacious Bush's notorious "read my lips, no new taxes".

Before Avid got hold of it in 2006, Sibelius had won the Queens Innovation Award; its founders, the Finn twins both received MBE for their achievement. Along with television, penicillin, tarmacadam, anaesthesia, the railway engine, and Alan Turing's computer - the very machine that it lives on, Sibelius is a uniquely British creation. It cannot be transplanted in Kiev or Asia, with all its development team pensioned off. Even if retained, staff clearly are not going to uproot themselves with all the family commitments they surely will have.

When you consider that this brilliant and dedicated team have been told their place of employment is being shut down, what else have they to do but immediately begin seeking employment elsewhere? Such talented people will obviously find alternative employment in a heartbeat, and maybe they already have for all I know. Therefore, even if Avid now relent, this shocking decision whose effects have barely begun to be realised by our vast, worldwide community, has proven to us "by their deeds shall ye know them".

Make no mistake: under Avid, Sibelius is doomed. The only viable outcome will be a sale of the asset while it still has value. As the world's best selling scorewriter, Sibelius may well be a cash cow for Avid right now, but once the development team have departed, it will implode, suffering the fate of its forebears, MOTU Composers Mosaic, Encore and Opcode Vision.

I therefore propose that pressure on Avid should now focus solely on persuading them to sell this enterprise. It will be attractive to buyers with vision and a conscience, and it can be a tax write-down for Avid. No-one can retain confidence in the Avid company that through bylaw, has progressively insulated itself from its shareholders, repeatedly posted losses, all the while quadrupling the salary of its top CEO to $4.8 million per annum. People like this are not members of the known universe. They surround themselves with obsequious yes men, and have no understanding of their staff as human beings. To such executives, people are mere servants, machines to be poked and prodded, then discarded just as soon as they can be replaced with slave labour offshore.

Profit is a perfectly acceptable motivation for any business, but profit without vision is a Highway to Hell. That's where Avid is headed in my estimation, along with its reprehensible self serving policies and the directors who dreamed them up.

I encourage anyone with with the means, knowledge and power to move in the direction I advocate above, to act swiftly before Avid assassinate the goose that lays the golden egg. They are not to be trusted.


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## sbkp

synergy543 @ Sun Jul 08 said:


> I thought this comment by Derek Williams on the AVID Feedback page was so apt that it should be reposted here. Please read it carefully as his advice and warning should be of utmost concern to all Sibelius users



+1

So depressing. I'm glad now that I never upgraded to version 7. As long as I can last on version 6, I'll be fine. If I have to move to another program, I won't have wasted my time learning v7.


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## Daryl

StrangeCat @ Sun Jul 08 said:


> Loaded up Sibelius 7 for the @##$ of it and I forgot how much I can't stand the interface!
> 
> I think the best one was Sibelius 3.1.1 I also happen to be one of the very first purchasers of Sibelius.
> 
> Was a funny reaction when you upgraded on the phone.


I've been using Sibelius since 1993, so if it disappears, I'm sticking to what I already know. There is no reason for me to learn another program.

D


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## windshore

I've used Sibelius from a time when I could get email responses directly from one of the 2 twins who created it. The development team over the years solicited me for suggestions on what is now the 5th keypad pallet of jazz articulations. A great addition to the program. I've seen a lot of changes. (The early days of (Notator) Logic were similar.)

Even though the twins didn't have much experience with jazz, they wanted to make the best program for notation that they could. It took a long time, but they finally got that part of that program up to speed. Was it because they could make more money? I don't think so. I think they wanted to have a killer program that pro's could use.

Since selling the company, the same focus on user needs has been dramatically lacking. Even those who work for the company can see clearly where the lack of leadership comes from. Those in charge now seem much more focused on justifying their position rather than responding to users needs.

Sibelius, even before this announcement was in big trouble. Where it goes from here is at best troubling. It is a sad day.


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## nikolas

Ah... missed the link, posted above and made a thread about the reaction towards Avid. Perhaps it's worth mentioning it in a different thread alltogether?

http://www.vi-control.net/forum/viewtop ... 39#3637139


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## Tanuj Tiku

Perhaps, piracy is a big reason why a lot of these software companies are not able to survive. 

How many people actually buy Sibelius? 

There are pirated versions of almost every software available faster than your can probably even purchase the damn thing.

I am sure, piracy has a big enough hand in making lives difficult for these companies. 

However, Avid does stupid things all the time. So perhaps, they are an exception but I am sure piracy hurts them as well in the end.



Tanuj.


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## MacQ

I'm sure you're right Tanuj, but I would have thought the education market would be enough to prop up the operation, regardless of piracy. Perhaps I'm just naive.

~Stu


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## midphase

Hello Tanuj,

I don't think so. Put yourself in the shoes of your average bedroom producing dude. Those guys are not interested in notation, they want beatz! This is really not the type of product that they would want to own, they might BT'it just to check it out...but I'd be willing to bet that they launch it once, look in dismay at all the weird GUI, and never open it again.

No...instead I believe the problem is that Sibelius caters to a smaller and smaller niche group. Unfortunately also a group which is working less and less and hence earning less and less and having a hard time justifying the purchase of software.

For the most part, schools have kept some of these companies open for business...but keep in mind that schools usually get substantially discounted rates on software, and in some cases they might even keep a percentage of the sale to the student for themselves.


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## dcoscina

I remember using Passport Encore with Mastertracks Pro for film scoring in the '90s. I thought Encore was a very well laid out program but alas it fell into the hands of Gvox who did nothing with it. I then jumped aboard NOTION in 2005 and found it good for composing but not so good for printing. I'd stayed away from Finale based on all the feedback I'd been hearing. And while I had to work on it last year to help out with a quick copyist gig for a LA composer, I still dislike it. Notion was sold by Jack Jarrett in 2008 or 2009 and now it's a bastardized version of Logic and Sibelius. It alienated core Notion users who lauded Jarrett for making a program that integrated custom sound playback with notation. But after hiring new R&D and programming staff, the program is doomed. 

I started checking out Sibelius around 2006 and liked its interface a lot though I did wish it had the same assimilation in sound playback as Notion did. While Sibelius 7 took a step back in some ways, I do appreciate the built in library. In some cases, the articulations they sampled are pretty nice, especially the metered tremolo samples. But its still not anywhere close to Notion for the sheer number of art playback. I'd hoped Daniel and his team would cultivate this with subsequent versions but alas, it looks as though that might be a pipe dream. 

more and more, I find myself turning to Sibelius for music creation. I'm finding it harder to compose orchestral music inside DAWs as I find them restrictive. I can gradually chip away at a composition in Sibelius on my laptop at my cottage as easily as at my home studio. 

Personally, with memory becoming more affordable and storage devices bigger and faster, I'd hoped that one day we could have Sibelius rival things like VSL for realism and control of sounds without abandoning the way music is created in the realm of virtual manuscript. Like midphase said though, it's a declining art. 

I think all those professionals who litter Avid's Sibelius site with testimonials should revoke their endorsements. People like Pat Metheny, John Rutter, Stanley Clark, James Horner, John Powell and the list goes on and on.


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## Nick Batzdorf

MTP user here too, and it took me a few years dragging and screaming to switch to Logic in the early '90s! I used Encore a lot, and it had some really good things about it - very fast to import MIDI, and then it was easy to clean up what it came up with (for example, converting to enharmonic equivalents was just a key command - command/H I think!).

The problem was with basic things like cutting and pasting (which it could't do), and I remember jumping through insane hoops with a piano part that had cross-staff beaming. I had to draw the lines manually!

Opcode took it over at one point, when it became Encore, and programmer Don Williams was working on it as recently as a few years ago.


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## Nick Batzdorf

By the way, the notation in Logic is perfectly serviceable for the odd part here and there. It does a fantastic job of interpreting what you play in, and the note separation tool that divides parts into left and right hands (or whatever) is great.

***

Another side note: the first time I tried Finale, it took - I'm not kidding - 15 minutes to import an 8-bar MIDI file. That was in the time of the Mac II, so obviously it's come a long way since then! But it was written in an open key signature, and it was asking crazy questions along the way, bla bla bla.

Encore imported the damn file in seconds.


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## windshore

LOL!...It is amazing that after all these years, Logic is still one of the best programs for quick, readable interpretations of midi files.


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## BopEuph

midphase @ Mon Jul 09 said:


> I don't think so. Put yourself in the shoes of your average bedroom producing dude. Those guys are not interested in notation, they want beatz! This is really not the type of product that they would want to own, they might BT'it just to check it out...but I'd be willing to bet that they launch it once, look in dismay at all the weird GUI, and never open it again.


Pretty much dead on. The guys who end up pirating the software are probably not going to be using it professionally; therefor, if it's not a necessary buy for their profession (or whatever those beatz guys would like to fancy what they do as), and they don't pirate it, they simply wouldn't have bought it in the first place. 





dcoscina @ Mon Jul 09 said:


> I'd stayed away from Finale based on all the feedback I'd been hearing. And while I had to work on it last year to help out with a quick copyist gig for a LA composer, I still dislike it.


Funny, I feel the same about Sibelius. When I started getting into copywork back in around 2000, I heard that Sibelius had a much easier learning curve, and while Finale had more bugs, it was also much more customizable. A good thing, too, since my main client since that time has some VERY out 20th century style music. I did try Sibelius for a few hours around that time, and I was so lost as to even how to put in a quarter note without having to use the mouse. 

But it's still opinion. I'm sure if I had ten years' experience into Sibelius, I could use it with just as much efficiency as I do with Finale. The Sibelius vs. Finale argument is, to me, about the same as Mac vs. PC. It's whatever you're most comfortable on. And because of this, I'm just as disappointed in what's going on with Sibelius, as is most of the Finale users. Actually, we're discussing it on the Finale forum right now, too:

Sibelius UK closure is confirmed – killed by US owners on the 4th of July


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## dcoscina

No doubt Finale can do everything under the sun you want it to. I think for pure copying it still has the edge, especially for those whacked out 20th George Crumb styled scores. For composing/editing/notatiing Sibelius feels as intuitive as writing with pencil to paper. It's a very quick program.


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## jleckie

A dying software for a dying breed.


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## BopEuph

dcoscina @ Mon Jul 09 said:


> No doubt Finale can do everything under the sun you want it to. I think for pure copying it still has the edge, especially for those whacked out 20th George Crumb styled scores. For composing/editing/notatiing Sibelius feels as intuitive as writing with pencil to paper. It's a very quick program.



You're probably right. I remember how I was so lost going through Sibelius, and then when I heard the comparison of the two, I realized I was still in complex Finale mode, where Sibelius was very much simplified. 

Well, I WOULD say one of these days, I might give it another shot so I understand both programs, but it all seems moot now. I have debated on getting it just to do half of my work in it to understand both programs, but never did.

Around 2005, the Air Force Band in D.C. was looking for a copyist, and one of the requirements was "extensive knowledge in Finale, WORKING knowledge in Sibelius." That's why I looked at Sibelius. After I sent off my packet, the Air Force went on a hiring freeze, and they called me and told me when the freeze is lifted to just give them a call and they would pull my packet out of a file; that they would be saving it. When the freeze was lifted, this particular position no longer existed. Now staff arrangers have to know Finale as extensively as a copyist.


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## Daryl

Finale is certainly much better than Sibelius at strange and avante garde sorts of notation (but not as good as SCORE). However, when it comes to more traditional notation needs, Sibelius is just quicker to use, and gets a much better result in a lot less time. As in all things, it really depends what you need to do as to which program is better.

D


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## JT

I think this is very bad news for both Sibelius & Finale users. The competition made them each better.

_"Sibelius is just quicker to use, and gets a much better result in a lot less time."_

Not really. I learned Finale first and am much quicker with it than I am with Sibelius. I work with both programs, but ultimately it's the skill of the user which gets fast, accurate results.


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## BopEuph

JT @ Mon Jul 09 said:


> I work with both programs, but ultimately it's the skill of the user which gets fast, accurate results.


This. Last week, my trombone student called me up and asked me to bring a scale sheet to a lesson. I fired up Finale, and had scale sheet any publishing house would be proud to have under their roof, or at least looked like something I tore out of the Arban's book. And had it finished in less than five minutes. Measurements were on par, no collisions, and no mistakes. Though, I'm sure I freaked out my twelve year-old student by writing every scale out in two octaves. :shock: 

A Sibelius user would have to have just as many years experience in that program as I do in Finale to have a quality job in that amount of time. 

Actually, I'd like to see all the steps that would have to go through Sibelius to have this done, just to see how many more or less it would take. This would include key changes without cautionary key changes from the previous scale, final barlines at the end of every scale, no measure numbers on the left, no indent at the top staff system, and all fit on a single sheet of paper with no collisions. On Finale, at least, these are all default settings that would have to be changed if you don't have a preset library for making a scale sheet.

Now, this isn't a contest to see which program is better, but I really am curious as to what would go into Sibelius if this project were done in that program. I just remember being incredibly lost when trying to do anything in that program.


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## rgames

I wonder how much it has to do with the European economic problems - Sibelius always seemed to have a lot more European users vs. Finale who seemed to be more in the US. Also, I always got the impression that Finale did a better job marketing to the hobbyist and education users. Sad truth is that you can't create many music products that don't have at least some penetration in that market. So the combo of the two might have been the deciding factor for Avid.

Neither Sibelius nor Finale is really a "professional only" piece of software. Finale has added all the Garritan and sequencing crap the last several years instead of fixing bugs and doing other things to cater to their professional base.

Also, I started on Encore, too. I tried both Sibelius and Finale and found Finale easier to use. There really isn't much distinction between the two (that I can see, anyway).

I will say, though, that Finale has a painfully long development cycle. I upgraded from 2001 to 2007 and barely noticed a difference. Then I upgraded from 2008 to 2012 and, again, barely noticed a difference. The only major difference in 12 years of Finale use was the 2007 - 2008 change to linked parts. That was a real time-saver. Other than that, I must say the program is remarkably static. Well, the 2008 - 2012 changes did include the Garritan and sequencing crap, so I guess there were changes, but none that most professionals cared about.

rgames


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## BopEuph

rgames @ Mon Jul 09 said:


> Finale has added all the Garritan and sequencing crap the last several years instead of fixing bugs and doing other things to cater to their professional base.



Yeah, this was my big gripe. I stayed on 2005 up until a little while ago, and loved it. There were plenty of bugs, but I knew the workarounds on every one of them. It was probably the most stable version of Finale, period.

Then, I upgraded to 2011 a while ago, and lost my 2005. Disappointed. Even though I need it for more up-to-date jobs, the old bugs were still there, new ones appeared...and GPO sounds worse than Smartmusic Softsynth, in my opinion. And on my old Vostro, it eats up quite a bit of my CPU. Though I REALLY like what they did with the selection tool. That has boosted my productivity by quite a bit.

The weird thing is, they were more interested in spitting out a new version every year, rather than fixing bugs. And most Finale users are pretty sure MakeMusic did this to have an edge over Sibelius, which only upgraded every few years. This is a large reason as to why this subject interests me...how will MakeMusic respond to this situation?


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## Nick Batzdorf

Did anything ever become of NIFF - Notation Interchange File Format (or something close)?

Edit: never mind. MusicXML took its place.


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## sbkp

BopEuph @ Mon Jul 09 said:


> Now, this isn't a contest to see which program is better, but I really am curious as to what would go into Sibelius if this project were done in that program. I just remember being incredibly lost when trying to do anything in that program.



I just tried it, and I think it took me about five minutes in Sibelius, too. Dueling screencasts?


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## BopEuph

sbkp @ Tue Jul 10 said:


> Dueling screencasts?



En garde!


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## Daryl

BopEuph @ Tue Jul 10 said:


> This would include key changes without cautionary key changes from the previous scale, final barlines at the end of every scale, no measure numbers on the left, no indent at the top staff system, and all fit on a single sheet of paper with no collisions. On Finale, at least, these are all default settings that would have to be changed if you don't have a preset library for making a scale sheet.
> 
> Now, this isn't a contest to see which program is better, but I really am curious as to what would go into Sibelius if this project were done in that program. I just remember being incredibly lost when trying to do anything in that program.


I think that a lot would depend on whether you'd done a job like this before. If you have, then it's 2 clicks and a KC to set it up (using House Styles), and then play the notes in, hitting a couple of KC at the end of each line. There wouldn't be any collisions anyway, because of Magnetic layout. I can't really see it taking 5 minutes, TBH. Of course, if you don't know your way round the defaults, then it would take longer to set it up, and even if you do, it would be at least 30 seconds extra. However, nothing that I do has to be set up from scratch, so this is irrelevant to me.

However, for me the introduction of Magnetic Layout into Sibelius cut my typing time down dramatically. I'm not sure whether Finale has this feature yet, so if not, then I think that there is still a good chance that Sibelius would be quicker to use for my normal day to day workflow.

As I said previously, there are things which are a biatch to do in Sibelius, but I tend not to work on that sort of material, so it doesn't matter to me.

D


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## BopEuph

I'm sure what Finale has is a version of "Magnetic Layout," but sometimes the spacing measurements get in the way of that. I just usually leave it to the default Fibonacci spacing, but when I have to do, say, twelve two-octave scales on a single sheet of paper, then things start not looking so good. I have to do a combination of minimizing the screen and fixing the measurements.

Man, if I had to play it all in using my keyboard, I'd be screwed! I barely passed piano in college--the professor only passed me because she felt bad that I wouldn't have graduated that semester had she not!

Is there an option in Sibelius to just use the QWERTY without playing it in? In Finale, I use "Speedy Entry" but have "use MIDI device for input" unchecked, unless I'm doing some in-depth piano work. Then it's faster for me to use the keyboard.


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## Daryl

BopEuph @ Tue Jul 10 said:


> I'm sure what Finale has is a version of "Magnetic Layout," but sometimes the spacing measurements get in the way of that. I just usually leave it to the default Fibonacci spacing, but when I have to do, say, twelve two-octave scales on a single sheet of paper, then things start not looking so good. I have to do a combination of minimizing the screen and fixing the measurements..


I don't think so. I think if it had, Finale users would have been shouting "Halleluja" from the rooftops by now. :lol: 



BopEuph @ Tue Jul 10 said:


> Man, if I had to play it all in using my keyboard, I'd be screwed! I barely passed piano in college--the professor only passed me because she felt bad that I wouldn't have graduated that semester had she not!


 I guess that playing it in wouldn't help you then. :wink: 



BopEuph @ Tue Jul 10 said:


> Is there an option in Sibelius to just use the QWERTY without playing it in? In Finale, I use "Speedy Entry" but have "use MIDI device for input" unchecked, unless I'm doing some in-depth piano work. Then it's faster for me to use the keyboard.


Yes, there is QUERTY input, and also a kind of Speedy entry specifically for Finale users.

D


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## sbkp

BopEuph @ Tue Jul 10 said:


> Is there an option in Sibelius to just use the QWERTY without playing it in? In Finale, I use "Speedy Entry" but have "use MIDI device for input" unchecked, unless I'm doing some in-depth piano work. Then it's faster for me to use the keyboard.



Certainly. For pitches, it's A, B, C, D, E, F, and G. For note values, ties, accidentals, and lots of other stuff, it's the numeric keypad. Sibelius's QWERTY interface is one of the things I really love about it.

My approach to doing the scale sheet was to put in all the bars (one per scale), add all the key signatures, then type in the first scale, then select it, hit "R" to repeat it, and use the up arrow to transpose it up a step (unless I was going from Gb to G, for example), then use the numeric keypad to remove accidentals to force the notes into the new key. Having done it once and now having the process already established, if I wanted to do it again, it would probably take 2 or 3 minutes, even from scratch.

Another thing I wasn't sure about, and where there would be some manual spacing adjustments, is on the first note of each scale. Sibelius puts the first note relative to the key signature's right edge (of course). That makes the left edge of the notes look uneven (of course). I suppose if I'd done the keys in circle-of-fifths order, it would look nicer.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand, "Dammit, Avid!!!!"


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## BopEuph

It's actually not too far from how I did it on Finale. Although, it seems like note entry is a lot like the way Finale changed Simple Entry to around 2005, but by then, I was already very used to Speedy Entry (some say simple is faster, but I've never really tried it). 

Yes, back to topic. Even I'm sad to see this happen to Sibelius!


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