A First Look At Finale 2008

I recently received a copy of the now shipping Finale 2008 music notation software program for Windows and Mac. Will it live up to its name?

For many years I have been an avid Finale user for printing high quality music notation for use in my classroom. Each year the folks at MakeMusic come out with a new version with more bells and whistles to play with. This year's release spouts a number of very desirable additions, but can it shake off the ideosyncracies that have plagued it since its first release over a decade ago?

I began my analysis of the new Finale 2008 software by giving it a fairly simple test. I used it to create a very simple transcription of the traditional children's song, London Bridge, for use with my fifth grade band this fall. Using the simple entry tool and number pad on my keyboard I plopped down the melody in short order, selected it, copied, dragged, and pasted the melody into all of the needed staves. The layout and overall design of the interface remains unchanged from other recent versions, but I admit to being slightly confused at first by being placed in Studio View when I exited the setup wizard. Had I not taken the time to look at the many tutorial videos in advance of starting my session I would have wondered what exactly I was looking at and how to get back to the more familiar scroll view or page view that I had been accustomed to.

One very nice addition to the Finale 2008 product is the use of Garritan Personal Orchestra Instruments for the playback of your compositions. These synthesized instruments are incredibly lifelike, so much so that when I first had the computer play back my simple composition I was visibly surprised. The Garritan sound fonts are unlike any that I have heard in a software notation product before, and add a lot to the experience. I in turn opened one of the many sample files that are found in the Finale 2008 folder and found that the Garritan sounds are everything that MakeMusic has touted them to be and are a fine practical addition to the overall program.

I ended my first session with Finale 2008 by printing out my new London Bridge score. It is only here that I found that Finale's old nemesis still remains. Since Finale was first introduced I, and many others, have lamented the fact that the printed output is not what is often considered "engraver" quality. In this category it appears that Finale has not attempted to make any inroads against the much more pleasing print quality of other competing music notation software products.

In future weeks I will publish more thoughts on this new version of the Finale music notation software and delve deeper into its many features.