Sibelius

* Sibelius will now avoid collisions between magnetic slurs and objects under their arc -- e.g. notes, articulations and accidentals -- by adjusting the shape of the slur and moving its end points to produce the best shape.
* New Play > Repeats dialog, allowing you to specify any sequence of bars for playback, and also to specify that nth-time endings should be played back after a D.C./D.S. jump
* Live Tempo can now include tap points, so that you can specify where you will tap, allowing the use of advanced conducting techniques such as melded and dead beats.
* Sibelius is now compatible with HyperControl , the new two-way communication standard built in to M-Audio's Axiom Pro range of keyboards. HyperControl automatically maps the keyboard's controls to playback, Mixer and note input controls in Sibelius, and the Axiom Pro's LCD display constantly updates to show the current values.
* Improvements in keyboard navigation between notes in different voices, and in which notes are played when individual notes in chords are selected.
* New Sibelius 6-style chord symbols can now be left-aligned.
* New baseline and superscript chord symbol suffix appearances for word-based suffixes (e.g. add, omit, sus, etc.)
* Further options for the numbering of 2- and 4-bar repeat bars.
* It is now possible to specify the width of leger lines on half note (minim) and whole note (semibreve) rests.
* Improvements to the positioning of the left- and right-hand ends of tuplet brackets.
* The Word Menus page of Preferences now shows the words as they will appear in the actual word menu, rather than plain text versions of them.
* It is now possible to adjust the Y position of rests once more, using a new Rest Y control on the Notes panel of Properties.
* New Merge Bars plug-in.
* Export anti-aliased bitmap graphics via File > Export > Graphics.
* Export embedded TIFF files in grayscale via File > Export > Graphics.
* Pick-up bars at the start of a score can now be exported as a short irregular bar rather than a full-length bar padded with rests when exporting a MIDI file.
* Many improvements to MusicXML import.
* Many improvements to the ManuScript language.
* Sibelius is now compatible with Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard and Windows 7.
* Sibelius for Windows is now a Large Address Aware application, allowing it to access up to 3GB RAM on 32-bit Windows, and up to 4GB RAM on 64-bit Windows.

...plus many other small improvements and fixes.

This update provides compatibility with the newly-released Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard.

This is a compatibility release only: it does not provide any improvements other than fixing a small number of compatibility problems with running Sibelius on Snow Leopard. There is no new update for Windows users, and users running Mac OS X 10.5 or earlier do not require this update.

* Sibelius's memory usage no longer grows unbounded when scrolling through the pages of a large score without editing (e.g. during playback)
* Sibelius no longer crashes when pasting material at the start of a score where the first item in the top staff of the selection would need to be pasted before the start of the first bar.
* Creating a key signature in a dynamic part no longer causes Sibelius to crash.
* The initial volume used by Sibelius when clicking on a note in the score, or inputting a note via the Keyboard or Fretboard windows, before the score has been played back is now correct.
* The Allow first syllable to overhang barline option in House Style > Note Spacing Rule now works as expected once more.
* Lyric hyphens are now correctly centered between syllables, as they were in Sibelius 5 and earlier versions.
* It was possible for Mixer redraws to cause a crash under some obscure circumstances. This bug has now been fixed.
* A minor problem with the Essentials Choral Combo sound set (for users of Sibelius Sounds Choral for Sibelius 6) has been corrected.
* Plug-ins > Simplify Notation > Combine Tied Notes and Rests now runs without an error.
* Non-magnetic lines no longer perform the look-ahead associated with the new slur direction rule for magnetic slurs, resulting in a small performance increase in scores with many lines.
* Various small problems related to the appearance and positioning of lines that cross system or page breaks when exporting scores to Sibelius 5 format or earlier have been fixed.
* A number of small improvements to the order in which scores are compared when exporting Rich Text Format log exported via the Export Log dialog, which now also includes line breaks.

* Magnetic Layout – dramatically cuts the writing time in half between the moment of inspiration and the final printed score – delivering the added assurance that all individual objects are positioned conventionally on the score where musicians expect to find them. The software automatically spaces and lays out scores to look professional and clear from the very first note. Previously, aligning individual score objects required time-consuming manual adjustments which now occur transparently to the user.

* Versions – enables educators to efficiently track student progress, spot plagiarism and promote collaboration. Students can record progress and submit creative commentary with their final coursework. Professionals now have a robust, effective way to track changes or collaborations with copyists, orchestrators and publishers by saving, manipulating and comparing revisions of a work piece within a single file.

* Keyboard and Fretboard Windows – provide a visual approach to the music education process, allowing aspiring musicians and composers to follow lighted key and finger positions as a score plays back – reinforcing the relationship between staff and tab notation with real instruments. These windows also create a new way for customers to input music directly from an on-screen piano keyboard or guitar fretboard, as opposed to using conventional methods such as clicking on the staff of the note or typing the note names on the computer keyboards via a separate MIDI keyboard.

* Classroom Control – offers a simple and single window for common classroom management tasks. This enables educators to keep students on subject by creating a streamlined approach for sharing files across the network during review cycles and facilitating daily classroom instruction. Messages sent by the educator appear on the student's workstation screen. Now, educators can easily attract attention despite any challenges in the teaching environment, such as students wearing headphones.

* ReWire Support – simplifies the once challenging process of incorporating audio tracks into notation-focused projects, making it an ideal tool to facilitate a film's orchestral session. By synchronizing Sibelius software with Pro Tools software (or other DAWs running on the same computer,) customers can start real-time playback in Sibelius and the DAW will follow, or vice versa. Further, composers or orchestrators can easily add a vocal to a song created with Sibelius or augment an existing recording for enhanced creative options.

Sibelius 5.2.5 features a small number of feature enhancements:

It is now possible to delete multiple user-defined text styles in a single operation in House Style > Edit Text Styles.

New Notebook (laptop) features keyboard shortcut set for recent model MacBook and MacBook Pro computers, that do not have an embedded keypad.

You can now Shift-click on the device and sound menus in an expanded staff strip in the Mixer to reset the device or sound for all staves in the score by choosing (Auto) from the menu.

Sibelius 5.2.5 also features a number of bug fixes, including:

When importing a house style, Sibelius now checks to see whether an incoming user-defined style matches by name to an existing user-defined style in the score, and if it does, Sibelius replaces the existing user-defined style with the incoming one (provided they are compatible, e.g. both are staff-attached).

When using Kontakt Player 2 for playback and inputting very short notes in step-time, notes played as they are input would hang forever; this problem has now been fixed.

When using Sibelius Sounds Essentials for playback, some General MIDI sounds would not play back during input until after you had played back the score at least once; this problem has now been fixed.

When Play notes as you edit is switched on, Sibelius will always play the appropriate sound when a note is input or selected, even if the staff to which the note belongs is muted in the Mixer.

Adding an articulation, slur, or some other markings no longer causes the playback sound to be incorrect or causes playback to be silent until the score is closed and reopened.

The message box that appears when the score you are opening uses a different configuration to the one you currently have chosen now correctly responds both to the Don't say this again checkbox on the message box itself, and the Warn if configuration used in score is different to the active configuration checkbox on the Files page of Preferences.

If you have Restore score window sizes and positions switched on (on the Files page of Preferences) and leave a score window maximised on a secondary display that is no longer connected to your computer when you next open the score, the score window is now correctly repositioned on the primary display, rather than opening up completely out of view (Mac only).

Remaining problems with booklet printing with scores where the first page number is not 1 have been fixed.

Remaining problems with duplicate instrument styles being created when copying and pasting music from and to staves using user-defined instrument types have been fixed.

Input maps

Use all the extra buttons, faders and rotary controls on your M-Audio keyboard to control the Playback window and the Mixer in Sibelius

Simply choose the appropriate input map on the Input Devices page of

Preferences

Playback improvements

Choose a default playback configuration to speed up start-up

Sort and rename devices in Playback Devices

Better playback of rolls and other unpitched percussion effects

Improved pitch bend and glissando playback in Kontakt Player 2

Support for loading and saving VST presets

Use any MIDI device without a sound set by setting up a Manual Sound Set, including program and bank numbers to use for each channel, and the ability to change a staff's channel in the Mixer

Mixer improvements

Display program names instead of sound IDs: simply set Display to Program names on the Playback page of Preferences

New "test" button to audition chosen sound

New pan slider for virtual instrument outputs (for e.g. VSL Vienna Instruments)

Change a staff's MIDI channel directly via the Mixer when that device uses a manual sound set

MusicXML support

Now supports MusicXML 2.0

Imports compressed (.mxl) files

Better layout support (e.g. system layout, object positioning, blank pages, multirests)

Better instrument detection

Imports unpitched percussion, nested tuplets, page-attached text, notehead shapes, hidden objects, chord diagrams, tab staves that use capos, and more

Bugs relating to incorrect bar lengths fixed

Mac OS X support

Spotlight support now included: find Sibelius files by any text contained within them

Quick Look support for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard now included: look inside Sibelius scores directly via the Finder without opening them

Plus many bugs fixed

Ideas Hub: Ideas Hub is a unique new feature that lets you capture, use and

re-use snippets of music. As well as using your own ideas, over 2000
ready-made ones are included – ideal for teaching.

150+ high-quality built-in sounds

VST and Audio Unit instruments support

Panorama: Panorama is a new, clearer way of viewing music in Sibelius. Instead of being chopped up into systems and pages, the music is shown in a single, infinitely-wide strip – far easier to read and navigate around.

Instant Cues

Chaging Instruments

Blank pages

Advanced bar numbers

Reprise & other music fonts

New & undoable plug-ins

...and much more!

* Fixed a problem that caused Sibelius to slow down during editing in scores using French beams.
* Fixed a problem that caused Sibelius to crash sometimes after stopping playback when using GPO Sibelius Edition.
* Fixed a problem whereby lines following text (e.g. lyric lines, or guitar lines) would appear at different distances away from the text at different zoom levels.
* Fixed a problem that could cause Sibelius to crash upon exiting after editing instrument names.

Support for new Garritan Personal Orchestra Sibelius Edition and Sibelius Rock and Pop Collection products

- Two new plug-ins
- Bar number ranges on multirests (and bar numbers can be dragged any distance)
- Advance through attached video files one frame at a time
- Create any MIDI controller change message via Play > Dictionary
- Easily create dynamic parts in different transpositions from the same instrument
- New timecode formats (15fps, 29.97 (drop) fps) and improved timecode import from MIDI files
- Supports new Apple Mighty Mouse (Mac OS X 10.4.2 or later)
- Supports PostScript (Type 1) music fonts

Plus many other fixes and improvements!

4 new plug-ins (Color Pitches, Boomwhacker Note Colors, Harmonics Playback, Remove Overlapping Notes)

16 new instruments

New Unregister Sibelius feature, allowing you to move Sibelius from one computer to another (so you can use Sibelius on multiple computers, without typing any numbers!)

Screen positioning during note input, editing and playback improved further

PhotoScore Lite & Professional update: many improvements to recognition & transferring to Sibelius, easier naming & adding of instruments, reads text in Cyrillic and Greek alphabets (Professional only), etc.

Spelling of accidentals in step-time input improved

Various editing operations much faster (e.g. repitching a long passage of notes, deleting notes and passages on Mac OS X)

Choose paper size, orientation and house style when importing MIDI files and transferring music from PhotoScore

Percussion notation improved when importing MIDI files

Save as Audio Track instability on some computers fixed

Scroll wheel support on Mac OS X

Live Playback velocity bars' vertical position now adjustable

Various other improvements and bug-fixes.

170 new features have been added, plus a special collaboration with Native Instruments to design a special version of Kontakt to play back music using high-quality instrument samples (no more cheap-sounding QuickTime Musical Instruments!), burn compositions to CD, and create audio files for the Web. Here are a few of the more interesting enhancements:

Font smoothing Mac OS X's font smoothing already made Sibelius for OS X look substantially better than OS 9 versions of Sibelius and Finale, but a new display setting will smooth all graphical elements on the screen for a look closer to what you get on the printed page.

New templates 60 new instruments are included (never again will you have to remember the range of a Hawaiian steel guitar), plus new manuscript papers, bands, and orchestras, including a film orchestratration setting designed by The Simpsons composer Alf Clausen.

Focus on Staves lets you hide other staves so you can focus on one part while composing.

Recording now supports two voice recording on one staff, sequencer-style recording of dynamics and timing, with the option to play back your original performance.

Shadow notes shows you where a mouse-inputted note will be before you click, a la Finale.

Kontakt Player Silver, based on Kontakt, will become available for the Mac in November 2003 as a free download (so obviously not in time to ship with Sibelius 3, sadly -- we'll get to celebrate by American Thanksgiving). This special Sibelius edition of Native's sample playback synth has 20 instrumental sounds, upgradable to 64 and up via Kontakt Player Gold. Given the quality of Native's synths, this should be very good news indeed.

Playback Sibelius, in addition to being able to burn Kontakt's playback to a CD track, now plays back complex repeats, with individual dynamics, finally properly supports keyboard dynamics, metric modulations, and glissandi.

Auto page breaks automatically places page turns in extracted parts (a feature being introduced in the new version of Finale shipping next month, too).

Scales & Arpeggios Plug-ins Educators, rejoice!

Improved engraving Working with "several of the world's leading music engravers," Sibelius has improved upon its note spacing algorithm. Hard to describe, but it looks revolutionary. Beaming, which had been known to behave a little oddly at times in Sibelius 2 and earlier, has been dramatically improved, and the rules are fully adjustable.

Updated scanning PhotoScore, Sibelius' scanning companion product has been updated, as well, including the Lite version that ships with Sibelius.

Backwards compatibility Thankfully, you can still save in Sibelius 2 format via Sibelius 3! Sibelius adds Finale 2004 file import capability, keeping pace with its rival's file formats.