To load a Garritan Instrument into the Aria Player for Finale

When you choose from the list of Garritan Instruments for Finale in the Document Setup Wizard, Finale loads all instruments into the Aria Player automatically when the new document opens. On the other hand, when you use the Staff Tool to add staves (Staff menu > New Staves or Staff menu > New Staves (with Setup Wizard)), the added staves will not automatically load into the Aria Player. After adding a Garritan staff to an existing document (or to load a Garritan sound for any staff not created using one of the GPO choices in Finale 2010’s Document Setup Wizard) the following steps are required to prepare for playback.

1. From the Window menu, choose Instrument List. The Instrument List appears. If you want to assign a new instrument (one not yet used) to a staff, you must first assign the staff a unique channel in the Instrument List. Even if you are using an instrument sound already used in the document, it is recommended to assign the staff a unique channel (especially if the staff is in the same range as another staff with the same channel). (A pitch on one staff is not distinguished from the same pitch on another staff if the staves share a channel. On/off messages apply to all notes of the same pitch which can disrupt playback).
2. In the row of the desired staff, click the popup menu under the Instrument column. Scroll to the top of this list and choose New Instrument. The Instrument Definition dialog box appears.
3. Enter the desired instrument name in the top text box. You might enter the name of the GPO instrument you would like to use here.
4. After Channel, enter a channel number not used by any other staff. Use the Instrument List as a reference. If you are assigning all new staves manually, number the channels consecutively from the top down (e.g. 1-16).
5. Click OK. The Instrument Definition dialog box closes. Repeat steps 2 through 5 for any other staves. Leave the Instrument List open.
6. From the MIDI/Audio menu, choose Instrument Setup > Audio Units Instruments. The Audio Units Instruments Setup dialog box appears.
7. Click the popup menu for the range including the channels you want to assign and choose Instruments for Finale 2010 (if it’s not chosen already).Then click the Edit button to the right. The Aria player appears. Any instrument already defined (for this bank of channels)appears within the interface.
8. Click the top slot (channel 01) and choose the desired instrument. The instrument appears in the slot.

If you clicked the Edit button next to Finale Channel “1-16” in the Audio Units Instruments Setup dialog box, the sixteen slots in the Aria Player are equivalent to Finale channels 1-16 (as shown in the instrument list). If you clicked the Edit button next to Finale Channel “17-32” in the Audio Units Instruments Setup dialog box, the sixteen slots in the Aria Player are equivalent to Finale channels 17-32 (as shown in the instrument list). 

9. When you have finished loading instruments close the Aria Player. Playback the document to audition the results.

Note that each instrument occupies a different amount of RAM. For example, the Garritan “Flute Pla1” sound uses only 1.17 MB of RAM whereas the Steinway Piano uses 10.55 MB. If you are experiencing choppy playback or missing instruments, AU instruments may have exhausted your computer resources. If this is the case, try loading the “Plr#” instruments instead of the “Solo” instruments to conserve RAM.

Note also: When you save a file configured to playback using the Aria Player, the absolute path to the folder containing the sounds is stored with the file. If this file is opened on a computer whose sounds are stored in a different location (or if the names of folders or drives are different) an“Auto Load” message will appear which will allow you to search for the folder. For this reason, if you’re interested in sharing your files with others (and would like to avoid the auto-load message), you might choose to not rename your default Mac hard drive from “Macintosh HD” or “Hard Drive” (depending on the version of your OS).

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