Speedy Entry
- Click
the Speedy Entry Tool . Another menu appears—the Speedy menu—whose commands
govern the behavior of this tool. Just to check, hold the mouse button
down on the word Speedy so that the menu drops down, and make sure that
there’s a check mark beside Use MIDI Device for Input.
If you’re ever stranded without a MIDI keyboard,
there are two ways in which you can enter music with the Speedy Entry
Tool when the Use MIDI Keyboard for Input option is turned off. See Speedy Entry for details.
If Auto Launch is turned on, the measure sprouts
a rectangular frame. If not, click on the first measure. In the frame,
you’ll see a thin vertical cursor at the left side of it, called the insertion
bar. There’s also a short horizontal cursor called the pitch crossbar,
which indicates pitch.
In the upper-left corner of the frame, you’ll
see a tiny “V1,” telling you that Finale’s ready for you to enter Voice
1. (If you needed to create multiple voices, stems up and stems down,
Finale would call them Voice 1 and Voice 2. It is more likely, however,
that you would use Finale’s four transparent layers.)
Use the up/down arrow keys to move the pitch
crossbar, and the left/right arrow keys to move the insertion bar.
- Play
middle C on your MIDI keyboard. While
holding down the key, press the 5 key on your computer keyboard.
If your MIDI system is hooked up correctly, a middle C quarter note appears.
If your MIDI keyboard is not sending correctly to the computer, you’ll
see a quarter rest; in which case, see Installation
for Windows or Installation
for Mac for information on setting up your MIDI system. To remove
the rest, click it and press Delete.
Why did you press 5? The number keys, both
on the numeric keypad and on the top row of the alphabet keyboard (QWERTY
keyboard), have special meanings to Finale. (Be sure to press the Num
Lock key if you’re using the numeric keypad.) In Finale, 5 means a quarter
note. Take a look at these diagrams:
To use Speedy Entry without a MIDI keyboard,
use the arrow keys to place the insertion bar on the pitch, then press
the duration number key.
Since the MIDI keyboard is providing Finale
with the pitch information, all you have to do to provide the rhythmic
information is press the proper number key. If you’re holding down a MIDI
keyboard key when you press a number key, you get a note. If no MIDI keyboard
key is being held down when you press a number key, you get a rest.
- Hold
down the D key on your MIDI keyboard and press the 5 key again; then E
(and press 5); then F (and press 5). You’ve just built the first
four notes of a C scale. Before you could really see what you’d done,
however, Finale advanced the editing frame to the next measure, ready
for you to play more notes.
- Note
that entry with a MIDI device using Speedy Entry is in a way opposite
from using a MIDI device with Simple Entry. In Simple Entry, the
note duration is specified in the Simple Entry Palette before playing
the pitches. In Speedy Entry, the pitches are held down prior to specifying
the rhythmic duration. To lock Speedy Entry to a duration (like in Simple
Entry), turn Caps Lock on.
You can turn off this auto-advance feature,
which advances to the next measure as soon as the first one is rhythmically
full:
- Press
the zero (0) key to exit the editing frame, or click the mouse on any
blank part of the screen. The editing frame goes away.
- From
the Speedy menu, choose Jump to Next Measure. If you click the
Speedy menu again, you’ll see that Jump to Next Measure no longer has
a check mark in the Speedy menu; you’ve just turned the auto-advance feature
off.
- Press
the zero key again. The 0 key also takes you back into the editing
frame you were last in. Now that
you’ve turned the Jump to Next Measure feature off, how will you move
from measure to measure?
- Press
the left bracket ( [ ) key on your keyboard. Finale moves you back
to the first measure. The left and right bracket keys move the current
editing frame one measure to the left or right, respectively.
- Now
press the left arrow and right arrow keys on the keyboard a few times.
The insertion bar moves by one note or rest each time you press the right
or left arrow key. You can also move the insertion bar by clicking a note
with the mouse.
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