Welcome to another helpful hint in my ‘Tips and Tricks’ sessions.

Getting Sibelius to playback the correct percussion sounds when selecting the Plug-In ‘Add a drum pattern’ using the Sibelius 7 sounds.

Sibelius has a great percussion Plug-In called ‘Add a Drum Pattern’. This automatically creates a drum pattern from a choice of 20-programmed patterns. However, you may find that when you play back the pattern using the Sibelius 7 Sounds, you may find that some of the notes do not play back with the correct sound or even no sound at all. When this happens, the simple fix is to either ‘Edit’ the percussion staff or create a ‘new’ percussion staff based on the current one selected.

So firstly, create a score with a single percussion staff using the Drum Set (Rock).

Now go to the ‘Note Input’ tab and click on the ‘Plug-Ins’ icon and select ‘Add a Drum Pattern’.

You will now be asked to choose a drum patterns from a range of the 20 patterns available.

I am going to ‘un tick’ all the boxes and choose the ‘Rock, Alternative with Tambourine’. Click OK.

Now, when I play this pattern, I will not hear the Tambourine part. This is because the Tambourine sound has not been allocated to that note head or position in the ‘Drum Kit Rock’ sound set.

So let’s fix this.

Navigate to the ‘Home’ tab.

Click on the small arrow located in the bottom corner of the ‘Instruments’ icon in the Ribbon. This opens up the ‘Edit Instruments’ window.

I am going to locate the ‘Drum Set Rock’ sound set and create a NEW Instrument based on this as I am only intending to change one sound (The Tambourine). Sibelius will ask if this is my intention and I click on ‘Yes’.

In the next window, I will name my new instrument and in this instance, I will name it Drum Kit (Ray). I then click on ‘Edit Staff Type’

I drag the slider so that I can see the note position for the Tambourine, click on the note and click on ‘New’.

I then choose my desired note head, and sound for that note head and position.

I click ‘OK’ and then ‘OK’ again and my new Sound Set Rock Kit (Ray) should now be available in the list of instruments.

Now, when I close all the windows and go back to my score window, I will click on the ‘Change Instruments’ icon in the Ribbon under the ‘Home’ tab….

…… find Drum Set (Ray) and click just to the left of the first bar of the drum staff……

…… and my new staff name and sound set will replace the existing staff name and sound set. (and the Tambourine will now be heard!!!!).

Any questions, just contact Ray Partridge at Music Technology Matters.

Phone: +61 418 159 916 Email: [email protected] Web: www.musictechnologymatters.com