Template 103: Edit Instruments

Geek-o-meter: 1️⃣ 2 3

As mentioned in an earlier post about templates, if you need to make changes to any instruments regularly, it's best to do it globally and, preferably, within your template.

Let’s explore what this entails and why it’s beneficial.

Let’s Start with Percussion

Have you ever found yourself in this seemingly innocent situation:

This is what happens when I have a Tam-tam staff interrupted by a Marimba treble staff. This engraving practice is not recommended, so let’s adjust it to be a bit better right from the start.

The first thing you’ll want to do is create a 5-line Tam-tam staff. Since this isn’t included with Sibelius, we need to build it ourselves. Select the first bar of the Tam-tam and go to Edit Instruments. Click Edit Instrument… in the bottom right corner. If you’ve done it correctly, Sibelius will notify you that you are editing an instrument currently in use. This is a good sign! Since there can be multiple instruments with similar names, it’s useful to confirm you are editing the correct one.

In this dialog, you can change the names as shown. The "Name in dialogs" field is only visible when you want to add, remove, or change instruments; it will not appear in the score or parts. This field is useful for adding extra information for your reference. Typically, instead of editing an existing instrument, I create a new one based on the chosen instrument and alter the name with my initials or any special features the new instrument might have.

All the text editing tools from the File Info menu apply here as well. For example, if I set the Full name in score to "Tam-\B\tam," it will appear as Tam-tam on paper, since I’ve enabled bold formatting. You can also create new lines, underline, italicize, and change font styles all within this menu. For instance, "Piano\n\\s40\\I\(for rehearsal\n\only)" will look like this:

¡Muy poderoso!

On the top right side, you can set the comfortable and professional range for various instruments, which is very handy. If, like me, you have several orchestration books and range charts, you may have noticed discrepancies in the information. Setting these ranges based on your own experience and the musicians you frequently work with can help you avoid the maroon and red noteheads.[^1]

Click the Edit Staff Type… button and go to the General pane. In my opinion, this should be the first pane you access, as it determines what can be configured in the leftmost pane.

Increase the number of staff lines to 5 and then return to the Percussion pane.

Max Pane

This pane is only available for percussion instruments, but it is incredibly powerful. Now that we’ve adjusted it to a 5-line staff, you can click on each notehead and move it up or down with the respective buttons. This means that, even though you can place a notehead anywhere on the staff, it will only produce a sound if it’s one of these three noteheads on the bottom line.

I prefer my Tam-tam on the bottom line, but if you’d like it on a space, simply click ‘Up’!

Here, you can also create custom percussion maps, but perhaps we should save that for another afsnit, Hansi.

However, following a tip from How to Write for Percussion, percussionists prefer keyless instruments if they need to switch between many instruments. So, select the bar with the marimba and edit the instrument. In Edit Staff Type…, uncheck ‘Key signatures / Tuning’.

And now, after resetting the note spacing, our score looks like this:

The Percs of Instrument Editing

If I prefer 5-line staff instruments, it’s much easier to edit them in my template and then forget about them. Even if I haven’t populated the score with them, it can save time if I know I’ll need them at some point. I’ll look for instruments labeled (TB) or (5-line). Spending a rainy day going through one category of instruments is very beneficial. And if you do it for all your percussion needs, you’ll save a ton of time on part layout! Sibelius has always had a strained relationship with Instrument Change text boxes, so having the entire part on 5 lines makes it much easier to manage.

Explore what the Edit Staff Type can do. I’ve already discussed percussion maps, like having a cymbal on the top line, a snare on the third space, and a bass drum on the bottom space. You can create utility staves with no bracket or clef,[^2] set whether it should have bar rests, and determine the direction of stems and articulations. The opportunities are endless![^3]

Footnotes

[^1]: This isn’t what they mean by “writing colorful music,” anyway.

[^2]: And I do wish you could also omit the time signature!

[^3]: Unless you really want to exclude time signatures and bar rests in the score only.