On August 26th 2024 MakeMusic announced that after they are sunsetting Finale music notation software. They are no longer developing it or selling it. They will be continuing tech support for one year until August 2025. And in a surprising move to many was the announcement that MakeMusic had made an agreement with Steinberg to offer Dorico Pro 5 for $149 for a limited time to Finale license holders through the MakeMusic website. You read read the MakeMusic announcement at: https://www.finalemusic.com/
On September 3rd 2024 ASMAC (The American Society of Music Arrangers and Composers, of which I am a board member) held a webinar with a panel of New York and Los Angeles music industry professionals, top music copyists, composers, arrangers as well as Daniel Spreadbury director of product development of Dorico. The webinar was cohosted by myself and Jeff Kellum. We had over 400 people in attendance. The tile of the webinar was “Finale’s Finale: Move Forward or Stay The Course.” The webinar was in part an homage to Finale and the people who contributed to it over the years. There was also a discussion on backup strategies and best practices on how to safe guard your files and scores for the future. Daniel Spreadbury spoke on their efforts to help users with their transition to Dorico. Justin Tokkee from Avid was in attendance and announced their offer to Finale users for a crossgrade to Sibelius for $99 for two year subscription and their plans to help Finale users transition. I presented a video on “Finale to Dorico Equivalents.” And we wrapped up with Q&A on Dorico with Daniel Spreadbury.
I know from experience that transitioning to a new music notation software can be frustrating but it’s not an insurmountable problem. So to help Finale users with the transition to Dorico I’ve posted my video from the ASMAC webinar on Youtube. My philosophy is, if you can find the equivalents between the two programs you can speed up the learning process.
More information coming soon on my new interactive online course, “Finale To Dorico Foundations.”
