Sibelius 7: strengths - many which are obvious weaknesses - many which are FRUSTRATING! 1. Sound sets in 7 are adequate for auditioning your compositions, but not for a viable "product." 2. Incorporating other soundsets look easy when you buy the xml controllers, but in practice can crash your Mac (Macs never crash, right? HA!) in a flash with just one small typo. 3. Integrating Sibelius 7 using EWQL or other sample programs with Pro Tools to get a satisfactory professional soundtrack...? Maybe that's easy for some (yea, yea...the one's on youtube, I know, I know...), but at my age I may not live long enough to figure this out on my own....and I do have a full-time job and kids in college, so I cannot go back to school to take courses or afford online courses that cost $1200 each. Looking at prices for commercial and educational products for composition and recording, I have to ask: do other people have $1000's laying around to spend? Sure, my perception of money is tainted because I'm a teacher. Which is why I LOVE macprovideo. I can afford it! And many, many public school AP Music Theory courses like mine are using Sibelius in the classroom.... ...so there are thousands of high school kids who need to learn Sibelius outside of the classroom... which creates more potential customers for not only Sibelius, but the other apps here already. hint, hint...

Hi odd musician! Sorry to hear about your frustrations with Sibelius. I'm not a Sibelius user, but can understand how it must be if an application seems to have some short falls. Have you tried sending the details of your frustrations through to the Avid/Sibelius support centre? ([url]http://www.sibelius.com/helpcenter/contact.html[/url]) Maybe they will address this sooner if they know users are having these issues.

LOL!! "odd" musician is probably more accurate! (Just ask my wife about our newest song, "The Intense Allure of Obscure Coiffure!") Thanks for your reply. While Sibelius acknowledges Jonathan Loving Sound Sets for Sibelius, they make sure to emphasize that they are NOT affiliated with them so don't ask about problems! Jonathan does have video assistance for his XML installations, but when you have SO MANY sound sets and Sibelius has SO many ways to clog the plumbing, a coordinating set of "basic techniques" would be so helpful! If I understood what they were doing, I would be glad to make the tutorials. I am a teacher, BTW. 30+ years of band and music theory, so I could easily make this digestible IF... such a huge word... IF I had the info at my fingertips, making a series of tutorials would be easy. Problem: the info is spread out over 700 pages of the Sibelius manual, slightly intricate knowledge of harddrive structuring and XML linking and the info from 10-15 different companies' sound programs. So hint-hint, nudge-nudge, wink-wink: ... if the Avid people are reading. If they would give specific and detailed instructions, I would happily apply them and make the tutorials. All I ask in return is a copy of the programs and the SoundSet materials for my own use. I guarantee all parties would sell more, at the entry levels especially. Oh well, the best laid plans of mice.... Thanks! John