Questions on Notation Software vs. Sequencers and How They Interact

I'm experiencing somewhat similar issues that Bryan is/was....

I have Sibelius and have written some compositions that play back reasonably well on Sibelius.... They use 16 staves or less and are more or less Jazz....

I have Cubase SX3 and have just recently attempted to import from Sibelius into Cubase SX3. I've tried both MIDI and Audio export.

My first goal is to be able to add audio to my Sibelius-written compositions. Specifically, I wish to add my tenor saxophone (and perhaps my alto and soprano as well). In this way, I'd have a more or less reasonable rendering of a finished product to present to my pianist, bassist and drummist. Or, I could just forget about those dudes entirely.....

If I import as audio, Sibelius reduces the 16 or so staves/instruments to 2 stereo outputs. The first question is thus:

1. Is it possible to import in audio (i.e., NOT in MIDI) from Sibelius to a digital audio workstation (DAW) and keep each instrument track (e.g., french horn, bass, etc.) individual? I assume that it is not, which brings up the second question"

2. Is it possible to add audio into Sibelius? I also assume that it is not, therefore question #3:

3. Is it possible to export dynamic envelope (i.e., soft to loud over time) information from Sibelius? I've written same into my Sibelius scores, yet what results from the export is totally dynamically flat and only changeable by physically altering controller volume information (#7, I think...) by hand (which is tedious and time consuming). Ditto for pan information; the Cubase "mixer" doesn't do anything at all, despite the presence of levers and sliders on it. Also, having already written such matters into the score, is there not a way to avoid doing so again?

5. Does Protools (which, like Sibelius, is owned by Avid) work better with Sibelius? Or does Sonar, etc?)

....I have a PC laptop and am NOT getting an Apple....

6. I've yet to buy the interface. I like Presonus and firewire, but Presonus doesn't play with Protools, so it seems that I need to figure out which software to use first, and then buy the interface. Any suggestions?

Thanks for your help!

- Jeff

1. Yes, this is possible, or at least it would be from Finale, which probably isn't that different from Sibelius. Find out where the mixer is for Sibelius. Solo the tracks that you want to export, export as audio. This should give you an isolated version of whatever instruments you soloed, allowing you to individually export certain instruments.

2. This is possible in Finale, dunno about Sibelius.

3. Yes, it's called exporting a midi file out of Sibelius and into Cubase.

5. You should be able to do what you want to do with Cubase.

6. You really don't need all that extra hardware to do what you want to do.

Hi Andy 1044, and thanks for the response!

Do you mean to separate the tracks (making, say, 12 different Sibelius "scores") and import each one individually into a track into Cubase?

I think Finale may do some things that Sibelius can't..... I just don't see an audio import feature.

The volume changes didn't "take" when I exported the score into Cubase. Am I omitting some procedure?

Thanks again,

- Jeff