Finale refugee asking… I compose in sections, then copy the pieces together. I figured out how to copy a block of music, but how do I copy to the first bar beyond the current end of the music? How do I say this block goes to a bar that doesn’t exist yet? How do I add another measure to insert the copied block?
Relatedly, once I’ve assembled the new version how do I get rid of the original working blocks, deleting both the notes and the bars they were in?
Shift B for bars, and type the number of bars you want to add.
I tend to add more bars than I’m likely to need for the whole piece; then type ‘trim’ into the same popover, and all empty bars from the last note to the end will be deleted.
Or just select the final bar line and paste.
To delete bars (and their contents), the quickest ways are to click on something at the left end of the passage to be deleted, type Shift-B -x Enter, where x is the number of bars you want to remove.
Alternatively click on the System Track (the grey bar above the music) at the right end of the section you want to delete, then Shift-click the System Track above the start of the section you want to delete - it’ll highlight orange.
You should then see a trash can icon at the left edge of the selection - click it to delete the bars and their contents.
Note that the plus button at the right edge of the System Track selection will add the selected number of bars at the end of the selection, so, for instance, in the image above, if I were to hit the plus button at the top right it would add four empty bars at the end of the selection.
Thanks. I tried a couple of the ideas and they worked well.
There’s also an “Add Bar at End of Flow” command that I tend to use myself when I want to create a bar in which to paste material. It doesn’t have a shortcut by default but it’s easy to add one (I use ctrl-B).
Ah, yes, I remember using that in the right panel on my first day before I learned about the bars popover!
