November font thoughts...

Is the November Music font worth buying to replace the Bravura music font? I am not unhappy with Bravura, but curious what November could add to a score. I know there are example scores on their website, but I think you get the best feeling for the difference by really having used it for some while. Anyone?

I’ve been using November for a while in Finale. I found its inky, imperfect look very likeable. It can make your scores look warm and breathing. At some point I stopped using it because I found it too characteristic, its imperfections even obtrusive at times. But it’s a good font, no doubt.

If you’re looking for a less conspicuous alternative, you might want to take a look at MTF-cadence: https://www.musictypefoundry.com/product/mtf-cadence
It’s the only other smufl font I know of at the moment.

I like November, but I think Bravura is superior for sight readers. As Florian pointed out it’s warm, but also calls attention to itself, sometimes undesirably. I’m sure it wouldn’t hurt anyone, and does make the score somewhat more personal (IMHO.)

That’s one of the things that actually bothered me with Novmber, being to fat/inky. I always loved the Edition Peters Beethoven Sonata engravings, probably because of the good memories I have of playing those pieces when I was younger. Is that by any chance imitated by one of the fonts at the MTF website? There is a font called Beethoven, not sure though if that is like the one Edition Peters used. I like the more subtle appearances of Cadence.

MTF-Beethoven is based on editions of Henle rather than Peters, I think.
Anyway, if I’m not mistaken, Cadence is currently the only smufl compliant MTF font. You probably won’t be able to use the others with Dorico.

Correct, correct, and correct.

I had high hopes that my other fonts would make it to Sibelius- and SMuFL-compatibility, but time just hasn’t been in my favor. I’m still going to try to do so by the end of the year, but other commissioned projects are taking precedence over my own.

Yes, I saw that as well. I decided to give Cadence a try and bought it. I like that it is much more subtle in apperance. Only problem I encounter now though is that immediatly after I installed the font, Dorico became very slow and gives me the spinning wheel all the time. Anyone else has this experience?

You just get the darnedest bugs, Andre. I have Cadence and I’ve never ran into problems. With anything, really. Dorico always ran very smoothly with me.

I know, it’s a curse and a blessing at the same time… I am going through Dorico’s growing pains :slight_smile:

Andre, did you try restarting your computer after installing the font? You really shouldn’t need to, but sometimes that does the trick.

I miss the November ornaments and hope for the day when we could switch fonts independently in Dorico.

Yes, I did and now it works normally. Maybe it’s also acting a llittle bit up because I am runing High Sierra (maybe I jumped a little too fast on this high train :slight_smile: )

Dorico became impossible to work with after I installed the Cadence music font. Even after having switched back to Bravura and restarted the computer, things didn’t go back to normal. Every mouse click, including trying to open a menu, results in a 10 seconds spinning wheel. Is there a way to fix this?

EDIT: I renamed the .json folder so Dorico could not find it, and Dorico became it old self again, so the problem lies in the .json file. Does this mean that file is corrupt?

I have a hard time believing the file is corrupt since it has had lots of downloads with no report of problems. Maybe re-download the files and re-install them?

I also emailed you about this. We’ll work something out. Sorry it’s happening, but it’s a complete mystery to me.

Anyone else have High Sierra installed and seeing problems with trying to use my fonts?

Hi Tisimst.
I was getting curious reading this thread and I bought and installed MTF-Cadence.
Here is the result when changing the music font… What am I doing wrong ? I installed the MTF-Cadence.json file in a properly named MTF-Cadence folder at the right place, did restart my computer.
FWIW I am still under El Capitan, and my November and Bravura fonts work perfectly…

[Edit]Ok, got it. I forgot to copy the .otf files in the Fonts folder ! I leave that mistake for others to use it if it happens to them. :smiley:
Capture d’écran 2017-10-01 à 18.03.48.png

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Usually this is caused by one of two things:

  1. The font cache needs to be rebuilt.

  2. The JSON file isn’t really in the right place (but it sounds like it is here). Can you show me the full path where you put it?

Can you confirm both of those for me?

EDIT: Or not installing the font properly lol :wink: just saw your edit. Glad it’s working for you now.

I did edit my post before you posted your answer. I just did not put the .otf files in the Fonts folder ! Now it works absolutely perfectly :wink:

In my case the score looks great, it’s only Dorico that is slowing down a lot and the spinning wheel that appears after every mouse click. I will reinstall tomorrow and see if there is a difference.

This morning I reinstalled the Cadence fonts and .sjon file and restarted Dorico, everything works completly normal, so at the moment I am a happy engraver :slight_smile:

I am glad you have everything now working as it should! I have only used the Bravura music font in Dorico and it looks fine to me although I haven’t compared it to others. Do you prefer the look of the Cadence font? What are the most noticeable differences between it and Bravura?