A little summer chat, between two “ploufs” in the pool.
Which fonts do you use frequently in Dorico (for the classical repertoire only)?
What are your preferences for large orchestral scores, chamber music scores, brass ensembles, etc.?
What experience have you gained (limitations or otherwise).
I love Bravura — very clear, legible, “transparent” (as in “there’s nothing odd about it that make it noticeable”)
If the music is tight and crowded, I find Sebastian to be the perfect alternative.
I could use the MTF fonts, Norfonts, or Leland… But honestly, I usually end up using Bravura or Sebastian. I understand there is nothing fancy or original in that choice, but that’s what it is 
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I also love Bravura. In fact, it was a major reason I flipped from Finale to Dorico (not the only). It looks to me more like real music than Maestro of Opus ever did, although I do sometimes change to Maestro for projects that require really small rastral sizes. I also have several of the MTF fonts (Cadence, Scorlatti) that some clients like. I have considered getting Sebastian, and may do that soon. But I’m pretty happy with Bravura. My personal opinion is Daniel did a great job designing it. But I’m also not quite the connoisseur that some others here are.
Tim
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You’re in luck – Sebastian comes for free with Dorico!
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Wow! Thanks for pointing that out. Shows how much I look at the font list anymore. Has it always been there?
Tim
I started with v5, and it was included there.
No Running. No Pushing. No Bombing. No Plouffing. 
Are you talking about music fonts or text fonts?
Well, I know what I like…
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Music Fonts, Ben.
I know your excellent Valerio, but in my Poll, I think about more common font.
Valerio is my 16-century style font, but I may have had something to do with Sebastian, also…
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I use Sebastian as a music font because I like the slim look of the notes. I’m also really fond of the clefs and time sigs. But I use Bravura for dynamics, trill signs and other ‘text’ indicators because I prefer the look of those glyphs. I don’t know if people have strong feelings about mixing two fonts (it’s probably a faux pas of some sort) but I like the combination. 
I love bravura. Every 6 months or so, I’ll have a look at all the other music fonts out there, and then I always come right back. It’s so lovely.
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I waffle between Bravura and Sebastian. Right now, I tend to use Bravura for clients and Sebastian for my own music.
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I use MTF Cadence, which I prefer over Bravura.
I don’t particularly care for Bravura for whatever reason. I stick with Finale Engraver.
Speaking of pools … it’s three years old now, but I did a little music font comparison in this thread of the available free fonts plus November 2.
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Tank you very much @FredGUnn for this link, very useful.
And thank you all for your very useful contributions on this subject.
We’ll be continuing all summer long!
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Hello! I use Bravura and Finale Maestro for music fonts, mainly due to their aesthetic for choral and chamber music. For text fonts, I use different fonts such as the new Splentino font, as well as Bodoni 72 Oldstyle and EB Garamond. The default text font doesn’t quite seem right to me, for some reason.
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I like just about every font mentioned and find it difficult to choose which to use any given moment. I’m kind of love right now with NorFonts’ two vintage fonts (Vintage BH and Vintage Plate). I just love that it makes things look like it’s an old published printing of some kind and it kind of takes away the feeling that was made on the computer. Hard to explain.
That being said, I’ve also come to realize that some of the things I like or dislike between the various fonts has as much or more to do with the engraver settings that are loaded in with the font from the json file, all of which is fully overridable, I mean I could just use bravura and change some of the engraver settings to match what Nordine did for the Vintage BH json and I might just like it almost as much! In other words am I in love with his actual fonts or the engraver settings he used to enhance the vintage vibe? I don’t know the answer to that.
I know this sounds weird but when I use those vintage fonts, it puts me in a different mood as I’m composing and looking at the music, my early classical training looked at that kind of stuff for many hours at a time over years and it just brings back certain feelings…which I feel affects my mood and creativity. if I were actually publishing my work, which I’m not…but if I were…I don’t know for sure what I would use. Honestly I see nearly every music font and say to myself, yea I like that one too…there’s only a few I don’t really like, Finale Engraver for one. Probably done with Petrucci I should say, just saw it too many times back in the early Finale days and associate it with “it came from the computer”
But if I were producing something like a working score for an orch recording session or something like that, my emphasis would be on readability and clarity and probably I would just use tried and true bravura most likely.
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You can actually create a poll in a post for users to vote. A good Discourse feature. Then you can get percentages of usage.
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That’s a good idea, Andro.
We could start with a vote, whether we should create a poll on the fonts 
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