Transposing, doing my head in.

[Contratrombone64]

Firstly, before I ask the question; be assured I really DO understand transposing instruments as I played the B-flat clarinet and alto saxophone in school. I also understand how to write for the Horn in F (up a perfect fifth).

The following is Finale's rather limited list of predefined transpositions, one can create them from scratch if needed (exactly my point). It's a given that m3 equals minor third and M2 equals major second, and P4 equals perfect fourth ... and so on.

A instrument (e.g. A clarinet)...(A) Up m3, Add 3 flats
B flat instrument (e.g. clarinet, trumpet)...(Bb) Up M2, Add 2 sharps
B flat instrument-treble (e.g. tenor sax, bass clarinet)...(Bb treble clef) Up M9, Add 2 sharps
D instrument (e.g. trumpet)...(D) Down M2, Add 2 flats
E flat instrument (e.g. E flat clarinet)...(Eb) Down m3, Add 3 sharps

I was trying to figure out the formula (based on the above) for horn in D flat and Horn in E (as I'm working on a Sullivan score which uses those crooks). But my brain just performed a CTRL-Alt_Delete whilst processing the data.

 

[Soubasse]

My initial thought was down a semi for the D-flat Horn and down a major 3rd for the E Horn, then I thought "hang on, they're horns!" I would assume D-flat Horn up a major 7th and E Horn up a minor 6th (I'm at home and my orchestration books are at school)!
Based on that coding above:
Db = Up M7, add 5 sharps
E = Up m6, add 4 flats

Hope that's right ...

EDIT: Just checked those very instruments in Sibelius and that's exactly what it did, so all being well with Finale, that formula should hopefully do it.

 

[Contratrombone64]

Hey Matt, I'm amazed that Sibelius actually has predefined settings for horn in Dflat? (Horn in E I can understand as it was qutie a popular instrument often paired with the horn in F).

 

[Soubasse]

The new version of Sibelius has definitions for instruments I'm still looking up to find out about!!