I wonder whether you have tried this:

File menu > Load Library…

Finale opens a directory dialog box, showing the folder Libraries.

Select the library Percussion Layouts.lib

Dear Peter, 

i did what you said, now it doesn't give me the error message, but nothing changes, the instrument is the same. 

i tried to change to a different instrument but nothing changes anymore

this is clearly a BUG

also because when i changed the instrument in the first place, i changed it only for 2 bars (highlighting 2 bars) but it changes the whole piece from then on...

please fix this i cannot have never-ending scores because i need to create a staff for each instrument and cannot use doubles...!

the attachment is to show that nothing happens after i changed instrument

thanks

I wonder if the problem is not returning to a pitched instrument after using one with a percussion map. I tried this in a default file, but it worked for me. What I did do is set the staff to Timpani and then select just the measures I wanted for Drum Set before invoking the Change Instrument command.

Thanks Adrian

that is exactly what i did, could you try when you have a chance, to go from timpani to cymbals, maybe is a classical instrument issue?

Or maybe it happens when you have scores with many instruments? i have 20 staves in my score.

not really sure how to fix this. 

I tried changing from Timpani to Cymbal Line Cymbals and back, and it worked fine. Cymbal line is IIRC part of the GIfF package that comes with Finale. 

Did you by any chance try to put the cymbal on a single line? (It doesn't appear so from your image.)

Or did you change the percussion layout? Those are the only complications I can think of.

If nothing else works, could you put the Timp and Cym on separate staves and hide the unused staff (in score and part) to simulate a single staff with both instruments?

Thanks Adrian

no i did not try to put the cymbal on a single line or hanging the layout

which version of finale and with which OS are you working on? maybe that is the culprit? some bug with my finale and el capitan?

Is there anyone from make music that can chime in?

do finale people even read or interact here?

thanks

matteo

Matteo,

You are correct that Change Instrument works somewhat differently on the Mac than on Windows. When I changed the highlighted measure from Timpani to Cymbal Line on my Mac, it did not just change that measure but subsequent measures as well.

Still, I was successful choosing a later measure and changing it back to Timpany, so for me at least the feature works.

Hope you can meet with similar success.

I'm having a similar (but not the same) issue when I try and change to a drum set from a tuned percussion part. It works for 4 staves but no more. Perhaps Finale has an inbuilt 'taste' function that disallows more than 4 drum sets to be played simultaneously?? ;-) Did I max out 'untuned' percussion midi channels?

Here's some images as I'm not sure this is the same issue Matteo is facing.

It appears that after four measures of drums you have pitched instruments playing on those staves. If I read this correctly, I'm not sure what you expected to happen; certainly I would want Finale to guard against overwriting pre-existing information if possible (or at least to warn me).

Hi J ADRIAN VERKOUTEREN

The process of changing to an untuned percussion instrument for four bars works fine in the top 4 staves, however I think I know what the problem is (but not exactly why). I have now remedied the situation

When I initially created the new document I added 4 marimba parts. By default Finale creates a grouped treble and bass staff. This is fine but because the piece was for beginner players and the melodic material stayed in a very small range, I deleted the unwanted staves. I think this is what threw everything out.

I created a new complete stave (mallets) for each of the single line marimba parts and copied all of the info from the old marimba part to this new stave. I then had no trouble at all selecting the 4 bars in question and changing to untuned percussion just for that time.

My next question is...

How do you create a marimba part with just treble or bass clef, not the grand staff right from the beginning or from the ScoreManager?

Also why did deleting a stave from a grouped instrument (marimba) cause it to not allow untuned percussion change of instrument... Strange

Thanks

John

Use the Score Manager to delete the second staff of the marimba part.