If you’re a longtime Sibelius user, like me, your favorite person in the world is probably Daniel Spread­bury. This morning he posted a new blog at Stein­berg, where he and the former Sibelius team are working on an entirely new notation program. Pretty thrilling stuff.

But did you catch this epic dig at his former employer, Avid, basi­cally implying that they have aban­doned Sibelius entirely (despite their insis­tence to the contrary)?

…the number of compa­nies actively working on profes­sional music notation software is very small, and perhaps now numbers only two (one being Stein­berg, the other MakeMusic).

Ouch.

The Polon­aise-Fantaisie is to be classed among the works which belong to the latest period of Chopin’s compo­si­tions which are all more or marked by a feverish and restless anxiety. No bold and bril­liant pictures are to be found in it; the tramp of a cavalry accus­tomed to victory is no longer heard; no more resound the heroic chants muffled no visions of defeat—the bold tones suited to the audacity of those who were always victo­ri­ous. A deep melancholy—ever broken by startled move­ments, by sudden alarms, by disturbed rest, by stifled sighs—reigns through­out. We are surrounded by such scenes and feelings as might arise among those had been surprised and encom­passed on all sides by an ambus­cade, the vast sweep of whose horizon reveals not a single ground for hope, and whose despair had giddied the brain, like a draught of that wine of Cyprus which gives a more instinc­tive rapidity all our gestures, a keener point to all our words, a more subtle flame to all our emotions, and excites the mind to a pitch of irri­tabil­ity approach­ing insanity.

—Franz Liszt, Life of Chopin.