Music Notation Software

[Kevin Nolan]

PianoManChuck,

Eastern European Orchestra's are used extensively - even by Hollywood composers (admittedly on more budget restricted productions). So there is a constant stream of composers from the US and Europe heading to Bulgaria and as far a Russia to avail of excellent orchestras, often at a fifth of the cost of a US or London Orchestra.

For me - I sat the UCLA Film Scoring program when it was run uniquely by UCLA in Dublin on a part time basis (now largely dormant as a program because it was heavily government subsidised and Ireland is broke!

I’ve documented on the Korg OASYS forum just how incredible this program has been – top Hollywood composers such as Don Ray, Bob Dransnin, Conrad Pope and only two months ago Christopher Young come to Ireland and manage our orchestral recording sessions – stunning!

In any case, on three occasions where such composers were heading to Bulgaria to record film scores, they (through their Irish contact composer/conductor Derek Gleeson) would put out a call for anyone wanting to use some of the time of the session to have a piece recorded. So I did it three times for three orchestral pieces (written to learn orchestral composing – not for actual jobs). Two of those worked out fabulously – but one – as I flagged earlier – did not! I have learnt so much from this. This is a boast but I hope you'll forgive it – for my second piece, Derek Gleeson rang me in Ireland form Bulgaria after the session to let me hear the orchestra applaud my piece! I had sent a really hectic piece sith up to 12 notes a second in places – as a kind of Stravinsky like orchestral sketch – and it worked out stunningly and the orchestra loved it. You have no idea what a kick I got out of that – and I had actually made myself sick with exhaustion writing the piece (done manually on paper including writing out all parts) – so to get that feedback was astounding – I learnt so much from it.

But – I learnt as much from the one that failed. I knew even when sending it over that I had not done an adequate job in arranging the piece – and of course placed miserable articulation and dynamics on it – so when I heard the rough DAT take on it, I didn’t even bother having it mixed properly (a separate cost). But it taught me loads about preparation and how to (or not to) arrange orchestral pieces (though that piece still confounds me – it’s one of my proudest themes – very Celtic-Classical and could even be a national anthem it’s so ‘Noble’ - but I’ll be darned if I can figure out how to orchestrate it properly). I’ll crack it one day.


The first session I did cost 800 Euro for a 7 minute piece; but by the 3rd piece a few years ago it had gone up to about 2000 Euro for the same length piece (70 piece orchestra). Eastern Europe is getting more expensive. Note it costs more if you are going to use the recording commercially – I do’t now how much but I believe its significantly more expensive.

Your best bet is to find out what composers are going out to Eastern Europe and see if you can tag along or get their conductor to conduct your piece. The recording will then be done by default. You would normally pay several hundred dollars more to have na engineer mix it properly (I use an engineer called Debbie Smith who has mixed for Conrad Pope and is an exquisite orchestral mixing engineer (among many other genres)). I could well imagine it costing you between $3000 - $5000 for a 5- 10 minute piece to be recorded by symphony orchestra – but the further east you go the cheaper it is and at one time up to about a year ago I was receiving emails form a Moscow based orchestra at very competitive rates.

So overall it’s very doable at quite realistic prices (compared to the tens of thousands of dollars at a minimum for a Hollywood orchestra). It has been a life changing learning experience – it has made writing orchestral music ‘real’ in my life and that’s a huge psychological advantage when pitching for jobs and in shaping my ambitions with concert music, for example. If you can in any afford to do it once in your life – I strongly recommend it.


And – don’t be ‘precious’ about your music. Seek out some composers, conductors or orchestrators and have then critique your music – you can only learn from them – and it will put a far better shape on your composition destined for actual recording.


IF you think of doing this, I can always email Derek Gleeson (the conductor / composer who brought the UCLA program to Dublin and who lives in Hollywood) and seek out some contacts for you to see if anyone can accommodate your piece in a session. Very often they want that because it makes the whole package more commercially viable for them too.


Kevin.

[SanderXpander]

Another friend of mine used a Moscow orchestra for a production and they had recorded everything in A438 even though the communication beforehand had specified A440. Problem was the separately recorded concert grand piano parts had been done on A440. In the end he spent a month beta testing the then not-yet-released Melodyne DNA.

[orpheus2006]

Or might there be another notation program that I may have overlooked?

lilypond

[PianoManChuck]

This is a boast but I hope you'll forgive it – for my second piece, Derek Gleeson rang me in Ireland form Bulgaria after the session to let me hear the orchestra applaud my piece! I had sent a really hectic piece sith up to 12 notes a second in places – as a kind of Stravinsky like orchestral sketch – and it worked out stunningly and the orchestra loved it. You have no idea what a kick I got out of that – and I had actually made myself sick with exhaustion writing the piece (done manually on paper including writing out all parts) – so to get that feedback was astounding – I learnt so much from it.

That's a fascinating story! I can only begin to imagine the feeling you had inside when receiving that phone call from Derek Gleeson! Must have been one of the most memorable ups in your musical life!

...
IF you think of doing this, I can always email Derek Gleeson (the conductor / composer who brought the UCLA program to Dublin and who lives in Hollywood) and seek out some contacts for you to see if anyone can accommodate your piece in a session. Very often they want that because it makes the whole package more commercially viable for them too.

Thanks Kevin... I may take you up on that some time down the road... but right now I'm just getting started. I just placed my order for Sibelius 7 and should have it next week. I'm going to need to learn that to a level comfortable enough where I don't need to think about what I'm doing inside that program. Once I master that program, then I can start actually putting together my works. So if your generous offer is still open at that point I will definitely contact you!

[PianoManChuck]

Or might there be another notation program that I may have overlooked?

lilypond

Thanks, but I don't see where that program allows any MIDI input...

[jazlover]

Cool info, Kevin...

[Sam CA]

What was mentioned earlier about the Eastern European symphonic recordings is totally true. I've used them many times before, not so much for recording huge symphonic arrangements, but for various smaller sections. In fact, you could watch the recording session in real time via Skype, which was really cool, because you could make real time comments if you wanted to. For some reason that company is not in business anymore, but i'm sure there are plenty others that do the same.

As far as inputting Articulations into the score using a midi keyboard: It's never going to be possible, simply because the variables are too great. There's so also many techniques and articulations that can not be reproduced using midi. It's not because the software is limited or anything like that, it's because there's so much of human element involved in it. Think about it. If you put the same score in front of two professional musicians, they'll interpret it slightly different. Even different takes from the same musician wouldn't sound the same exactly. If you were to convert those audio performances to midi, you would get different versions of the same score....so it's not something you expect the software to guess for you. It might do some basic educated guesses but they might not always be very musical.
For inputting notes only, you can get great results by playing in real time. You can customize the settings that suit your style best. I forgot to mention if you're an educator, they do have academic discount available for Sibelius.

[jg::]

I'm just chiming in to let people know that there is a 3rd option, being used successfully by many arrangers around the world.

www.sonicscores.com

Overture first started in the late 80s, I think, and was taken up by Opcode, then moved to Cakewalk. For the last 10 years it's been a small independant software developer, still going!

I've been using it since the Opcode days, and never bothered to change, since I may do just one or two notation/scoring jobs each year, and when they come in, I never want to take the time to learn a new program. So I've learnt the quirks of Overture, and it seems that every notation program does have its issues. Notation is such an intensive graphics/audio/MIDI combination that it's bound to throw up lots of hurdles for programmers. It's no wonder that only a handful of pro applications have survived.

I recently upgraded to the lastest Overture, and used it to produce a rather complex score for the live-to-air TV orchestra on Channel 9's Carols By Candlelight on Xmas Eve recently (here in Australia). MIDI note input and some playback courtesy of my Oasys. It did the job well - you need to pay special attention for a live-to-air production with limited rehearsal time. But the score and parts looked professional, if I may say so, and best of all, the conductor and band had no problems, and the performance rocked!

jg::

[aron]

What the.... Overture is still going on????

Wow. I liked Overture - I helped test it. However unless it has radically changed, Sibelius is a lot easier to use.

OK, if you can tell me that Graphic Notes Music Publisher is still going strong, that would make my day!

[jg::]

Well, ease of use is a subjective thing, aron. Often, it's simply what you get used to doing.

Overture has real-time and step-time entry methods that are very easy. The real-time MIDI entry gives good results in most cases. "Ease of use" was Overture's catch-cry in the 90s, before Sibelius, and at a time when Finale was quite complicated. Since then, it has improved, indeed, meaning that it is probably easier than you remember.

So again, just throwing out another option for people to consider....

jg::

[PianoManChuck]

I'm just chiming in to let people know that there is a 3rd option, being used successfully by many arrangers around the world.

www.sonicscores.com

Thanks for throwing that out there! I checked out their website and it (Overture 4) does look impressive... Had I known about it earlier I'd have downloaded and evaluated that demo as well, but I already ordered Sebelius 7 in that I was completely satisfied with the demo and its capabilities. I didn't see that Overture 4 supported native 64-bit operating systems, whereas Sibelius did.

The retailer I purchased from had stated that Finale used to dominate the market, but in recent years, Sibelius has caught up and overtaken Finale sales. He stated he hadn't worked with either in-depth himslef, but based on sales info alone, it tells him that more people liked Sibelius, which generally translates to "easier to use". I think I became one of those statistics too... the ease of use (in addition to its capabililties) is what sold me on Sibelius. From the brief intro to Overture 4 on the sonicscores website, there's no doubt Overture 4 is quite capable of doing what I want as well. But also from what I saw, I believe I'd still have chosen Sibelius in the end.

[aron]

Well, ease of use is a subjective thing, aron. Often, it's simply what you get used to doing.

True. I was there when Finale 1.0 was released. I was working for Graphic Notes and we had an ADB keyboard that allowed really quick note entry. Unfortunately our software was buggy (but useable) and Finale had impressive demo real-time entry. I did a shoot out once with Finale, Graphic Notes Music Publisher and maybe Encore. It's been a long time.

When Opcode brought in Don to work on Overture - I still remember him gushing about Object oriented programming and how the libraries would allow him to write code 10X faster. Of course the reality is that it still took a long time.

[jamsire]

If you're doing music notation and you want it to come out PERFECT, you need these three books in your arsenal:

The Guide to MIDI Orchestration (3rd or 4th Edition are fine):
http://www.amazon.com/Paul-Gilreath/e/B ... 006&sr=1-1

Study of Orchestration (you NEED to also get the CD-ROMS):
http://www.amazon.com/Study-Orchestrati ... 121&sr=1-1

Pocket Guide to Music Notation:
http://www.amazon.com/Essential-Diction ... 188&sr=1-3

I hath spoken. Any Sibelius question PM me and I'll help you out.

Jamsire

[Sam CA]

The Guide to MIDI Orchestration (3rd or 4th Edition are fine):

I've read this book. Although a great reference but it's primarily written to learn how to work with Samples libraries.

[vEddY]

Again, sorry to intrude but... didn't see any answer to one of my questions anyone know a decent drum notation software that can read MIDI and print out drum notation?