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Author Topic: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback  (Read 5530 times)

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Steve_freereeder

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #20 on: April 28, 2016, 05:28:44 PM »

It is not a mistake, but a deliberate intention on my part to start a new tune section on a new line of music. It helps to make the structure of the tune clear. You can often see this use of repeats and pick-ups in classical orchestral music. Far from being redundant, anything which helps the player navigate the music is a good thing.

Tired of all this now...  :(
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Lester

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #21 on: April 28, 2016, 05:34:08 PM »

I believe that a liberal sprinkling of 'In my opinion' or 'my preference is to' etc may help out in this thread.

Jack Campin

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #22 on: April 28, 2016, 06:41:24 PM »

Going back to the original question...

Quote
I know a number of musicians far more talented than myself, playing all sorts of instruments - flutes, whistles, saxophones, fiddles etc. I've been wanting for a while to break down tunes in to parts for them and play something a bit more than just 10 instruments playing the same tune - something that could be called a performance

...maybe fancy notation is not what you want to achieve that.  You may want to score harmonizations properly, but if you try to do the whole arrangement as a written score, it will probably end up very big compared with what it actually expresses, and you'll have to delegate somebody to be the conductor and read it.

I would go for an assemblage of fragments, where each player got the dots they needed, and a set of verbal instructions about how to fit it all together.  You don't need to write the tune out 4 times to be played on 4 successive instruments, with blank bass lines for all except the last time round where the cello comes in - just write the tune and the bass out once, and say who plays which when.  A folk arrangement is not a classical symphonic work, and different notations are appropriate.

Quote
You can often see this use of repeats and pick-ups in classical orchestral music.

...and the same goes for this.  A Mozart symphony has a much less regular structure, and you can't abbreviate as effectively as you can with a medley of folkdances.
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playandteach

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #23 on: April 28, 2016, 07:24:17 PM »


What Steve did is a very common mistake with transcriptions of folk tunes (because phrase boundaries in folktunes are not usually on the barline).  People don't notice that the same pickup is used when the section repeats, and they misplace the start of the repeat and use a variant repeat when there's no need for one.  It happens whatever medium you use for the transcription, but my procedures give me a better chance of spotting it.
Forgive me if I'm reading this incorrectly, because I can't open abc transcriptions on this computer - but I'm not sure it's fair to say that Steve is making a mistake by transcribing the tune conventionally. A great deal of music - folk or otherwise - fails to start phrases on barlines (thank God), and I'd suggest that adapting a fantastic and widely understood notation system to avoid misreading seems like saying that people who find it hard to stay in time with a metronome are better served by having one which follows them. Moving section divides to include upbeat figures feels to me like robbing the upbeat of its function.
I could be completely misunderstanding what you are suggesting, so please feel free to correct me. And I'm certainly going to check out Musescore for my students.
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Jack Campin

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #24 on: April 28, 2016, 07:46:52 PM »

There may be a bug in Musescore behind the preference? - in Sibelius it can be difficult or impossible to make a section start in mid-bar.

Can Musescore actually write the first part of that tune the way I did it, with the repeat starting at the start of the tune and no variant ending, or did Steve do it his way because Musescore forced him to?  (I've got an old version of Musescore at home but not on this machine, I can experiment later tonight).
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Chris Brimley

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #25 on: April 28, 2016, 10:44:21 PM »

I confess that I haven't entirely followed what the 'mid-bar' issue discussion was about, and I've perhaps missed your point about a bug, Jack, but if this helps:  MuseScore allows you to deal with anacrusis or pick-up measures in the 'measure properties' option by allowing you to have 'nominal' and 'actual' numbers of beats per individual bar, and you can then replace the single bar line with a repeat bar line or whatever.  So you can do pretty much what you like with bars.  You can give them different time signatures separately, if you want the time signature to appear, and you can exclude sub-bars from the bar count if you want.  There is also a relatively new option allowing you to split and merge measures.

Just as a personal thing, I find with dance music that I like to be able to see the structure on the page, and I try therefore to do what Steve says, and try to start new sections on new lines.  Some ways of writing music repeats and partial repeats may be perfectly logical, but they can be a devil to follow in a hurry if you're not familiar with a piece, and therefore I sometimes try to remove 'looping back' notation and just replace it with repeated bars.   This may take more space, but it's easier to read I find, and it also allows you to amend notes different times through a section, later on.
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Jack Campin

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #26 on: April 29, 2016, 12:23:15 AM »

Quote
I find with dance music that I like to be able to see the structure on the page, and I try therefore to do what Steve says, and try to start new sections on new lines.

So do I, and that's what my revision of the score does.  Did you look at the two to compare?

Back to the previous point, about whether writing out complex scores is actually worthwhile, whatever technology you use.  How often are you going to re-use an arrangement that specifies 10 instruments?  Back to the drawing board and rescore the whole thing when the tenor sax player decides they'd rather use a clarinet?  Score-based "folk orchestra" groupings I've been part of have always seemed like some barbaric cult of tree sacrifice.  There are better ways to do it.
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Steve_freereeder

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #27 on: April 29, 2016, 07:52:59 AM »

Score-based "folk orchestra" groupings I've been part of have always seemed like some barbaric cult of tree sacrifice.  There are better ways to do it.

Here's an example of a bit of 'barbaric cult of tree sacrifice' which I arranged for my Melodeon Orchestra workshop at Melodeons at Witney last November. It actually worked rather well. My workshop attendees loved it and received a big cheer after they performed it brilliantly at the final day's showcase concert. But it's a pity you weren't there Jack, as doubtless you would have shown me a better way to do it.
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Chris Brimley

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #28 on: April 29, 2016, 09:20:22 AM »

Steve, do you have a .mscx version of that?
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Chris Brimley

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #29 on: April 29, 2016, 09:44:15 AM »

'So do I, and that's what my revision of the score does.  Did you look at the two to compare?'

No, Jack, I didn't, I'm afraid was trying to make more general points rather than become involved in a disagreement.  Having now done so, I think I'd just say that both versions seem well-laid out, and the difference in where the repeat marks come in the A section seems to me of minor significance (in fact I couldn't even find it at first).  I'm sure MuseScore can easily do both.

Personally, I like initial repeat bar marks anyway, even when they're not strictly required, because I think they give the reader an early indication that there's going to be a repeat from that point later on, and when you get to the end, it's easier to spot where to go back to.  But, hey guys, is this disagreement really worth the candle?

(BTW, can somebody help me get my message icons to work again?  It makes it a bit confusing without.  Is this MS Edge or something?)
« Last Edit: April 29, 2016, 09:47:49 AM by Chris Brimley »
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Steve_freereeder

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #30 on: April 29, 2016, 12:14:00 PM »

Steve, do you have a .mscx version of that?
I certainly do! See attached...
Feel free to use it as you wish, although I'd appreciate it if you were to please credit me as arranger in any public performance, thanks!
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Chris Brimley

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #31 on: April 29, 2016, 12:57:48 PM »

Thanks Steve, I didn't want to perform it, just hear all the parts together - it's great!

The other thing I just checked is whether MuseScore would still play the A section twice if I removed the first repeat bar line, following the discussion.  And it seems it does - the stave intelligence must be quite sophisticated.
« Last Edit: April 29, 2016, 01:02:26 PM by Chris Brimley »
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Matthew Rickard

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #32 on: April 30, 2016, 09:28:54 AM »

Just one word:
MuseScore

Thank Steve, that looks like just the thing! Long 3 day weekend so I will spend an afternoon playing. I am completely musically untrained and just picking things up as I go along, so I am just wanting to play and see what I can create - so free software is perfect.


I'm not sure whether you're looking for score-creation software or multi-track recording.

Score creation but a key element is playback. My aim is not just to create multiple parts of a tune for multiple instruments, but also to arrange a tune so that to builds as a performance - first time through instruments playing a certain part, then next time through the parts are spread differently upon the different instruments. That is the kind of thing I want to play around with, then see what it is like to play live with my friends. Might not get anywhere - so free software is for the best.

But it's a pity you weren't there Jack, as doubtless you would have shown me a better way to do it.

Damn, sorry, didn't mean to start an argument!
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Pete Dunk

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #33 on: May 01, 2016, 11:41:22 PM »

Damn, sorry, didn't mean to start an argument!

You didn't! ;)
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Pete Dunk

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #34 on: May 02, 2016, 12:26:43 AM »

I certainly do! See attached...
Feel free to use it as you wish, although I'd appreciate it if you were to please credit me as arranger in any public performance, thanks!

Can you do that in concert pitch with the lowest part written in treble clef for a concertina band with baritones and bases and that don't do bass clef?  ;D

Oh and yes, this really is a tiresome thread (sorry O.P. it's not your fault!). Either accept conventional music theory or not. If you don't accept it then by all means do whatever floats your boat but please don't lecture people who know what they are talking about because your understanding varies from the academic norm. The accepted version of musical theory in the UK resides with the Associated Board of the Royal School of Music.

I don't have any ABRSM music exams, I'm not sure that Steve_freereeder has either although he probably has, you don't get to be a Doctor of Rocks for nothing  ;) but can we please leave out theoretical statements we're not qualified to make?
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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #35 on: May 02, 2016, 08:22:06 AM »

Graham Spencer

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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #36 on: May 02, 2016, 09:05:17 AM »

Damn, sorry, didn't mean to start an argument!

You didn't! ;)

Yes he did  ;)

Is this the 5-minute argument, or the full half-hour...??  ;)
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Re: Multi-instrument multi-part composition software with playback
« Reply #37 on: May 02, 2016, 09:13:16 AM »

[[ADMIN]]

This thread has reached the end of it's usefulness.   The original question has been answered well, and now we are going in ever decreasing circles.  Time to bring it to a close.

Theo

[[/ADMIN]]
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