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One thing that seems lacking on this great forum is a section or threads on notation software. I would suggest that many of us must be using notation software like Sibelius and Finale or Guitar Pro and the like for transcriptions. For those of us who do a lot of transcription or composition, this software is fantastic, but there is often a pretty steep learning curve to gain experience and facility with the software. Once you do, however, the benefits are multiple, including on your overall musicianship and skills, including composition and improvisation.
So I'd like to launch a thread where those like me who use notation software can commiserate or celebrate the good, the bad, and the "notation software experience" and its effect on you as a musician and guitarist. As an opening volley, I would venture that one of the benefits to using NS for transcriptions is the speed and accuracy, malleability, and clarity. Plus, more importantly, one learns music theory and practice in the act of creating a transcriptions which also serves as backing tracks for your practice or performance purposes.
What are your thoughts and experience?
Jay
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11-21-2013 10:34 AM
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I use Sibelius on my desktop and MuseSore is on my wife's laptop. Sibelius is better but I'm a big fan of MuseScore because it's free.
My favorite uses are:
- Notating compositions. For me, notating compositions makes me much more productive. Once I have a phrase or section notatied, 'I'm done' and am moving on to the next part. Of course, having the composition notated makes it so I won't forget.
- Notating my 'lick diary'. This is a way I develop vocabulary. I also often use my lick diary to practice technical skills (instead of playing scales or arpeggios).Last edited by fep; 11-21-2013 at 10:47 AM.
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MuseScore works for me.
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I've been using Sibelius for many, many years. Before that I used Mosaic and before that Professional Composer. That was 1986, so NS is old hat for me. It's a given. Nothing to get excited about for me. I'm glad that it works. PC was a pos, but thus stuff was in its infancy. Sibelius is great. I love it.
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Agreed about the NS utility. What I was thinking about is how using this software affects my skills with composition and overall musicianship. For example, I was playing through my transcription of The Way You Look Tonight. For years I was frustrated in part by the Sibelius software (the now legacy G7 version - $60) because I wanted to play in the notation in Real Time accurately. This is made more difficult by the fact that software 'reads' your playing precisely in tempo with the metronome, which means that you must play very mechanistically on top of the beat, or your anticipation or laying back on the beat will be written as played - often requiring considerable editing. But the workaround solution I've found is to play in the parts one at a time. Melody, then bass, and finally adding in inner voices as separate notes or as pairs of thirds, for example. When done in this fashion, the engraving and timing comes in much more accurately, with much less editing required.
To be continued. My job calls.
Jay
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I've never inputted by playing. I just do it all by hand. Of course, unless you quantize it ahead of time, no NS will know whether you intended a dotted 32nd note or that your time is bad. I write like I do if I were writing on paper. I don't try to make the program think for me. I have to KNOW whether I mean a dotted 32nd and a half rest and how I want to articulate things. It has been very educational for me for learning the various articulation symbols and terms I didn't know and how best to layout a chart. That's mainly been trial and error and complaints over the years from snooty musicians.
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Hey, Henry! What I find is that the humble G7 was quite accurate at reproducing what you played, but that in the long run, inputting one 'voice' at a time was much more accurate and easier to play 'mechanistically' to the metronome. My time is actually excellent, but if you perform with 'swing', the engraving is excessively complex, or at least not what you want to work off or use for a final copy. So I found that inputting one voice at a time saved me a lot of hassle reediting the work.
But in addition it made me reflect on how fundamentally musical harmony and counterpoint is the interplay between individual voices. Of course, guitar is a polyphonic instrument, but there is much to say compositionally from thinking of the interplay of individual voices. In fact, this approach has fundamentally altered my thinking about composition. This is true whether I'm creating a chord melody arrangement for solo guitar and voice or composing my own original music.
I understand what you are saying about composing with clear intention as to time values and rhythms. But I'm also very practical, and although quite fluent at sight reading (classical background), I still find occasions where playing a complex rhythm intuitively in Real Time is easier than notating it a priori, so to speak. And in any case, the actual process becomes part of the ongoing learning process of how you translate the music in your mind into reality on paper and as a performance. Of course, the important thing is the musician find his or her way to accomplish their goals.
Jay
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Why would you want to input notes with a guitar?
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Being able to do it manually has really helped me compositionally also in this sense. I've been able to write away from the computer and away from my instrument, fairly complex stuff, fairly accurately. Knowing the key strokes I'm pretty fast at inputting 8,16, quarter notes, rests, chits symbols, and harmonies. I'd get too frustrated with guitar glitches. I have a guitar with a GK-2 for recording synth stuff. Drives me nuts. Even with a piano I'd hate inputting notation.
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Ron - I did try to use my Godin LGXA-SA (synth access) with my Roland GR-20 guitar synth via USB interface for note input, but it failed to work. Latency is a big problem. These days, however, it sounds like there is a new hardware solution, Midi Guitar, which allows one to use your regular electric guitar (ie, with normal pickups rather than the special hexaphonic 13pin pickup on the Godin) as a controller for software synths and possibly even as a work around to drive the Roland GR-20 synth. The advantage of this new beta midi solution is a marked decrease in latency. Beyond extending the notation input options, I'm interested in this from the point of view of orchestration with software synths.
At least in theory there are a lot of potential advantages to inputting notes with the guitar. Capture your improvisations, work on transcriptions, write out etudes for students, etc. Currently I input notes either with my Yamaha keybord synth or using the computer keyboard and/or a virtual guitar fret board. The latter two approaches are ok but just take longer to execute. At least for now I'm doing just fine with using the keyboard synth, but I wouldn't mind having options to use a guitar. One reason I like inputting in Real Time is the spontaneity of the process. Frankly, if you are working on a standard like The Way You Look Tonight, it is much easier and faster to simply play in strict tempo (mechanistically) the melody, a bass line and an inner voice or two accurately sequentially.
I agree with Henry that working with notation software helps with composing. It has really changed my composition approach especially in terms of creating good melodies. I find I'm thinking actually more in terms of counterpoint interplay of individual lines.
Jay
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My vote is Finale Printmusic. In my opinion it's the best for the money. Best, for me, means that it works and is capable of producing professional looking charts (like I'm going to write a freaking book).
More often than not, I'm notating parts and exporting them as midi files for instruments I don't play like piano, strings, and drums.
Wouldn't it be ironic if I used a keyboard to input the notes that will end up being played by a synth in my computer. So I never use an instrument to input the notes.
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I was thinking about Henry's observation regarding writing 'away from the computer' which is a wonderful skill to develop. One of the benefits of using notation software is that it is like "imprinting" such that notation becomes a fluent language graphically. Reinforces the pattern recognition.
Another benefit I find is the gratification of hearing the result - a kind of instant feedback. The orchestration possibilities and the creation of backing tracks are synergistic in developing an idea as well.
While nothing replaces a good musician, this is a fair approximation.
Which leads to another question. Would you ever envision using the tracks you create as recording takes? I would think probably not. I feel better using them to create an arrangement that I then record via guitar or synth.
jay
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I was thinking about Henry's observation regarding writing 'away from the computer' which is a wonderful skill to develop. One of the benefits of using notation software is that it is like "imprinting" such that notation becomes a fluent language graphically. Reinforces the pattern recognition.
Another benefit I find is the gratification of hearing the result - a kind of instant feedback. The orchestration possibilities and the creation of backing tracks are synergistic in developing an idea as well.
Ken, I've never tried Finale. Hiking the learning curve with Sibelius was quite enough. Worth it though.
While nothing replaces a good musician, this is a fair approximation.
Which leads to another question. Would you ever envision using the tracks you create as recording takes? I would think probably not. I feel better using them to create an arrangement that I then record via guitar or synth.
jay
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I use the notation to record from. Here's an example of something I wrote and then used the piano and flute from the notation as part of a recording to create a demo for the band I was in. (This was done in sibelius).
Originally Posted by targuit
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I'm sure Sibelius does the job as well as Finale. Originally Posted by targuit
The tracks I create with notation->midi are used in demos of original pop songs. The parts are usually simple and/or repetitive. But if you are careful to include dynamic markings and further tweak the velocities and timing in the midi editor, then they sound quite natural.
If it's jazz or anything to be played live, then I'm usually just making a lead sheet or chord chart, not a full arrangement. The owner of the studio where I work uses Finale to score vocal harmonies and string parts for recording with live players.
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fep, that's a good example of how I use Finale. That's a good tune and a good mix of live and midi parts.
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Finale here, used it for LOTS of years.
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I don't get it. If it works -- big if -- the guitar puts a note on the score. Where's the latency? You mean the note gets put on the wrong beat in the score? Wrong duration? Originally Posted by targuit
My experience has been only with inputting with a keyboard, which gets down a fleeting idea, usually for horns and strings. Even then I almost always have to go into the score and tweak it. Originally Posted by targuit
For guitar ideas, I usually play it about 50 times till I have it memorized, then write it, then tweak it. For me it's a lot of work with tied notes, anticipation, etc. trying to get the score to where it plays back halfway decently. To take it to the level where the playback of the score sounds like a live guitar is way too much work and has little point.
I think it will be a long time before there is recording/score creation software that comes close to notating all the nuances as played, and bottom line, that's what the guitar is for.
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I mostly enter from a computer keyboard.
Sometimes I enter from a musical keyboard/synth. When using Sibelius 6 entering from a music keyboard is especially handy when entering block chords for horn sections. There is a plug-in that will explode the one stave of block chords and move each voice to a seperate stave for each of the instruments, in each instruments transposing key (or concert, you can toggle back and forth). This is a really fast way to enter horn section parts.
When entering notes from a midi device like a musical keyboard, unless you can play with robotic percision, you need to set the resolution. For example, you might set it to eighth notes or swing eighth notes. Then when you play the part everything will be quantized to the nearest eighth note. And, it will still notate the longer notes... like half notes, whole notes etc.
You probably wouldn't want the software to notate all the nuances of the performance, that would make it extremely difficult to read... it would be too much information on the score.Last edited by fep; 11-24-2013 at 01:48 PM.
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Ron, to be clearer, there is a Roland device, the GI-20, which transmits just the midi data and may be acceptable. In choosing which to purchase, I got the GR-20, the full synth. But in any case these devices may now be super ceded by the Midi Guitar device, for which you do not need the special hexaphonic pickup required for the Rolands. Setting the resolution parameters is tricky, at least on the old G7 version of Sibelius, which was a fraction of the cost of the full Sibelius package. The newest editions of Sibelius may work better.
I have to admit I remain a bit deluded about guitar synths. Expensive toys that don't work that well.
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Guitar Pro is quite good for guitarists...:-)
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Guitar Pro is excellent for guitar and basic backing tracks.
I use Studio One as a DAW because it came free with my interface. That allows you to spiff up the backing tracks a bit.
Now I am into making spiffy backing tracks and so avoid Band In A Box because their hide the weenie marketing offends me.
You can take music written in notation in Guitar Pro and export it as MIDI, then import it into the DAW. But then you want to change something. I find editing MIDI to be a royal PITA so I have to go back to Guitar Pro, re-note, re-export, and re-import.
Presonus has bought the company that makes "Notion" and has a special offer for the next couple days, $50. They claim you can edit MIDI and notation on the same page. They say a lot of things. Like Band In A Box, and most people in this marketplace, they are practiced deceivers. But they do deliver a certain amount of value and $50 isn't a lot. Why doesn't someone buy it and report back?
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What is this "hide the weenie marketing"? I don't know that term. Am I the only one that doesn't know what that means?
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No you're not the only one....I don't know what it means either. Originally Posted by fep
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I've never heard it either.
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