On 10-Dec-10, at 10-Dec-10 11:57 PM, Eric Dannewitz wrote:
On Dec 10, 2010, at 6:59 PM, John Howell wrote:
Right, IF the rental Agencies decide to provide digital orchestra
books. The same Agencies, of course, that are still sending out
books copied 60 years ago by the contractor's brother-in-law!
True, though I haven't seen a hand written theater score in a LONG
TIME......we'd have to go back to them late 90s I'd say when I
first started doing shows. I rack up about 8 to 10 theater gigs/
subbing things a year (we are talking different shows, not actual
number of times I go out and play). I haven't seen hand written
scores at all.
I'd hazard a guess that John plays a lot of original orchestrations,
while Eric plays a lot of remounts or reduced orchestrations, which
have been re-arranged for a smaller band. Even transpositions would
be done these days on computer, but these wouldn't necessarily find
their way back to the rental agency. I know because I did a couple of
these myself. You'd think the rental agency would want some nice
clean parts done for a small band that might enhance the chances the
show would be rented again, but no, they tend to leave those things
up to the renters.
The weirdest thing was that when I spoke to them on the phone, they
refused to furnish full scores, and told me that the terms of the
agreement prevented me from making ANY changes at all to the music in
any way! I pointed out to him that the producer had a signed contract
with all the terms laid out, which included him commissioning a re-
orchestration of the show for a smaller band. I also knew for a fact
that they had several different versions of some of the tunes in
different keys, because the official first-run version of the show
had different actors with different ranges from night to night, but I
couldn't get them to give me THOSE, either! I ended up working from
16 or so open parts books laid in a big semicircle around my desk. I
also didn't hand over my re-orchestrations when the run was finished,
and they never asked.
Christopher
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