Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
On Mar 16, 2010, at 7:05 PM, John Howell wrote: Not at all, Jef. It's a plain fact that a number of pieces were once considered unplayable, until a new generation of players came along and took them up as a matter of course. I heard that Monteverdi's string players griped when he asked them to do pizzicato. Or is that just a myth? mdl ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
On Wed, March 17, 2010 12:29 am, Michael Greensill wrote: Now, after about 100 years, if we could just get string sections to learn how to swing.. [Coffee-Sputter] Maybe Dudamel will. I had one conductor explain to me that string players are so driven to be in tune and to play together that asking them to engage in the imprecision of swing violated this basic drive. Hey, it's just what I was told. Dennis ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
Dennis Bathory-Kitsz wrote: On Wed, March 17, 2010 12:29 am, Michael Greensill wrote: Now, after about 100 years, if we could just get string sections to learn how to swing.. [Coffee-Sputter] Maybe Dudamel will. I had one conductor explain to me that string players are so driven to be in tune and to play together that asking them to engage in the imprecision of swing violated this basic drive. Hey, it's just what I was told. P.S. -- it's a good thing nobody ever told Nelson Riddle that string players can't swing! -- David H. Bailey dhbai...@davidbaileymusicstudio.com ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
On Wed, March 17, 2010 7:16 am, dhbailey wrote: On the other hand, in my opinion, the reality of the situation is that string players can't swing because nobody's taught them how. Nobody's made them play swing music. It's not that they can't, they just need to learn. This makes no sense to me. How could string players have missed this? Doesn't everybody playing any instrument play at least a little pop or jazz -- even to earn supplementary income -- if they were born after, say, 1930? No? Yes? I'm not really in touch with the lives of string players, but still... Dennis ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
Dennis Bathory-Kitsz wrote: On Wed, March 17, 2010 7:16 am, dhbailey wrote: On the other hand, in my opinion, the reality of the situation is that string players can't swing because nobody's taught them how. Nobody's made them play swing music. It's not that they can't, they just need to learn. This makes no sense to me. How could string players have missed this? Doesn't everybody playing any instrument play at least a little pop or jazz -- even to earn supplementary income -- if they were born after, say, 1930? No? Yes? I'm not really in touch with the lives of string players, but still... No -- most school and youth orchestras don't do swing stuff, sticking to the classics instead. And in most private string lessons, they're often studying with string teachers who have never had to swing and have never been interested in it so the teachers don't expose their students to it. The lucky students will study with teachers who will say, now that you've got a good handle on the classical repertoire listen to how Stephane Grappelli and Joe Venuti and Ray Nance have handled the violin in the jazz world. Now listen to what Jean-Luc Ponty showed the world back in the 1970s. And listen to the Kronos Quartet and hear how diversified their styles are. Now let's learn how to swing. But that sort of teacher is all too rare in the string world. -- David H. Bailey dhbai...@davidbaileymusicstudio.com ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
On 17 Mar 2010, at 10:46 AM, Dennis Bathory-Kitsz wrote: This makes no sense to me. How could string players have missed this? Doesn't everybody playing any instrument play at least a little pop or jazz -- even to earn supplementary income -- if they were born after, say, 1930? No? Yes? Yes. However, expectations are extremely low. Part of this is just a fundamental lack of respect for nonclassical music. I suspect most orchestral string players have no idea how terrible they sound playing jazz rhythms or pop rhythms -- and if they do realize it, they simply don't care. As far as they are concerned, that music is beneath them. They are wholly uninterested in putting even a minimum of effort into it -- say, picking up recordings of the Walter Page-Jo Jones edition of the Count Basie band and trying to play along with Lester Young's solos, imitating his phrasing and vibrato (which is easily translatable to string instruments). And even if one person is willing to do a little homework, getting the entire section to do it? Fuhgeddaboudit. Also, I hate to say it, but even the most well-intentioned players, who have an authentic love and respect for swinging jazz or hard-grooving RB or rock, *vastly* underestimate the difficulty of playing that kind of music convincingly. It is comparable to learning a foreign language, in terms of the time investment required, the benefits of early immersion, and the telltale accent that is almost impossible for non-native speakers to get rid of. The other, more fundamental, problem is a lack of emotional connection to the beat, which is endemic in classical circles. It's changing -- the generation of classically-trained players in their 20's and 30's is *much* better about this, judging by NYC new music circles at least -- but for the most part, older orchestral players are incapable of playing music that demands rhythmic authority or the ability to control placement in relation to a regular pulse. They don't hear it and they don't feel it. But it's hard to swing if you can't play four consistent quarter notes in a row. Cheers, - DJA - WEB: http://www.secretsocietymusic.org ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
At 9:29 PM -0700 3/16/10, Michael Greensill wrote: It's a plain fact that a number of pieces were once considered unplayable, until a new generation of players came along and took them up as a matter of course. Now, after about 100 years, if we could just get string sections to learn how to swing.. The difficult we do immediately. The impossible takes a little longer, --American CBs, WW II -- John R. Howell, Assoc. Prof. of Music Virginia Tech Department of Music College of Liberal Arts Human Sciences Blacksburg, Virginia, U.S.A. 24061-0240 Vox (540) 231-8411 Fax (540) 231-5034 (mailto:john.how...@vt.edu) http://www.music.vt.edu/faculty/howell/howell.html We never play anything the same way once. Shelly Manne's definition of jazz musicians. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
[Finale] Finale Preferences Tip (Mac)
Chuck Israels wrote in another thread: I had re-built the prefs, but I may need to do it again, if only I could remember where they are kept, so I could trash them! I know you already solved this, but I'll take the opportunity to pass out a useful tip about the preference file. 1) Many users find that the Finale preference file gets corrupted more often than it should. When you start Finale for the first time, it will make a preference file in this location: ~:Library:Preferences:Finale 2010 Preferences (Note that ~ refers to Your hard drive name:Users:Your user name) 2) If you copy or move that file to the Finale application folder, Finale will use that preference file instead. Macintosh HD:Applications:Finale 2010:Finale 2010 Preferences (If you changed the name of your hard drive or moved your Finale application folder, then the path would also have to change accordingly.) 3) Make a copy of the preference file in the Finale application folder (once you've got all the settings the way you want) and then zip or stuff it. Macintosh HD:Applications:Finale 2010:Finale 2010 Preferences.zip (You now have the preference file in your Finale application folder as well as a compressed archive copy in the same folder.) 4) When your preference file goes bad again, and it will, simply unzip your archived copy of the preference file. It should then replace the faulty preference file. (Depending on your archiving program preferences, your original zipped or stuffed file might get trashed, so make sure you keep a copy of the archive before unstuffing or unzipping it.) 5) Finale will only use the preference file that has the proper name. In the case of Finale 2010, the file name needs to be Finale 2010 Preferences and nothing else! -Randolph Peters ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
Darcy, I'm leaving your response intact. It's a revelation -- thanks very much for this explanation. It makes great sense. (Even as a longtime nonpop composer, I've had a similar and deep longtime love of jazz -- my very first jazz album was Coltrane's Ascension ... yes, when it was brand new. I was hooked.) Dennis On Wed, March 17, 2010 11:14 am, Darcy James Argue wrote: On 17 Mar 2010, at 10:46 AM, Dennis Bathory-Kitsz wrote: This makes no sense to me. How could string players have missed this? Doesn't everybody playing any instrument play at least a little pop or jazz -- even to earn supplementary income -- if they were born after, say, 1930? No? Yes? Yes. However, expectations are extremely low. Part of this is just a fundamental lack of respect for nonclassical music. I suspect most orchestral string players have no idea how terrible they sound playing jazz rhythms or pop rhythms -- and if they do realize it, they simply don't care. As far as they are concerned, that music is beneath them. They are wholly uninterested in putting even a minimum of effort into it -- say, picking up recordings of the Walter Page-Jo Jones edition of the Count Basie band and trying to play along with Lester Young's solos, imitating his phrasing and vibrato (which is easily translatable to string instruments). And even if one person is willing to do a little homework, getting the entire section to do it? Fuhgeddaboudit. Also, I hate to say it, but even the most well-intentioned players, who have an authentic love and respect for swinging jazz or hard-grooving RB or rock, *vastly* underestimate the difficulty of playing that kind of music convincingly. It is comparable to learning a foreign language, in terms of the time investment required, the benefits of early immersion, and the telltale accent that is almost impossible for non-native speakers to get rid of. The other, more fundamental, problem is a lack of emotional connection to the beat, which is endemic in classical circles. It's changing -- the generation of classically-trained players in their 20's and 30's is *much* better about this, judging by NYC new music circles at least -- but for the most part, older orchestral players are incapable of playing music that demands rhythmic authority or the ability to control placement in relation to a regular pulse. They don't hear it and they don't feel it. But it's hard to swing if you can't play four consistent quarter notes in a row. Cheers, - DJA - WEB: http://www.secretsocietymusic.org ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
At 11:53 PM -0700 3/16/10, Mark D Lew wrote: On Mar 16, 2010, at 7:05 PM, John Howell wrote: Not at all, Jef. It's a plain fact that a number of pieces were once considered unplayable, until a new generation of players came along and took them up as a matter of course. I heard that Monteverdi's string players griped when he asked them to do pizzicato. Or is that just a myth? That's probably a myth, since lute, bass lute, and a whole bunch of other plucked stringed instruments were in common use and he would have been imitating them, but he was the first to write bowed tremolo (measured, not unmeasured, just as trills were measured in his day) in his Madrigals of War and Love of the late 1630s, and the fiddlers might have taken exception to that. What we have to remember is that violin in the early 17th century was still considered a dance band instrument, with about the same social status as the sax in the early 20th century, and the players weren't yet the stuck up guys we are today! John -- John R. Howell, Assoc. Prof. of Music Virginia Tech Department of Music College of Liberal Arts Human Sciences Blacksburg, Virginia, U.S.A. 24061-0240 Vox (540) 231-8411 Fax (540) 231-5034 (mailto:john.how...@vt.edu) http://www.music.vt.edu/faculty/howell/howell.html We never play anything the same way once. Shelly Manne's definition of jazz musicians. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] Finale Preferences Tip (Mac)
Hi Randolph, Thank you - I used to do what you suggest all the time, but since I have refrained from resizing/shaping the tool pallet, the preferences hardly get corrupted, and I have stopped taking the trouble. I wonder if the tool pallet issue has been repaired, so I think I will do as you suggest and then try to move the tools around to see what happens. At least I will be well prepared in the event of a corruption. Thanks, Chuck On Mar 17, 2010, at 8:21 AM, Randolph Peters wrote: Chuck Israels wrote in another thread: I had re-built the prefs, but I may need to do it again, if only I could remember where they are kept, so I could trash them! I know you already solved this, but I'll take the opportunity to pass out a useful tip about the preference file. 1) Many users find that the Finale preference file gets corrupted more often than it should. When you start Finale for the first time, it will make a preference file in this location: ~:Library:Preferences:Finale 2010 Preferences (Note that ~ refers to Your hard drive name:Users:Your user name) 2) If you copy or move that file to the Finale application folder, Finale will use that preference file instead. Macintosh HD:Applications:Finale 2010:Finale 2010 Preferences (If you changed the name of your hard drive or moved your Finale application folder, then the path would also have to change accordingly.) 3) Make a copy of the preference file in the Finale application folder (once you've got all the settings the way you want) and then zip or stuff it. Macintosh HD:Applications:Finale 2010:Finale 2010 Preferences.zip (You now have the preference file in your Finale application folder as well as a compressed archive copy in the same folder.) 4) When your preference file goes bad again, and it will, simply unzip your archived copy of the preference file. It should then replace the faulty preference file. (Depending on your archiving program preferences, your original zipped or stuffed file might get trashed, so make sure you keep a copy of the archive before unstuffing or unzipping it.) 5) Finale will only use the preference file that has the proper name. In the case of Finale 2010, the file name needs to be Finale 2010 Preferences and nothing else! -Randolph Peters ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale Chuck Israels 230 North Garden Terrace Bellingham, WA 98225-5836 phone (360) 671-3402 fax (360) 676-6055 www.chuckisraels.com ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
At 7:16 AM -0400 3/17/10, dhbailey wrote: When I conducted a community orchestra, we were going to do a Sinatra medley, and as expected, the orchestra couldn't swing. I explained things and they began to get it but still weren't fully loosening up. Finally I simply brought in some recordings of the original tunes and told them Now that you have the beginnings of an understanding, listen to this and then we'll try to copy it. They got it right away after that, and the following year it was much easier to do similar music. Well-put, David. Basic educational psychology: first we hear and then imitate. Only much later to we see and then interpret, based on what we first heard. Works for language, works for music. Similarly, I teach the historically-naïve string players (and wind players for that matter) in my Early Music Ensemble how to play proper baroque trills and appoggiaturas, and they start doing it at sight once they understand the differences. Proper baroque articulations with the bow are a little harder to get across, and so is playing with notes inegals (which is not QUITE the same thing as swing--more like an Irish fiddler's lilt). John -- John R. Howell, Assoc. Prof. of Music Virginia Tech Department of Music College of Liberal Arts Human Sciences Blacksburg, Virginia, U.S.A. 24061-0240 Vox (540) 231-8411 Fax (540) 231-5034 (mailto:john.how...@vt.edu) http://www.music.vt.edu/faculty/howell/howell.html We never play anything the same way once. Shelly Manne's definition of jazz musicians. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
At 10:46 AM -0400 3/17/10, Dennis Bathory-Kitsz wrote: On Wed, March 17, 2010 7:16 am, dhbailey wrote: On the other hand, in my opinion, the reality of the situation is that string players can't swing because nobody's taught them how. Nobody's made them play swing music. It's not that they can't, they just need to learn. This makes no sense to me. How could string players have missed this? Doesn't everybody playing any instrument play at least a little pop or jazz -- No. even to earn supplementary income -- if they were born after, say, 1930? No? Yes? Oh, I did some dance band playing back in the '50s, but not on a stringed instrument. And through the late '50s and '60s I often worked with top notch jazz players, so I can't claim to be ignorant of the style and yes, I think I can swing on viola as well as the next guy (but not improv), but for a serious string player that side of the business might as well not exist. Same thing for classical pianists, practicing Beethoven in their little practice rooms. I'm not really in touch with the lives of string players, but still... Well, anyone who's had occasion to work in commercial music, sure, but there aren't as many of those as you might think, and let's face it, when a recording session calls for a string section, it's isn't so they can swing, it's so they can sound like a symphony string section! Back in the '70s, a pair of good friends and colleagues in Indianapolis were both cellists. The wife played in the Symphony (and still does), and couldn't swing at all. The husband couldn't stand orchestra playing, but was one of the 1st-call cellists for recording sessions and could play anything you put in front of him. And this is in the same family! John -- John R. Howell, Assoc. Prof. of Music Virginia Tech Department of Music College of Liberal Arts Human Sciences Blacksburg, Virginia, U.S.A. 24061-0240 Vox (540) 231-8411 Fax (540) 231-5034 (mailto:john.how...@vt.edu) http://www.music.vt.edu/faculty/howell/howell.html We never play anything the same way once. Shelly Manne's definition of jazz musicians. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
At 11:14 AM -0400 3/17/10, Darcy James Argue wrote: Part of this is just a fundamental lack of respect for nonclassical music. All too true. In fact we have an influential minority on our own music faculty who feel exactly this way. Some will unbend for jazz (although they wouldn't want their daughter to marry one!), and some won't, but they actively oppose any commercial music (the kind you can make a living from!). And I think that's typical of most college music faculties. (Although as a matter of fact our cello teacher, who's a terrific all-around musician, happens to be a jazz guy!) Also, I hate to say it, but even the most well-intentioned players, who have an authentic love and respect for swinging jazz or hard-grooving RB or rock, *vastly* underestimate the difficulty of playing that kind of music convincingly. It is comparable to learning a foreign language, in terms of the time investment required, the benefits of early immersion, and the telltale accent that is almost impossible for non-native speakers to get rid of. Beautifully put, Darcy. I couldn't agree more!! Especially about the accent, which I'd never thought of but which I can sure hear. John -- John R. Howell, Assoc. Prof. of Music Virginia Tech Department of Music College of Liberal Arts Human Sciences Blacksburg, Virginia, U.S.A. 24061-0240 Vox (540) 231-8411 Fax (540) 231-5034 (mailto:john.how...@vt.edu) http://www.music.vt.edu/faculty/howell/howell.html We never play anything the same way once. Shelly Manne's definition of jazz musicians. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
On 17 Mar 2010 at 11:14, Darcy James Argue wrote: The other, more fundamental, problem is a lack of emotional connection to the beat, which is endemic in classical circles. It's changing -- the generation of classically-trained players in their 20's and 30's is *much* better about this, judging by NYC new music circles at least -- but for the most part, older orchestral players are incapable of playing music that demands rhythmic authority or the ability to control placement in relation to a regular pulse. They don't hear it and they don't feel it. But it's hard to swing if you can't play four consistent quarter notes in a row. I would say that the problem you've described quite eloquently is the reason so many traditional classical musicians can't play their *own* repertory in a way that is the slightest bit interesting. I hate to slag my own alma mater, but last night I listened to the Pipe Dreams broadcast for the week, which features a 2006 Bach birthday celebration from Oberlin (http://pipedreams.publicradio.org/). The performances by the students (not all on organ) sound timid and careful, as though someone advised them to take no risks since it was a radio broadcast. A few are very, very good, but most are just not interesting, even though there's an awful lot of beautiful stuff going on at the small- scale phrasing and articulation level. A perfect example of not getting it is clear from comparing the two continuo pieces, the first an aria from a Bach cantata, the second a trio sonata (not necessarily by Bach, actually). There is just no comparison -- the two continuo players in the first are wooden, contributing nothing at all to the forward movement of the piece (in fact, holding it back, I'd argue), while the second continuo group is the best part of the performance, tons of nuance and forward movement throughout (though in that case, the poor harpsichordist is almost inaudible), while the two mis-matched violins have some lovely moments, but little in the way of large-scale momentum. Some of the pieces played on the concert are incredibly exciting and wild on paper, but you wouldn't know it from the way these students perform it. I don't know if my memory is faulty or not, but back in my day, the playing was messier, but there was a lot more risk taking so that performances were lively and *exciting*. Notes were missed, but the music wasn't. And it's rhythm that's the issue here when you're talking about an instrument that can't do anything with loud/soft note-to-note. It's all about articulations, agogics and small-scale rhythmic adjustments to give the illusion of dynamic shape within a line. I was very disappointed. On the other hand, my teaching at NYU (ended in 2002, so not really current) showed me a change in students from rebels against their teachers to compliant sheep who just wanted to know what the teacher wanted. At NYU this also happened at the same time as a quantum leap in the quality of students, and a transition from a glorified commuter school to a near Ivy-level national university. My students in the early 90s didn't know anything about poetry, but they sure knew how they felt about music. My students in my last years of teaching knew all about poetry but didn't have any opinions they were willing to express or argue for. Give me the first batch of students any day! But maybe what I observed was a cultural change and the timid Oberlin student performances are just a very high-level instance of the same thing. In the end, though, I really do think it comes down to rhythm as the thing that makes compelling music making, despite the traditional overemphasis on pitches and harmonies in the way students are taught about music. It is, perhaps, a case where the oral tradition has been lost but the old-fashioned teaching methods that ignored rhythm because students just had it naturally are still used despite the fact the students don't have it any more. -- David W. Fentonhttp://dfenton.com David Fenton Associates http://dfenton.com/DFA/ ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
On 17 Mar 2010 at 12:12, John Howell wrote: Proper baroque articulations with the bow are a little harder to get across, and so is playing with notes inegals (which is not QUITE the same thing as swing--more like an Irish fiddler's lilt). I don't know what that latter style is (I'm not a fan of the repertory), but I despair over the brain-dead misunderstanding of notes inegals. The main point is not alteration of the rhythmic values but of the weighting of the notes. The slight alteration of the lengths of the notes is a side effect of the weighting, and will be perceived even when it's not there. And those players who can't do it except with 2:1 ratio between the strong/weak notes (and I mean in length, not weight) drive me crazy (most of them are keyboard players, because they have to do it with articulation alone, since they can't do it with weight). The other thing that gets my goat is that so many players don't understand that the amount of inegal is VARIABLE, and that variability is an expressive tool that allows the performer all sorts of variety of expression. But, again, this bumps up against the problem that a lot of unimaginative people have, that they want a cut- and-dried solution to a problem, and don't want to have to experiment or interpret to find the best solution. And, of course, the notes inegal problem and the swing problem are virtually identical. But, like A415, a wrong view of what is correct seems to have ossified in the Early Music world. The A415 compromise is a pragmatic one, and maybe the 2:1 inegal is also practical for professional groups that don't have rehearsal time, but both are historically wrong and lead to performances that lack the nuance and color that would be possible with more flexible approaches to the style. -- David W. Fentonhttp://dfenton.com David Fenton Associates http://dfenton.com/DFA/ ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
Hi David, Fascinating -- I know nothing about the notes inegal problem but your description of it makes it sound very familiar. What's most frustrating about the swing problem, though, is that sure, it's an oral tradition, but it's an aural tradition that is *very well documented on recordings.* And yet people persist in putting that horrifying Swing (two eighths = triplet quarter, triplet eighth) indication on charts -- or worse, actually playing it that way. Again, one listen to any pre-1941 Lester Young solo (many of which are collected and transcribed here, with commentary from the great Lee Konitz: http://thebadplus.typepad.com/dothemath/2009/08/1-18-with-lee-k.html) ought to be all it takes for anyone to realize (A) that the purported 2:1 swing ratio is complete BS, and (B) there is a huge difference in rhythmic placement between playing *anticipations* and playing *lines* -- there is no one-size-fits all solution. But it's hard enough getting student jazz musicians to wrap their heads around this distinction -- and if they can't do it, how are you going to get classical musicians to do it? Cheers, - DJA - WEB: http://www.secretsocietymusic.org On 17 Mar 2010, at 1:17 PM, David W. Fenton wrote: On 17 Mar 2010 at 12:12, John Howell wrote: Proper baroque articulations with the bow are a little harder to get across, and so is playing with notes inegals (which is not QUITE the same thing as swing--more like an Irish fiddler's lilt). I don't know what that latter style is (I'm not a fan of the repertory), but I despair over the brain-dead misunderstanding of notes inegals. The main point is not alteration of the rhythmic values but of the weighting of the notes. The slight alteration of the lengths of the notes is a side effect of the weighting, and will be perceived even when it's not there. And those players who can't do it except with 2:1 ratio between the strong/weak notes (and I mean in length, not weight) drive me crazy (most of them are keyboard players, because they have to do it with articulation alone, since they can't do it with weight). The other thing that gets my goat is that so many players don't understand that the amount of inegal is VARIABLE, and that variability is an expressive tool that allows the performer all sorts of variety of expression. But, again, this bumps up against the problem that a lot of unimaginative people have, that they want a cut- and-dried solution to a problem, and don't want to have to experiment or interpret to find the best solution. And, of course, the notes inegal problem and the swing problem are virtually identical. But, like A415, a wrong view of what is correct seems to have ossified in the Early Music world. The A415 compromise is a pragmatic one, and maybe the 2:1 inegal is also practical for professional groups that don't have rehearsal time, but both are historically wrong and lead to performances that lack the nuance and color that would be possible with more flexible approaches to the style. -- David W. Fentonhttp://dfenton.com David Fenton Associates http://dfenton.com/DFA/ ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
[Finale] Finale 2009 and full GPO
To the collective wisdom: I've got these (FinMac2009 and full GPO with Aria player). How do I get the KS to work? I know that using the setup wizard automatically loads the notation version of GPO. And that arco and pizz and tremolo will trigger those in the strings. But how about things like flute vibrato on/off and fluttertongue? Any help would be appreciated! David Froom ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
On 17 Mar 2010 at 13:52, Darcy James Argue wrote: Fascinating -- I know nothing about the notes inegal problem but your description of it makes it sound very familiar. I hear the same familiarity whenever I hear y'all despairing over swing. What's most frustrating about the swing problem, though, is that sure, it's an oral tradition, but it's an aural tradition that is *very well documented on recordings.* This is one case where there's a lot less excuse for those who can't swing as opposed to those who can't play notes inegal -- we really don't know exactly what it sound like because all we have are written- down descriptions of how it was to be done (and many of those are contradictory). And yet people persist in putting that horrifying Swing (two eighths = triplet quarter, triplet eighth) indication on charts -- or worse, actually playing it that way. I grew up playing in high school band (percussion) and stage band (piano) thinking that's the way it worked, and it wasn't until I was an adult and had taken up a stringed instrument that I developed the perception necessary to hear the variety of emphasis and duration in swing. Over my musical lifetime, I've had various levels of aha! moments where I developed perceptions that were earlier lacking, and that then enabled me to appreciate things I'd previously been unable to hear. My best example of this is one of my earliest (but I've had waves of them since): Back in high school I recall thinking that I was playing Chopin almost as well as Artur Rubinstein. This was, of course, completely ludicrous. I wasn't even close. But in terms of what *I* heard in Rubinstein's playing, I was doing all of it and more! The number of things I wasn't hearing was huge. Only later on did I develop the awareness of all the nuances that allowed me to hear what Rubinstein was doing that was well beyond anything I was capable of (then or now). You can't play what you don't hear. And I think that's the issue with a lot of the players who can't swing, whether that be in jazz or French baroque. Again, one listen to any pre-1941 Lester Young solo (many of which are collected and transcribed here, with commentary from the great Lee Konitz: http://thebadplus.typepad.com/dothemath/2009/08/1-18-with-lee-k.html) ought to be all it takes for anyone to realize (A) that the purported 2:1 swing ratio is complete BS, and (B) there is a huge difference in rhythmic placement between playing *anticipations* and playing *lines* -- there is no one-size-fits all solution. But it's hard enough getting student jazz musicians to wrap their heads around this distinction -- and if they can't do it, how are you going to get classical musicians to do it? In playing a stringed instrument, the most important thing of all is bow control (at least, so it seems to me). But most of the teaching (arguably) is about the left hand (pitch) and bow direction (up or down bow), with, I think, insufficient emphasis on bow speed and bow division (the amount of bow used for each note -- for instance, in a quarter / two eighths passage, theoretically, the quarter note would use twice as much bow as each of the 8ths, though it actually is more logarithmic, and the quarter uses roughly 4 times the bow (or more) as the 8ths). My viol teacher often gets undergrad students taking up the viol after studying cello or violin for years, but they've never heard a thing from any of their teachers about bow division! And they end up giving up the viol quickly, since it turns out to be much, much harder than they thought (they often imagine they can just pick it up and play at a high level because it's just another stringed instrument). And that's even before they get to the issues of playing musical styles they don't know (their heads explode when they have to play in a viol consort, reading polyphonic music in 4/2 -- they can't count and they keep getting thrown off by the rhythmic independence of the individual lines; and don't get me started on Baroque ornamentation, another topic that floors them). In jazz, I suspect there's a similar issue with tonguing, phrasing and breath -- not that these things are not taught, but that they are *hard* to execute sensitively, and that those who can't play with this level of nuance often lack it because they don't perceive it in the models they are listening to. Exactly *how* you teach their ears to hear what they don't already perceive is a conundrum -- having them listen to good models is not going to accomplish much if they can't perceive the desired result in the models (or if they their ears shoehorn all swing into the 2:1 ratio because that's the only model they have in their heads, even when there's a huge amount of subtlety and nuance in what they are listening to). -- David W. Fentonhttp://dfenton.com David Fenton Associates http://dfenton.com/DFA/
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
On Mar 17, 2010, at 11:22 AM, David W. Fenton wrote: (the amount of bow used for each note -- for instance, in a quarter / two eighths passage, theoretically, the quarter note would use twice as much bow as each of the 8ths, though it actually is more logarithmic, and the quarter uses roughly 4 times the bow (or more) as the 8ths). Many good points by made by Darcy and David. It is indeed impossible to teach swing nuances to those who don't hear and digest them. About the portion of David's points quoted above: fast notes are perceived as louder than slow (longer values) ones, - so, proportionally, more bow is needed. At least that is my experience. Chuck Chuck Israels 230 North Garden Terrace Bellingham, WA 98225-5836 phone (360) 671-3402 fax (360) 676-6055 www.chuckisraels.com ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
Wow! A new word every day. I had to look up inegalnot easy, it turns out it's a French word and we need the accent on the e. But here's a site that explains it and gives musical examples and mentions swing! http://www.dolmetsch.com/musictheory20.htm I've very much enjoyed the intelligent comments on strings and swing. I get to do quite a lot of Symphony Pops charts and I've found the only phrasing for a whole section that can vaguely pass muster in the swing department is to write quarter note triplets against a 4/4 rhythm. The fundamental thing about string sections is that they watch the damned conductor instead of listening to the drummer! I was lucky enough to get to write some charts for the Kronos on one of my wife's CD's and they swing OK but nowhere near as much as The Turtle Island folks. If you have any interest you can follow the score and listen by going herehttp://www.mikegreensill.com/pages/services.html# Mike G. www.mikegreensill.com ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
On 17 Mar 2010 at 11:46, Chuck Israels wrote: On Mar 17, 2010, at 11:22 AM, David W. Fenton wrote: (the amount of bow used for each note -- for instance, in a quarter / two eighths passage, theoretically, the quarter note would use twice as much bow as each of the 8ths, though it actually is more logarithmic, and the quarter uses roughly 4 times the bow (or more) as the 8ths). Many good points by made by Darcy and David. It is indeed impossible to teach swing nuances to those who don't hear and digest them. About the portion of David's points quoted above: fast notes are perceived as louder than slow (longer values) ones, - so, proportionally, more bow is needed. At least that is my experience. I assume you mean that the longer notes need more bow to get the same perceived dynamic level. That's one of the elements, but there's also a very pragmatic one. If you use the same amount of bow for a quarter note as for a half note, the quarter note will be MUCH louder than the half note (more bow in the same time period increases the amplitude of the vibrations, i.e., it's louder). If you use the same bow *speed*, you'll use less bow for the shorter note, since it will travel have as far in half the time. One has to plan all these things in your bowing so you don't end up at the tip of the bow or at the frog, with no bow left to play the upcoming notes (leaving out the compensating bow stroke, of course). For the experienced player, these things are second nature. For the player who has never been taught them, some of it likely comes naturally (the mechanics force you to do some of it), but it's not going to be subtle, and it's going to result in some notes sticking out that shouldn't. Swing and inegal put another layer of bow control on top of what's necessary just to play the right rhythms and dynamic levels. And none of that is even discussing how you shorten notes (e.g., staccato), whether you stop the bow to stop the note, or whether you taper the note sufficiently to make it sound detached without actually stopping the bow (and all the gradations combining varying degrees of those possibilities), all of which has a lot to do with perceived weight/duration. All of this has to be learned to the point that it is second nature (just like good intonation, which has to be physically second nature - - a good ear doesn't cut it except in learning how to be mechanically reliable and in adjusting to tuning flux in the ensemble, e.g., lowering the thirds of chords, making 5ths pure, etc.). This is not something you can layer on mechanically after having the mechanism explained to you! My judgment of modern string players is that in general they are taught rather crude bowing principles (and good string players go way beyond the simple rules to make very subtle variations that are outside what's taught in the crude rules), and some percentage of players never quite get beyond those simple rules, unfortunately. If all they know are those crude rules, you're never going to get them to swing (whether in jazz or French Baroque) -- they simply don't have the technical subtlety necessary to execute it (even when they can perceive it). I don't know if things are worse today than they used to be, but I can say that a lot of older recordings and recordings of performers who were trained in the early 20th century are much more subtle in their bowing (while also less accurate in pitch/rhythm) than more recently-trained players. It also seems to me that there's something of a separate playing style taught for orchestral playing, but I'm really stretching on that one (and betraying my prejudices, many of which perhaps developed because I've never worked directly with high- level orchestras), and that style seems to me to reflect a certain attitude among string players that orchestral playing is an inferior form of music-making in comparison to solo playing and chamber music. Add in the disdain that a lot of pro-level string players have for musicology and early music and you end up with a pretty dismal standard of playing. But I'm digressing here. Sturgeon's Law surely applies everywhere... -- David W. Fentonhttp://dfenton.com David Fenton Associates http://dfenton.com/DFA/ ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
At 1:17 PM -0400 3/17/10, David W. Fenton wrote: On 17 Mar 2010 at 12:12, John Howell wrote: Proper baroque articulations with the bow are a little harder to get across, and so is playing with notes inegals (which is not QUITE the same thing as swing--more like an Irish fiddler's lilt). I don't know what that latter style is (I'm not a fan of the repertory), but I despair over the brain-dead misunderstanding of notes inegals. The main point is not alteration of the rhythmic values but of the weighting of the notes. The slight alteration of the lengths of the notes is a side effect of the weighting, and will be perceived even when it's not there. ABSOLUTELY I've never read a clearer explanation. John Elliot Gardner did it in a very exaggerated way for the dance tune that ends Les sauvages in the DVD of Rameau's Les indes gallantes, and it works, but it isn't exactly subtle. (I just did that music on our last concert.) 'Way back when, my wife and I played the recorder parts on Brandenburg 4, and we decided to use weight-based inegals on the 8th notes in the slow movement. Hardly any rhythmic distortion at all. It worked beautifully, but the violin soloist would have none of it, so we had different nuances combined, and thankfully our conductor allowed it. The only reason I know about the lilt thing is that I got roped into playing on an historical reenactment film for the New Harmony Community in Southern Indiana. (They were a community that kept the men and women completely separated, and then couldn't figure out why they died out!) Two of us fiddlers were classically trained and the other two were folk fiddlers (not necessarily Irish). I was fascinated that all their bowings were the opposite of ours, and that the result was exactly the difference in weight you mention, although with classical technique it would have been the opposite. Very educational. John -- John R. Howell, Assoc. Prof. of Music Virginia Tech Department of Music College of Liberal Arts Human Sciences Blacksburg, Virginia, U.S.A. 24061-0240 Vox (540) 231-8411 Fax (540) 231-5034 (mailto:john.how...@vt.edu) http://www.music.vt.edu/faculty/howell/howell.html We never play anything the same way once. Shelly Manne's definition of jazz musicians. ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
On 17 Mar 2010 at 12:02, Michael Greensill wrote: Wow! A new word every day. I had to look up inegalnot easy, it turns out it's a French word and we need the accent on the e. But here's a site that explains it and gives musical examples and mentions swing! http://www.dolmetsch.com/musictheory20.htm Unfortunately, that article disseminates precisely the incorrect sense of inegal that I'm complaining about, i.e., that it's principally an alteration of duration (as opposed to principally a variation of weight, which secondarily alters either the perception or execution of the actual durations). It's surprising how much that short passage gets completely wrong (the sole musical example has zilch to do with inegal), and how much about the topic it omits entirely. For instance, the emphasis on the idea that it's mostly limited to slow movements is completely wrong. It happens in both slow and fast movements. And the old saw about French vs. Italian has been shown to be untrue (though the inegal practices were different for the two styles). Dolmetsch and his followers were early pioneers in trying to figure out how to perform early music, but much of their research has turned out to be incomplete and even misleading and wrong. It's more a starting point than an end point. That said, it's not clear to me what the source for the information on that website may be, i.e., if the name of the site has anything really to do with the lineage of the information conveyed there or not. I've very much enjoyed the intelligent comments on strings and swing. I get to do quite a lot of Symphony Pops charts and I've found the only phrasing for a whole section that can vaguely pass muster in the swing department is to write quarter note triplets against a 4/4 rhythm. The fundamental thing about string sections is that they watch the damned conductor instead of listening to the drummer! It's my guess that one of the reasons for the persistence of braindead 2:1 swing/inegal is that it's hard for a professional group to do anything more subtle than that in the scant rehearsal time available. -- David W. Fentonhttp://dfenton.com David Fenton Associates http://dfenton.com/DFA/ ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
[Finale] Print as PS / page size problem (Mac2009)
Can someone tell me the exact steps to get Finale to properly export a PDF or PS file with embedded EPS graphics? I'm still trying to figure out whether I should save the EPS (from InDesign) with a preview or not — or which kind of preview — but it seems I can't win with any settings. I've tried the following: — Save EPS with TIFF preview from ID. Place in Finale. I see the low-res TIFF preview in Finale, and it prints that way (to printer, to Save as PDF, and to Save as Adobe PDF ). — Save EPS without TIFF preview from ID. Place in Finale. I see the placeholder with the file name instead. That gets printed and PDFed. — Save as PostScript instead from Finale (as I understand this to be the general workaround for EPS trouble), then either let Preview or Acrobat make a PDF. The EPS now looks as it should, but the page size is off. It looks like 8.5x11 (parts are 10x13, so it's getting cut off on the sides), even though I don't have anything set to 8.5x11 that I'm aware of : Page Setup is 10x13, Page Format in Finale is 10x13 — where else is there a page size to set??? Getting very frustrated and don't have much time — hopefully the workaround is not too time-consuming as I don't want to jump through hoops with over 40 parts. Using Finale Mac 2009, under Snow Leopard. Thanks for any help, Rich ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
It's surprising how much that short passage gets completely wrong (the sole musical example has zilch to do with inegal), and how much about the topic it omits entirely. A good example of why the internet is about information and not knowledge. Thanks for putting us straight.if of course you're right :) Mike G. www.mikegreensill.com ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
On 17 Mar 2010 at 12:37, Michael Greensill wrote: It's surprising how much that short passage gets completely wrong (the sole musical example has zilch to do with inegal), and how much about the topic it omits entirely. A good example of why the internet is about information and not knowledge. Thanks for putting us straight.if of course you're right :) Well, in the case of the Handel, that's a notation issue, not an execution issue. They hadn't yet developed our modern notational convention for triplets -- they had a different convention, i.e., notating them as dotted eighth/sixteenth. In the context of a passage with triplets, performers would understand what to do. And there's no particularly subtlety involved (they are correct in the way they transcribe it). Pairing that with a discussion of inegal indicates exactly how wrong the explanation of inegal is, in that the only situation in which one would find anything in common between the two topics is if you erroneously equate inegal with triplets (i.e., changing the rhythmic value in a 2:1 ratio), and all the treatises on inegal will tell you that this is backwards, that inegal is about weight and not principally about duration. If you start from a correct understanding of inegal, there is no reason to throw in the Handel example here. I tried to locate a good example or proper inegal, but the MySpace videos I was looking at for seem reason kill my WiFi router, so I gave up! Maybe somebody else can offer up something to listen to... -- David W. Fentonhttp://dfenton.com David Fenton Associates http://dfenton.com/DFA/ ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
On Mar 17, 2010, at 2:22 PM, David W. Fenton wrote: This is one case where there's a lot less excuse for those who can't swing as opposed to those who can't play notes inegal -- we really don't know exactly what it sound like because all we have are written- down descriptions of how it was to be done (and many of those are contradictory). There's at least one exception to that. In an early-19th c. French book about the proper pinning of barrel organs, there's a detailed illustration of the pinning for a barrel to play the overture to The Marriage of Figaro. When the illustration is transcribed into MIDI and played back, the music turns out to be in very distinct (and rapid) notes inégales. If such performance was still common ca. 1820, then it seems to me that swing may very well be a direct continuation of the notes inégales tradition, via New Orleans. After all, only 30 years later Gottschalk was writing pieces that sound best when slightly swung, so such a connection is not at all implausible. (I have a CD of a German pianist playing Gottschalk w.o swing, and it is unbelievably stiff--like a mounted skeleton of the music.) Andrew Stiller Kallisti Music Press http://www.kallistimusic.com/ ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] OT: trying to upgrade browsers
Thanks once again to everybody responding to this thread. On Mar 16, 2010, at 2:07 PM, Bob Morabito wrote: Hi Andrew http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/otherversions/ Select an operating system: Select Mac OS X 10.1-10.3 Hit continue Then hit Agree and Install now When I click Continue, nothing happens. Andrew Stiller Kallisti Music Press http://www.kallistimusic.com/ ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] OT: trying to upgrade browsers
Hi Andrew, Try downloading Firefox first, then navigate to that website using Firefox. Cheers, - DJA - WEB: http://www.secretsocietymusic.org On 17 Mar 2010, at 4:31 PM, Andrew Stiller wrote: Thanks once again to everybody responding to this thread. On Mar 16, 2010, at 2:07 PM, Bob Morabito wrote: Hi Andrew http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/otherversions/ Select an operating system: Select Mac OS X 10.1-10.3 Hit continue Then hit Agree and Install now When I click Continue, nothing happens. Andrew Stiller Kallisti Music Press http://www.kallistimusic.com/ ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
Re: [Finale] composers and new effects
On 17 Mar 2010, at 21:28, Andrew Stiller wrote: There's at least one exception to that. In an early-19th c. French book about the proper pinning of barrel organs, there's a detailed illustration of the pinning for a barrel to play the overture to The Marriage of Figaro. When the illustration is transcribed into MIDI and played back, the music turns out to be in very distinct (and rapid) notes inégales. Fascinating. Do you know where I could find a copy of that MIDI file? Michael ___ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
