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Old 06-26-2018, 06:37 PM
Sherry C's Avatar
Sherry C Sherry C is offline
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Default "Mini Guide": Tips for getting great sheets from "found" MIDI files

Hi friends,


I play in a big band and we sometimes use "found" or purchased MIDI files to create tailored charts for our band. I was just reviewing some files today for working into some Christmas numbers, and thought I'd put together some notes for others who may want to use this approach for getting some good sheet music. Most of these tips can be found elsewhere, or in the User Guides for Notation Composer and Notation Musician. I just thought I'd condense them into a little "mini guide."


This looks like a lot, but it's one of those cases where describing things takes a lot longer than actually just doing them once you know what to do

  • Removing "extraneous" staves: Some guys who do MIDI files put in all their "credits" in empty tracks (staves) so while those staves don't show up on the Conductor's Score (they have no notes), they do mess with the channel and instrument settings sometime when you're listening to the playback. If you play a file and it all sounds like a herd of pianos, this is most likely the reason. Just use Staff/Setup, and Delete any staves that don't have the box "In Part" checked for the "Conductor's score" part.
  • Transcription (eg. "swing" vs. "straight"): Composer can transcribe files a few different ways in order to make the sheet music more readable. For the "swinging" files, you'll want to use the Transcription option "Swing". If you open a file and you see a lot of triplets in it, try using Format/Retranscribe, and select "Swing" for the affected staves. It will typically look a lot nicer and be much easier to read. IMPORTANT: always check the notation first for this type of thing, because when you use Retranscribe, it will lose all the annotations (text, slurs, etc) that you have done in the file.
  • Beginning count in: Can just delete those measures in most cases (unless there are pickup notes of course) by using Measure/Remove measures and then designating the ones to delete.
  • Sound changes: You might see little "horn" looking symbols in the score. These indicate sound changes, like going from an open trombone to a muted one. If you see these in the score, then there would need to be an annotation (whatever horn guys use for that ) about the mute or open or whatever. To see what the sound change is, click the Sound Changes tab, and then click on a sound change to show what instrument it is. After that you can just mouse over any of the sound changes to see what they are.
  • Piano: a lot of MIDI files have the piano all in one track; Composer will ask you when you open the file if you want to split the piano staff into a two-hand piano part, and you should click "yes". Mark (the originator of the software) was a piano player, and so the split is designed for easier playing rather than just splitting at a given note.
  • Instrument transpositions: Composer will open the song initially with everything in concert pitch. To have Composer do all the proper instrument transpositions for printing the sheets for musicians, just use Staff/ Transpose to each instruments key; Click "Next" (this dialog is just an 'are you sure which type?' dialog box), then click the "Look up all..." button. Click "Finish" to have the Conductor's score displayed in the various instrument transposed keys. Sometimes you'll need to change a clef (eg. for the tenor or bari saxes) - just double-click on the clef symbol and change it to the proper one.
  • Splitting up multiple parts from a single staff eg. Trumpets 3,4: Sometimes there will be more than one instrument on a staff. You can split these using Staff/Split melody and accompaniment. This will split those notes into two staves, upper notes on one, lower notes on another. If there are more than 2 parts on a staff, just do it again til there's only single notes per staff. You may have to go back and add in any unison notes to the "accompaniment" staff if those get put in the melody staff - just add the notes in like you would if writing a song from scratch with the mouse.
  • Key Signatures : Composer usually gets them right, but you may want to double-check that the notation reads easily for your players.
  • Enharmonic spellings of notes: ditto as for the Key Signatures.
  • Vocals: Sometimes the vocal line has lyrics, but oftentimes not. You'll need to use the Text/Lyrics tools to enter those, or you can assign the vocal as an instrument solo(s).
Enjoy!
Sherry
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