Composing by hand versus software.

Even finale and sibelius have limitations...it's very hard to make big changes, for example...

What do you mean by 'big changes'?? And, how is is any easier to make said 'big changes' in your musicDNA program?

Even finale and sibelius have limitations...it's very hard to make big changes, for example...it's often easier to start over. I write using MusicDNA, a very compact code/shorthand.

I'd say it has the advantages of writing by hand: having to think everything through, know the relationships, etc, but also the advantages of using a score editor: copy & paste, little tools to help you (transpose, auto generate counterpoint), etc.

## First 9 notes of ode to joy theme:

keych("C Major");

melody("III5 III5 IV5 V5 V5 IV5 III5 II5 I5", "Q");

^-- Much easier to mess with than a score editor or on paper, but you can still give it the same rigor you would on paper.

bulls**t

you've either never used Finale/Sibelius, or you simply don't know how to read music.

it is ridiculously simple to make VERY major changes in a score in a notation programme.

Even finale and sibelius have limitations...it's very hard to make big changes, for example...it's often easier to start over. I write using MusicDNA, a very compact code/shorthand.

I'd say it has the advantages of writing by hand: having to think everything through, know the relationships, etc, but also the advantages of using a score editor: copy & paste, little tools to help you (transpose, auto generate counterpoint), etc.

## First 9 notes of ode to joy theme:

keych("C Major");

melody("III5 III5 IV5 V5 V5 IV5 III5 II5 I5", "Q");

^-- Much easier to mess with than a score editor or on paper, but you can still give it the same rigor you would on paper.

I don't want to jump on the bash wagon, but NOT having copy and paste is one of the main advantages of writing by hand. It makes one lazy, and really truly is detrimental to the music. When writing by hand you're apt to think EVERY note through.

Never mind auto-counterpoint!!

... but also the advantages of using a score editor: copy & paste, little tools to help you (transpose, auto generate counterpoint), etc. ...

I'm sorry, but I frown upon that. One should never let his computer do his work for him. And to be quaint, score editors such as Finale and Sibelius offer virtually unlimited power and control when it come to making changes in a score, even from the largest scale right down to altering a tiny augmentation dot. I find shorthand programs, such as MusicDNA and Lilypond (neither of which I have ever used) a little confusing. Because everything is in a code-like format, it may take a while to weed out errors in a larger score. I would thing that programs such Finale, Sibelius, NoteWorthy Composer, and others are basically tools that make the code/shorthand for you, only you never see the actual code, just what it produces, so there is never a need to look at the score and then having to go into the code and change something using textual directions.

I think that copy/paste is a great tool if used carefully. I have used it gratefully in many of my works, I find it indespensible in a large recapitulation, even a piece with a repeated figure such as a bass line. When I've pasted, I usually observe the results and make changes where necessary, using the copied material merely as a template to deviate from should I feel necessary.

Much easier to mess with than a score editor or on paper, but you can still give it the same rigor you would on paper.

But only if you actually understand that kind of thing. It'd be ten times faster to do it in a score editor.

Hey all, I'm working on a few musical examples to illustrate my point. I'll paste links to the scores in here when they are ready, likely late tomorrow (it's Friday night, after all).

But prose-wise, I'll say this.

Daniel, writing by hand can indeed be used as a means to force the composer to think of every note which is set down. But at a certain point the composer doesn't think in terms of individual notes, but in triadic harmonies, melodies atop other melodies, etc, and to write items note by note forces the composer out of this musical thought of higher complexity down to the nitty-gritty, similar to a writer thinking in sentences but laboriously writing each letter. If working at the pace demanded by handwriting is helpful to your art, then why change? But for me, I think a composer's creative genius, just like a painter's, can only be fully unlocked if he or she is able to work at the greatest possible speed that his mind and creativity can support, which in some cases handwriting cannot keep up with.

MusicManJ4, Finale etc do operate as you suggested, the GUI essentially generates the code, which sets the notes into the score, after which you (primarily) manipulate them individually. They do not however allow you to manipulate the GUI, the code itself, nor create your own applications based on their code. Thus the layer of functionality which would grow organically from allowing the composer to create his own "musical API" cannot take root.

Rienzi:

Composing is not 100% creativity. It is hard work 99%. (at least for me and my personal opinion). Thus speed does not matter. It's not that if I don't notate the next 10 bars I'll loose my thought, and the train to completing the piece. That is why I practiced, ad still do, and will do forever.

As on Finale etc. I see what you mean, but I have to confess that I've yet to find something I can't do with Finale. As of functionality, again I see what you mean, but in copying it is about speed, and after 8 years in Finale, I won't be changing, but most importantly I doubt many people would be able to reprogram the GUI of such a software in order to faciliate funcionality (which either way has been tested in Finales case for more than 13 years now, and sibleius for more than 6 (I think?)). Yes, you can't create a new tool in Finale (for example), but is there something you need and can't make it in Finale?

For me, the method I use to write the score down is totally irrelevant with respect to the actual music. A computer sheet music program is to music like a word processor is to language. It doesn’t tell you want to say, it’s just a super sophisticated typewriter.

Also, when doing creative writing I won’t hesitate to use things like a thesaurus to search for better words to convey what I’m trying to say. And when I write poetry I won’t hesitate to use a rhyming dictionary to find the best possible words to express what I want to express. These things don’t limit, or change my original creativity in any way, if anything they enhance it!

Same goes for a sheet music program. Even before computers most composers would play things out on a piano, or other instrument to get a feel for what they sound like. Well, asking a computer to play them for you isn’t really any different.

As far as I’m concerned, the method used to write the score is really irrelevant. Does a word processor have anything to do with a writer’s creativity? I think not. Why should a music processor be any different for a composer?

Moreover, there are two elements to music. One is the music itself. This has absolutely nothing at all to do with any knowledge of “note”-tation. A person can have the most beautiful music the world has ever heard locked up in his or her head and have absolutely no clue how to write musical score. On the other hand, another person might be a genius when it comes to notating music, but when it comes to creating music they just don’t have the gift.

Don’t confuse score with music. They are as different as thought versus printed words. There are many people who have great thoughts but who can’t read or write. On the other hand there are many people who can read and write but don’t have a thought worth writing down.

Just because someone is adept at writing score freehand doesn’t mean they have a clue what good music is. And just because someone needs a music processor to write score doesn’t mean that they have no clue about music.

The two are totally separate things. I just don’t see the connection. So for me the question is moot.

I'm sorry, but I frown upon that. One should never let his computer do his work for him.

I agree with writing one's own counterpoint. But honestly, by your logic, nobody should use predetermined ensembles, forms, traditional harmonic techniques, chord progressions or even styles. That would be using other people's work! You're basically saying all music should be completely random. :toothygrin:

When I compose I like pencil and paper at my piano or guitar but when it comes to orchestrating thats when I go to Sibelius and get on the computer!

I agree with writing one's own counterpoint. But honestly, by your logic, nobody should use predetermined ensembles, forms, traditional harmonic techniques, chord progressions or even styles. That would be using other people's work! You're basically saying all music should be completely random. :shifty:

...I don't know, but I don't think that's what he's trying to say or what his logic is at all. That just sounds...way off. How does not letting your computer work for you mean you have to do nothing no one's done before?

Anyway, if you don't use traditional techniques, that's not being random.

...I don't know, but I don't think that's what he's trying to say or what his logic is at all. That just sounds...way off. How does not letting your computer work for you mean you have to do nothing no one's done before?

Anyway, if you don't use traditional techniques, that's not being random.

The fact is... if you take any influences from other people, studying how things are done even just to add knowledge to your own, using progressions and modulation techniques you've learned about from somewhere else... that's all using someone else's work to advance your own. It's an extreme comparison, but, someone programmed that auto-counterpoint algorithm. A human. Using it and using generic counterpoint techniques that have been perfected... by humans... over the centuries, they are both instances of using another's work. So if you want to be completely pure and independent of others' work... you'd have to write something completely original that transcends everything that's been perfected in the practice of writing music!

It's a bit of a deep thought on an insignificant statement, but I tend to think a lot. So whatever.

The fact is... if you take any influences from other people, studying how things are done even just to add knowledge to your own, using progressions and modulation techniques you've learned about from somewhere else... that's all using someone else's work to advance your own. It's an extreme comparison, but, someone programmed that auto-counterpoint algorithm. A human. Using it and using generic counterpoint techniques that have been perfected... by humans... over the centuries, they are both instances of using another's work. So if you want to be completely pure and independent of others' work... you'd have to write something completely original that transcends everything that's been perfected in the practice of writing music!

It's a bit of a deep thought on an insignificant statement, but I tend to think a lot. So whatever.

if I compare your statement to, let's say, writing a text, one would heve to say that it is like letting the computer wrrite the book for you.

letting a computer put together counterpoint for you is not "using techniques". it's finding a way of letting the COMPUTER use the techniques. and there is no comparison between youself putting counterpoint together and letting someone else do it FOR YOU. that's just silly.

if you think counterpoint is all a question of simply repeating formulae and is that mechanical, then you haven't done enough of it.

Lord Skye:

I'm just saying I don't know how it fits with what he said. I'm not saying you're wrong, I just don't see that's what he was getting to.

EDIT: After reading QC's post which I did not realize was there, I guess you were wrong (ack! I sound like such an donkey right then!) in your thinking.

... if you take any influences from other people, studying how things are done even just to add knowledge to your own...that's all using someone else's work to advance your own.

...So if you want to be completely pure and independent of others' work... you'd have to write something completely original that transcends everything that's been perfected in the practice of writing music!

There's a huge difference between knowing/understanding/using traditional techniques, and clicking a button to generate 'generic' counterpoint.

Contrary to popular belief, it is possible to be innovative and original while, at the same time, using traditional compositional devices...though it requires skill and an intimate knowledge of the techniques.

Also, probably way off topic, but I don't feel it's possible to be completely pure and independent - there is no true originality anymore... You can find new and creative ways of using existing elements, but I don't expect any true innovations in music any time soon...

...

Sorry for the delay, yesterday got kind of eaten up by Harry Potter.

Lord Skye: good call. It's up to each person to decide how much of another's work to build upon. That becomes the assumption we work under when we go to create our own art. As Pablo Pacasso said, "Bad artists copy. Great artists steal". That's why I like the common practice-era rules, tho I'm just getting started composing. :)

So. I created the musical examples I mentioned above, meant to show how using MusicDNA makes changes easier. I also wanted to show how my code-based approach has the advantages of both composing by hand, and composing using computational help.

What I did was this, I took the 'lullabye' theme, and created four variations upon it by copying and slightly changing the code, starting with this. It is the lullabye melody, but broken up into 4 little melodic phrases.

Play MIDI, View Score: Variations on Lullabye

# melody([MIDI track #], [pitches, noted by Scale Degree|Octave], [Note durations Q is quarter, etc]

tb("`real` melody");

melody(0, "III5 III5 V5 III5 III5 V5", "E E DQ E Q H");

melody(0, "III5 V5 I6 VII5 VI5 VI5 V5", "E E Q DQ E Q Q");

melody(0, "II5 III5 IV5 II5 II5 III5 IV5", "E E Q Q E E H");

melody(0, "II5 IV5 VII5 VI5 V5 VII5 I6", "E E E E Q Q H");

Variation 1: In this one, two phrases within the melody are doubled in duration:

melody(0, "III5 III5 V5 III5 III5 V5", "Q Q DH Q H W");

# ^ Note durations changed from "E E DQ E Q H"

melody(0, "III5 V5 I6 VII5 VI5 VI5 V5", "E E Q DQ E Q Q");

melody(0, "II5 III5 IV5 II5 II5 III5 IV5", "Q Q H H Q Q W");

# ^ Note durations changed from "E E Q Q E E H"

melody(0, "II5 IV5 VII5 VI5 V5 VII5 I6", "E E E E Q Q H");

Variation #2. In this one, I just shifted the scale degrees down by one in two of the phrases within the melody.

tb("Variation 2");

melody(0, "II5 II5 IV5 II5 II5 IV5", "E E DQ E Q H", ". . . . . .");

# ^ Pitches changed from "III5 III5 V5 III5 III5 V5"

melody(0, "III5 V5 I6 VII5 VI5 VI5 V5", "E E Q DQ E Q Q");

melody(0, "I5 II5 III5 I5 I5 II5 III5", "E E Q Q E E H");

# ^ Pitches changed from "II5 III5 IV5 II5 II5 III5 IV5"

melody(0, "II5 IV5 VII5 VI5 V5 VII5 I6", "E E E E Q Q H");

There are two more variations, each *very* straightforwardly made.

...but the coup de grace is changing it flawlessly to Minor Mode, which takes the smallest of changes.

song(KEYCN, 80, 3, 4);

# Changed key from KEYCM

Play MIDI, View Score: Variations on Lullabye (minor mode)

In all, producing this score took me approximately 1 hour, maybe less. I would make a change and recompile, and the score and MIDI would be updated automatically (no dragging and dropping notes, deleting and inserting, the cpu took care of it). I probably had to refresh the score a good 40 times as I copy and pasted, then modified the code, but it was still a very quick process. As fast as you can word process you can compose music.

One could sketch it by hand just as easily within the same time frame, but it would still be a sketch and would, as 'skiscore' said, still need to be entered into Sibelius for proper orchestrating, etc (the MusicDNA MIDIs can be edited by Sib/Finale too, but the grunt work will be done already). You're still dealing the same abstractions you would be when composing on paper (keeping the pitches within the current key's scale in mind, thinking of melodies in terms of broken up phrases, etc), but basically all notation is done for you automatically and not like what Finale often devolves into for the uninitiated: a fight with the mouse, dragging and modifying individual notes.

Qccowboy:

I agree with robinjessome. If you have control over how the counterpoint is auto-generated, and know precisely what it's doing at every step, is it really having the computer 'use the techniques' or do the creating? I would contend that your knowledge and control over how the counterpoint is generated is what grants you independence over the automatic-ness of the software.

Please double check your links... [nevermind...the links in the duplicate post work]

Also, it took an hour for 51 measures of music? That sounds like a long time to me...

like I said... someone who has no idea how Finale works.

I think it would have taken me around 1 minute to do all that in Finale, including harmony, orchestration, cleaned up score.... why waste an hour?

that sort of reminds me of this commercial on TV for this special frying pan, where they show someone stabbing like a lunatic with a spatula at a fried egg saying "why go to all the mess and trouble with a regular frying pan when...." and the person doing the demonstration has obviously never held a spatula nor frying pan in their life.

robinjessome: You're right. But I was playing around with it the whole time to find interesting variations (as you would on a piano), making small modifications and reversing them, I didn't have it all figured out in my head when I sat down to notate it. And remember that I'm a novice composer -- my first complete piece ever is posted in the Keyboards forum. I've *just* gotten the software where it can do this stuff.

Qccowboy: I get it. "I use Finale. Look at Finale." I didn't ask you to judge me or my software. If you're already wedded to your approach, then my approach is not for you.

Aaaaanyway, I'm actually working on the counterpoint generator right now :) I'm going to try going by Fux rules, but may have to go with Walter Piston if Fux doesn't get low-level enough.

Enjoy your Sunday guys.

Qccowboy: I get it. "I use Finale. Look at Finale." I didn't ask you to judge me or my software. If you're already wedded to your approach, then my approach is not for you.

actually, yes, you DID ask us to "judge your software" when you made patently undefensible comments regarding the ease of use or lack thereof of Finale and other notation programmes.

Admittedly I've not done much composing away from the piano, but composing away from keyboard isn't just far more difficult than composing with one (which is, essentially the same as using a computer, just slower), it's also totally different. You need a wholly different skill set to compose mentally and in silence, and accordingly your compositions will surely differ depending upon the composition method.

By the way, writing with the computer is not necessarily faster, for me anyway. Sometimes one can be faster, sometimes the other can be faster.

By the way, writing with the computer is not necessarily faster, for me anyway. Sometimes one can be faster, sometimes the other can be faster.

It's true - it all boils down to what you're doing, how you do it, why you're doing it...so many variables can affect the output.

Personally, there's many things I do, but are needlessly complicated or impossible with standard notation programs. MUCH easier/quicker to do it on paper.

I think it’s totally irrelevant how music is composed.

All that’s really important is that people enjoy listening to it.

As long as the latter is true, no one really gives a rat’s *butt about the former.

:w00t: