Last year Kristin School commissioned a piece from me for their amazing award-winning choir, Euphony, to include in their 2010 repertoire. They premiered it at the Auckland Town Hall on Wednesday 16th June 2010. See the video below:
It uses the text from Bub Bridger’s poem, Wild Daisies.
The choir was once again successful in getting through to The Big Sing Finale, along with many other choirs from around New Zealand. You can see the full list of these choirs at The Big Sing website.
Wild Daisies is notated for SSA choir and if anyone is interested in buying a copy please let me know.
Musician? Got your iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad? Well, what are you going to put on it? As a musician, sharing my time between rehearsals, conducting, composing and teaching, I have fine tuned a collection of amazing apps for my iPhone that I find are absolutely essential and I hope will help you save you a lot of money and give you some great tools. Just a note, I’ve used all of these on an iPhone but they are all available (if not now, will be very soon) on the iPad.
Field Recorder – This is an outstanding digital recorder for the iPhone. One review of it says “Audiofile Engineering’s FiRe application is by far the most advanced stereo audio recording application we’ve seen for the iPhone and iPod Touch, going far beyond the limitations of previous go-to apps…”. It is a professional quality recorder and the list of features is huge so check out the link. It has a beautiful interface, the quality of recording is amazing, you can edit in the app and can export as WAVE, AIFF, CAF, AAC, Apple Lossless, AAC, Podcast, Ogg Vorbis and FLAC. So handy for capturing a rehearsal or auditions, taking field recordings and pretty much endless possibilities.
Dr. Betotte TC – There are many metronomes but few powered up for the music professional. Dr. Betotte TC has all the normal features of a normal metronome such as playing any time signature, beat divisions, the ability to save your tempos and settings to a playlist, tap in a tempo – but it has got so much more. For a start all of the rhythmic divisions have their own volume sliders, one click halftime feel, options for swing tempo, you can import your own audio samples and the playlist can auto advance. Some nice other features (which are so easy to access) include an alarm timer that syncs with the metronome and customisable gradual up/down, step up/down and quiet count buttons. These step up/down buttons are so handy for students learning a passage, as it gradually gets faster over time (or however you set it up). What I do like about this metronome is its visual capabilities – it’s often really unhelpful just having a “beep, beep” metronome. For learning scores or for reference in rehearsals it is so handy to just have a ticking needle, or a huge “1, 2, 3, 4, …” being counted on screen. This is by far my metronome of choice.
Stay In Tune – There are a lot of tuners available, a lot of good ones and generally they all have the same features. It’s how they deliver the features which makes the difference. Stay In Tune is my favourite – it has a wonderful, clear interface, you can also easily produce tones, calibrate and select specific tunings for different instruments. It is also one of the most accurate and gorgeous I’ve found.
Backline Calc – It’s a musical calculator and perhaps the last app you would think about looking for, but once you have it you’ll realise how handy it is. There are six categories and some examples include: Length (sum times, compare tempos, song length, beats to tempo, time to samples), Pitch (MIDI note, frequency and wavelength conversion), Timecode (frames to timecode, convert timecode), Electric (power, voltages), Acoustics (distance to time, sound pressure level, panning) and Files (file size). These are only a few examples – a very handy little app.
Chordmaster by Planet Waves – The most advanced and intelligent guitar chord reference. You can make chords easily with sliders, you can strum them and the overall interface is beautiful. It’s also nice to see a popular and well known music accessory company delving into apps.
SoundHound – We all hear a song on TV and want to know what it is and there are several apps who help you out with this, the most popular being Shazam – but these don’t go much past the novelty factor of holding the device to a speaker and finding out the song. I like SoundHound as it provides a few more features such as effectively picking up you singing personally, or you can just type the title, album, artist or lyric. Also, in the results, it provides iTunes links, all the lyrics, YouTube videos and the ability to easily share.
Karajan® – Music & Ear Trainer – Karajan is by far the finest ear trainer. It is powerful and very customisable in each of the categories – intervals, chords, scales, pitch and tempo (bpm). It has detailed statistics so is great for students using in lessons or for your own interest. Personally, I use the tempo recognition all the time (great for conducting) and the pitch recognition is handy too. The pro version is entirely worth the money. (iPad screenshot below)
Oxford Dictionary of Music – Yes, your dream has come true. The entire Oxford Dictionary of Music is available on the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad. It has a wonderful interface, easy search and is regarded as the most up-to-date music dictionary out there. Also good to note that no internet connection is required to use the app. These guys only do dictionary apps so they know what they’re doing. This is a must.
Circle Theory – Based around the Circle Of Fifths, this is a handy reference tool. I use it mainly with students using the more straight forward functions like seeing the relationships between notes, key relationships, key signatures, intervals and triads. But I’ve also used it myself for transposing between keys, checking notes of transposed instruments and as a reference for modes. A great little app.
Virtuoso Piano – Well we have to touch on some instrument apps. I’m sure the first app any musician gets is a piano but many are very basic. My favourite is Virtuoso Piano Pro as you can have multiple keyboards, easily flick between octaves, calibration and record/play features. Another really great app.
Guitar: Play and Share – Without question this is the finest acoustic guitar app. I’ve been playing around with it a lot lately and it is wonderful. Very clever, very easy to use and the sound quality is fantastic. Loads of features and ways to customise, different guitars – who needs a real one?
I won’t mention any more instruments as there are so many good ones (and far more that are rubbish). But if you’re interested in these, the video below is a great watch. It is from the Rend Collective Experiment featuring David Crowder and they produce the whole song from iPhone instruments. Awesome.
ProRemote – This is the only app I don’t own due to the whopping price tag (NZ$124.99, US$99.99), but it gets my attention and admiration. It is a remote control for ProTools, Ableton Live, Apple Logic or Soundtrack Pro. They say it “is like having four Mackie Control Universal Pro’s but better because it is wireless and much less expensive. You get almost $5000 of hardware for the price of ProRemote.” Very impressive. (iPad screenshot below)
Well it is an amazing series of products that I hope you will all enjoy checking out and using. I have found them all to be essential with my day to day work, saving so much time and hassle. Please let me know any other feedback, any great apps I have missed or your comments.
On Saturday 8th May, Moana Ataahua, the 2009 SOUNZ Community Commission, was premiered at the 2010 ERUPT Lake Taupo Festival by the Taupo Choral Society, Tauhara College Choir, Great Lake Big Band, Taupo Youth Wind Band, Taupo Concert Band, and Tauhara College Stage Band and was conducted by Justin Gibbs. Before we get to the concert, the day before we had a final rehearsal and the recording.
The recording
It was such a special project and one that so many people were involved with, so making a recording to keep as a memory was an absolute must. I have not personally heard it yet, but I have been told that it sounds great. See all the photos from the evening here, a selection is below:
The choir, most are hiding behind the curtain.
Keeping an eye on things.
Percussion.
The rest of the percussion.
Clarinets, saxes.
Flutes, trumpets
The orchestra.
Everyone.
Justin Gibbs getting in to it.
The concert
The morning setup and sound check went well and the weather (thank goodness) was pleasant. The concert was the groups all performing their own set, leading up to Moana Ataahua at the end. They absolutely nailed it! Far better than the recording the night before and by far the best they ever performed it. Stephen Gibbs at SOUNZ said:
The well-rehearsed group gave a committed and enthusiastic performance of the work that was equally well-received by the audience. The compositional skills that Ryan brought to the work were apparent in the way that he was able to layer, mix and blend relatively straight-forward musical lines for such a wide range of voices and instruments. The result was a work full dynamic changes: verve, interest, subtlety, and volcanic energy leaving performers and audience with a suitable sense of grandeur.
“If Lake Taupo were a piece of music, what would it sound like?” was the Festival’s introduction. Ryan provided an apt answer.
Drew James (festival director), Justin Gibbs (conductor), Ryan Youens (composer). Photo by Stephen Gibbs (www.sounz.org.nz).
Taupo-nui-a-tia College kapa haka group. Photo by Stephen Gibbs (www.sounz.org.nz).
Taupo-nui-a-tia College kapa haka group. Photo by Stephen Gibbs (www.sounz.org.nz).
The main event. Photo by Stephen Gibbs (www.sounz.org.nz).
Going well... Photo by Stephen Gibbs (www.sounz.org.nz).
Everyone on stage.
Justin Gibbs getting in to it. Photo by Stephen Gibbs (www.sounz.org.nz).
Done.
With some of the choir members. Photo by Stephen Gibbs (www.sounz.org.nz).
It was such a big project for the community, they were proud of it, they put so much rehearsal time into it, and all stops were pulled so to see the polished and fine performance at the end of the journey was just fantastic. In the weeks leading up to premiere I was looked after so well by the ERUPT festival and the community so a huge thank you to everyone. A big thank you must also go to festival director Drew James who thought of the project and SOUNZ for making it happen with their community commission.
I remember seeing digital music stands for the first time a few years ago in a series of concerts in the UK where some DJs collaborated with composers and live musicians. I can’t find the link to it now, but basically composers were writing music alongside the DJs and the musicians were playing it in realtime from their digital stands. I remember thinking how great it was, and even now, that weighs up as some pretty adventurous activity!
Yesterday I posted a tweet mentioning my enjoyment at seeing Harry Connick, Jr. and his band using digital music stands on American Idol. This ignited a great response of knowledgeable and intrigued comments. They are not yet being used professionally in this part of the world, and I can’t say I’ve seen one in person, so I thought I’d explore them a little – here are my findings.
There seem to be three companies whose products are being used widely. The first is Music Pad, who it seems are the most popular and are the only (as far as I can see) company who have the whole product (a dedicated 12.1″ tablet), not just the software. The Music Pad Pro is their main product – looks fantastic and packed with features.
If you are thinking, “Yeah okay, fair enough, great for a brass player reading a chart, but how about a conductor reading an orchestral score?” Well, you need the Music Pad Maestro.
Ah yes, the possibilities of usage are wonderful to dream about. Let’s come back down to reality – for a Music Pad Pro plus carry bag, foot pedal and a few various cables, you could expect to pay around US$800.
A far more cost-effective option is just to purchase the software and you can run it on your own device. What looks to be the supreme product is the Music Reader, which sits at around US$99 for the full professional version. It is Mac and PC compatible and perfect for flat widescreen monitors, tablet and other touch screen PCs and, as of recently, the Music Reader is available on the Apple iPad – where it is a free download.
Another option is the eStand, although very sadly it only runs on PCs. Still not cheap – for the full professional multi-page package, you can expect to pay US$499.
So I am guessing you have many questions about how certain things work – let’s try and answer some.
Turning pages – three options: touch the screen, use the foot pedal or use a MIDI trigger.
File format – sibelius, finale, PDF and image file formats.
Annotations – you can still annotate on the score as you would with a pencil on traditional paper.
Portability – well, beats potentially carrying around hundreds of pages of music.
Stand lighting – you won’t be needing that anymore.
Syncing – you can sync devices on stage so everyone is on the right track.
Viewing – several options of single to multiple page views and you can “look ahead” with a half page turn.
Page order – you’ll never get them out of order again.
Printing – you can print from the programme … but why would you want to?
Extras? – Yes, there is of course a metronome and tuner.
If you’re thinking “is a tuner and metronome the only extra features you can give this?”, well that’s just what I was thinking. But, the Same Page Music Performance Station has both the sheet music as well as metronome and tuner features … AND a personal monitor mixer. Yes, you can take charge and adjust your own monitor levels.
See a great video of the Same Page system below:
I look forward to seeing the developments with these products. As a copyist, it’s exciting to see the ability to make the score or parts and have it in front of the players in seconds. Even in more relaxed environments such as teaching, its potential is exciting. Maybe this is my excuse to buy an iPad?
Let me know your thoughts, experiences if you’ve had them or links to any videos with these in action.
Two weeks ago I travelled down to Taupo for the first big rehearsal of Moana Ataahua. Brilliant. Really good. Everyone thoroughly enjoyed it, thank goodness, and managed playing it well on first attempt. Justin Gibbs, the conductor, says:
“Smoldering, bubbling, swelling and ultimately eruptive! Moana Ataahua (Beautiful Lake) by Ryan Youens embraces all that Taupo represents. The violent yet beautiful geological processes that have heaved up and carved out our part of the world are represented here in music. Thundering percussion, shrill woodwind, triumphant brass and lyrical, arching melodies in the choir unite to create a composition that leaves you breathless until the final thump. Written with an intimate understanding of how community music operates, Moana Ataahua is sure to release an eruption of pride in our town.”
Here some photos from rehearsal number one:
Clarinets, saxes, choir.
Helping out with the percussion.
Alto Sax music.
Checking the score.
Singing along.
We also took the opportunity to visit the venue again.
The town is red with ERUPT.
Rehearsal number two, a week later, was a huge step up in standard. The orchestra started to become very tight and the choir, as you will notice in the photos, tripled in size from the first rehearsal so the balance was much better. The community seems to be really enjoying the project, some very good musicians just turned up and wanted to be involved. Here are a few pics of this second rehearsal:
Sing choir, sing.
Sounding good choir.
Some of the percussion section.
What fun.
Justin Gibbs at helm.
Yes!
It is an absolute joy to be at each of these rehearsals and see the work progressing. Heading down again this Sunday for a final rehearsal, ahead of the recording next Friday and premiere next Saturday:
Saturday 8 May, 2 – 3.30pm
Weather postponement: Sunday 9 May, 2 – 3.30pm
Duration: 1.5 Hours
Venue: Unison Amphitheatre Riverside Park
Price: FREE
Huge thanks and congratulations to all those involved. I look forward to rehearsal three in a few days.
SOUNZ, the Centre for New Zealand Music, who commissioned Moana Ataahua for the ERUPT Lake Taupo Festival with their SOUNZ Community Commission, published an article about the project on 19th April, 2010:
“If Lake Taupo were a piece of music, what would it sound like?
An answer to this question will be given by more than 150 musicians on the afternoon of Saturday 8 May when, as part of the ERUPT Festival in Taupo, they present a free concert in the Unison Amphitheatre on the banks of the Waikato River. The highlight of the concert will be the premiere performance of Ryan Youens’ Moana Ataahua (beautiful lake), the musical result of a 2009 SOUNZ Community Commission.
This new work is the epitome of what the SOUNZ Community Commission is about bringing together the Taupo Choral Society, Tauhara College Choir, Great Lake Big Band, Taupo Youth Wind Band, Taupo Concert Band and Tauhara College Stage Band under the musical direction of Justin Gibbs who is Head of Music at Tauhara College and conducts four of the above groups.
Ryan also involved the wider Taupo community in the early stages of the work’s conception. “Last year, in September,” Ryan explains…” …read the whole article here…
Posts on my music and work in the music industry. Also on Apple, Sibelius, online music marketing and music technology. I look forward to your comments and feedback.
