Help with instruments & parts (I think?)

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pjunge
Posts: 2
Joined: Sun Nov 17, 2019 4:47 am
Sibelius Version: Ultimate
Operating System: Windows

Post by pjunge » Sun Nov 17, 2019 5:11 am

You wanna talk "beginner"? I can't even read sheet music! So I need your help.
I have a bunch of music cues for the play we're doing at school and I want to record them using Selibius. Problem is, I don't know how to get all the right instruments to play!

I have each cue scanned into a separate file, now I need to tell Selibius which staff/notes are played by which instruments. Part of the problem is that some cues have different instruments for the treble and bass clefs, some are all the same instrument with the exception of one note being a different instrument, some are two different instruments playing the same notes at the same time.

I couldn't figure out how to set the instruments at the sheet music level, so I tried on the mixer. There I couldn't get it to do different instruments for each clef. Do I use different parts? Different voices? Different staffs/staves*?

*I've been able to figure a lot of the vocab and function of sheet music, but I'm still kind of stuck on staves and systems. Bars, staffs, keys, clefs, etc I'm fine with.

Thank you so very much for helping out a VERY beginning person! I'm much better with blocking and characterization than I am with music!


MikeLyons
Posts: 1631
Joined: Fri Jun 24, 2016 7:20 pm
Sibelius Version: Ult. 2024.3.1/7.5
Operating System: Windows

Post by MikeLyons » Sun Nov 17, 2019 8:01 am

You are probably not going to like hearing this, but you seriously need to talk face to face with a musician. Someone who can actually read and understand music.This is not something you are going to be able to do without a clear understanding of musical notation and theory as well as an idea of how engraving software like Sibelius works.

You might be able to get away with it by using a DAW like Cubase or Pro-tools as you don't need to know any notation to use those but, in their own way, they are just as complicated.

You might want to also look at the manual, so that you get an idea of the terminology used by Sibelius.

When you add an instrument to a score, that instrument is usually automatically given a sound (like trombone, say) according to the instrument you pick. If this isn't happening then there is something wrong somewhere.
Sib 6.2, 7.5 and 2023.6, Windows 11, 32GB RAM, 16TB 7200RPM Storage, 2TB SSD, Note Performer 3.3.2, EWQLSO, EWQLSC, Harmony Assistant and some others. mike@mike-lyons.co.uk

pjunge
Posts: 2
Joined: Sun Nov 17, 2019 4:47 am
Sibelius Version: Ultimate
Operating System: Windows

Post by pjunge » Sun Nov 17, 2019 6:06 pm

I understand the basics and I'm working from existing PDF sheet music with all of the correct notations. And I had one of our music people double check it for me. They said everything looks great, notations, keys, tempos, etc.

It's the instruments that are throwing me off. I want to export or record each short piece (some literally two notes long!) for playback during our play. The music calls for a mix of instruments which is what I want to adjust (examples below).

Does my problem lay in working with scanned music rather than from scratch? From scratch I can set the instruments and make separate parts - I did that for fun the other day. Is there a way to change the overall instruments on an existing document and/or separate clefs into different parts so I can assign separate instruments to them?

Or, would it be easier to export to a DAW and change sounds there. I have more experience with DAWs like GarageBand and Audacity than I do with notation software!

Examples:
Cue #1 is a harpsichord on the treble and bass clefs with one low note played by a pipe organ.
Cue #2 both clefs are played by a piano and celeste.
Cue #3 Treble clef is a piano while the bass clef is cello and bass.

I'm good at reading manuals but I haven't been able to find the best way to do this.

Thank you again for helping such a beginner out!

MikeLyons
Posts: 1631
Joined: Fri Jun 24, 2016 7:20 pm
Sibelius Version: Ult. 2024.3.1/7.5
Operating System: Windows

Post by MikeLyons » Sun Nov 17, 2019 9:10 pm

So are your pdfs of scores or parts?
Are the scores transposing or concert pitch? (Look at the key sign. A concert pitch score will have all the same numbers of sharps and/or flats in each staff; a transposing score will have Bb instruments in one key, Eb instruments in a different key, concert pitch instruments in a different key again and so on.)

When you say you are working from original pdfs, why can't you just use these?

Are you trying to produce a performing score or something different?

Sibelius makes it easy to handle parts by using dynamic parts (version 7.x onwards). Apart from formatting on the page you shouldn't have to do anything else.
Sib 6.2, 7.5 and 2023.6, Windows 11, 32GB RAM, 16TB 7200RPM Storage, 2TB SSD, Note Performer 3.3.2, EWQLSO, EWQLSC, Harmony Assistant and some others. mike@mike-lyons.co.uk

bobp
Posts: 1182
Joined: Thu Dec 27, 2012 12:53 am

Post by bobp » Mon Nov 18, 2019 3:27 am

I would think that for you, this would be a job for Garageband. Totally do-able in Sibelius, but you need to spend more time with it.
Bob Porter
Sibelius 7.5, W10,i5,16 GB ram,desktop

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