A full day yesterday. We set off early for the fortnightly Good Vibrations event in Congleton Library. I brought my little theremin, which though not very musical (it has a small range and is never in tune) was a real showstopper in terms of attracting attention and awe. It was a lovely day, as ever, there.
Later in the day I worked on standardising my new scores. The Love Symphony, being my most symphonic of scores pushed me with a few more lessons in the art and craft of scoring, and many of these need applying to older scores. I learn something new when scoring each album. Recent lessons include the divisions of instruments, pitch ranges (rules like basses having C3 as middle C; this is C4 on a piano and most other instruments), and the strict instrument order.
The latter is something I've neglected. Now, when I sequence, I put basses at the bottom, leads at the top, and generally ordering high to low, with drums at the bottom. This order is a consequence of my scoring over the past few years. Older sequences have parts all over the place, generally the more interesting or busy parts near the top. Printed music scores have a strict order to the instruments, with woodwinds at the top and strings at the bottom (for example), and high to low in each group. I've put a 'lead' (normally the vocal) at the very top for songs. Vocals are (in orchestral scores) below percussion instruments and the piano, but most pop songs, many of which are vocal and piano, or vocal and guitar, need to highlight the vocals.
These standardisations are things that have changed and grown over the years I've been scoring my work. I will also need to distinguish between a plucked and bowed bass. Most bass instruments are plucked, even synth basses emphasise the attack, but some, like the bass in 'The Cabinet Of Dr Eckelmann', and 'Challenger', are constant, drone-type, basses. My scores typically say 'Bass' and leave it at that.
All of this will take a lot of work; updating each old score. I've no doubt that, when I complete all of the albums, I'll need to update everything again too. The task seems Sisyphean.
I've spent today applying these rules to The Love Symphony, The Dusty Mirror, and the new Square Spoon scores. For the first time, these will be on sale rather than free, so I also need to provide some images of what people actually get, and detail the instruments and each document. I have 20 albums of scores now. Updating these will be a lot of work, even for relatively small changes. Each album may take an hour, but 20 hours is half a working week. This is an expected part of the long term job of publishing things as best I can, for no money, but because I think it's artistically important and artistically useful to do so.
I also need to start work on Deb's new book illustrations.
