# A range of classical works rendered by NotePerformer



## leslieq (Oct 6, 2020)

Hey all, sharing a playlist of classical works I’ve rendered in NotePerformer here: Classical Works Playlist


You’ll find:

Bernstein’s “_*Lonely Town*_” from “On the Town”
Shostakovich _*Symphony No.5 III. Movt*_
De Falla’s “_*Danza Rituel del Fuego*_” from “El Amor Brujo”
Holst’s “*Venus*” from “The Planets”
Bates’ “*Temescal Noir*” from “B-Sides”
Bernstein’s “*Candide Overture*”
Debussy’s “*Premiere Rhapsodie*” 
Britten’s “*Fugue and Finale*” from “Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra”
Ravel’s “*Lever du Jour*” from “Daphnis et Chloe”
Debussy’s “*Jeux de Vagues*” from “La Mer”
Bernstein’s “*Scherzo*” from “West Side Story”
Ravel’s “*La Valse*”
All playback directly from Sibelius Ultimate using NotePerformer 3.2/3.3.1 and Altiverb

Upcoming uploads to include Brahms Symphony No.2 and Lutosławski’s Concerto for Orchestra.

Hope you enjoy. Feedback welcome


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## joebaggan (Oct 6, 2020)

Nice job! What's your workflow for doing this in Noteperformer? Do you play in each part at the keyboard and tweak the dynamics and other details later? How long does it take to do one of these pieces?


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## leslieq (Oct 7, 2020)

joebaggan said:


> Nice job! What's your workflow for doing this in Noteperformer? Do you play in each part at the keyboard and tweak the dynamics and other details later? How long does it take to do one of these pieces?



So the workflow itself isn't complicated at all. 

*General Info*
NotePerformer is so good out-of-the-box that it really comes down to inputting the notes (yes, I go from printed scores/PDFs and typeset each instrument part into Sibelius by hand). Some pieces are quicker than others — dependant on how intricate the music is. E.g. De Falla's _Danza Rituel del Fuego_ was quite quick to input, as many instruments share the same lines and almost the whole first section gets repeated in the second so you can do a lot of copy/paste. 

Bates' _Temescal Noir_ on the other hand was a total pain.. every single part is individual, has complex triplet and syncopated rhythms, extended instrument techniques, a lot of dynamic markings in the score. 

I work off the published orchestral scores. These are very much "Conductor" scores so they often have just enough information (dynamics, phrasing, expressions, techniques...etc) to communicate the intent of the composer. The beauty of this is it allows conductors and musicians to fill in the blanks with their own interpretation. That's what makes great classical music truly great — you can hear the same piece over and over with different orchestra/conductor and they all have a different approach/bring out something new in the piece. 

*Thinking about Performance*
From my experience in orchestras, the types of mark-ups and notes that players make in their instrument parts is so telling. They'll not only add things like bowing (for strings) or breath marks (for wind) or sticks (for percussion); but in collaboration with a conductor refine thing like tempo, phrasing, dynamics, expression and techniques to get the overall performance.

With that in mind, here's the trick to replicating this with software like NotePerformer. 

*Translating Performance to Software*
Unlike a DAW, the mixer faders in Sibelius cannot be automated. Therefore, when you set them they'll remain at that setting for the entirety of the file. You can significantly improve NotePeformer playback by taking time to think about the overall balance you want to achieve, and then setting the faders accordingly (i.e. are you aiming for a brilliant brassy sound, or a warm stringy sound etc). By default, the faders are set to 95%. I'll rarely use any fader at 95%, but based on the overall feel I want, I'll balance out each instrument. 

For example, here's what the mixer looks like for Ravel's _La Valse_: 




...and Shostakovich _Symphony No. 2_: 




...or Holst's _Venus_: 





For performance, I'll then add additional performance information to the scores as I go along. E.g. if I want a solo oboe line to standout a bit more than the dynamic marking of a passage, I'll add a new [hidden] dynamic that is a notch louder to get the desired level. If the music needs to slow or speed up, I'll add things like rit./rall./accel. markings etc to suit. Basically "filling in the blanks" like a conductor would with the musicians. The crucial thing to note here is that musical performance language is so evolved that you can affect any kind of musical performance using existing standard musical terms — so no weird hacking of Sibelius required.

*On Panning and Reverb*
I like NotePerformer's automatic instrument pan settings so I don't change any of that. 
On reverb, I have Sibelius' built-in reverb setting to DRY and set the mixer 38% or less. Preferring to manage overall room reverb with third-party Altiverb 7 — this is totally optional. The AMBIENT setting in Sibelius gives adequately good results. 

I also sometimes like the impact this Performance setting has for some scores: 




*Finishing Things Off*
I don't do any further post-production or mastering on these...(partly because this starts getting a bit too techie for my brain) I just simply export the audio directly from Sibelius. 

Voila!

Apologies for the long read...eek ;P


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## joebaggan (Oct 7, 2020)

Thanks for the detailed info! I find copying scores like this to be a good learning experience for composition study. I use Dorico and Noteperformer with Stream Deck to do this sometimes for smaller contemporary chamber music scores, and do find it takes quite a bit of time for intricate music. So seems like doing larger ensembles/symphony scores would take forever, but well worth it for the learning experience I bet!


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## Nyran (Oct 7, 2020)

Great job, you should sell the Sibelius files, the ones that are public domain!


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## Rob (Oct 7, 2020)

Thanks for sharing this Leslie! Great job!


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