Thank you, Steve. You are the first to respond to my open question regarding the use of a piano reduction, which after all is exactly why piano reductions became standard in the first place, to provide the necessary information to singers in compact form that does not require the ability to read a full score either transposed OR concert pitch!
This is also standard in Broadway scores (the full piano-vocal scores, not the "Selections From" collections), some of which are so carefully marked as to be quite practical as conducting scores. Of course Robert didn't mention in his original post that he was talking about non-tonal music, which does present a different level of difficulty not just for singers but for instrumentalists as well, and does require that performers of ANY kind be very well trained as musicians and not just have pretty voices for singing pretty melodies. John At 7:19 PM +0100 10/2/12, Steve Parker wrote: >My solution here is a vocal score with piano >reduction (never to be actually played) heavily >marked with relevant instrumental cues. >It can be much better than leaving the singers to decipher their own cues. > >Steve P. > >On 2 Oct 2012, at 18:40, David Froom <dfr...@smcm.edu> wrote: > >> On 2 Oct 2012, at 1:00 PM, Robert Patterson wrote: >> >>> One could discuss all day longs things that singers should and should not >>> do. I think books have been written on the subject. But they are beside the >>> point here. >>> >>> What I am saying is, if you want the best performance out of the most >>> number of singers, I highly recommend providing a C score. I have paid the >>> price for not so doing and I won't make the same mistake twice. >> >> Robert is absolutely correct here! This is my >>experience, even with well-known, successful >>singers, even those who have sung a lot of >>contemporary music. They simply want to be >>able to quickly find their pitch from the >>score, and if they are constantly checking to >>see who is playing and remembering what that >>instrument's transposition (at the moment, for >>scores with switching instruments), it can >>seriously disrupt a rehearsal and/or a >>performance. The best singers, if you give >>them a transposed score, might just ask you to >>make a C score for them. I'm talking about >>non-tonal music here. >> >> Conductors keep their eyes on the whole thing >>all the time. Singers have their own part, but >>in performance need to look out at the audience >>as much as possible, so they jump back to their >>score for quick reference to their part as well >>as the other instruments, often jumping from >>instrument to instrument for a reference pitch. >>They also have to think about dramatic >>projection, etc. Why make their lives more >>difficult, or increase even by a couple of >>hours the time needed for learning and >>rehearsing? >> >> My solution is to create a C score for the >>singer and a transposed score for the >>conductor. Everyone is happy, no one is >>confused. >> >> David Froom >> _______________________________________________ >> Finale mailing list >> Finale@shsu.edu >> http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale > >_______________________________________________ >Finale mailing list >Finale@shsu.edu >http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale -- John R. Howell, Assoc. Prof. of Music Virginia Tech Department of Music School of Performing Arts & Cinema College of Liberal Arts & Human Sciences 290 College Ave., Blacksburg, Virginia 24061-0240 Vox (540) 231-8411 Fax (540) 231-5034 (mailto:john.how...@vt.edu) http://www.music.vt.edu/faculty/howell/howell.html "Machen Sie es, wie Sie wollen, machen Sie es nur schön." (Do it as you like, just make it beautiful!) --Johannes Brahms _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list Finale@shsu.edu http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
