Tag: Sibelius

The art of transcribing – Part 5

As always, be sure to read parts 1, 2, 3, and 4. It’s been a while! In this one, a fellow submitted a transcription of Django Reinhardt for critique. By and large, it was a good job, but there were certain ornaments that were not correct but that are very typical of Gypsy musicians. In the Gypsy community, there are certain subtle techniques that they subconsciously do that many people outside their community miss or misinterpret. Some of them are revealed in this transcription. I often show a lot of these to my homestay students who want to work on sound and technique. What’s that you say? Homestay lessons? Want more info? Click here! One of the most important lessons to learn from Django Reinhardt is to understand how he thinks. He often thought in […]

The art of transcribing – Part 4

As always, be sure to read parts 1, 2, and 3. In this fourth part, we will be focusing on transcribing solos where the timing is not always in sync with the rhythm section. This can prove to be a huge challenge. It requires a strong foundation in music theory, and a strong knowledge of the idiom, which in this case, is straight ahead jazz. When I mean that the timing isn’t in sync with the rhythm section, I don’t necessarily mean this in a negative way. When it comes to good musicians, this floating time is often intentional. In this particular instance, we will be looking at a solo by Swedish jazz guitarist Ulf Wakenius. This is from volume 3 of his lesson series available at DC Music School. Ulf Wakenius is known for playing […]

The art of transcribing – Part 3

As always, be sure to read parts 1 and 2. In this third part of the art of transcribing, I want to show you one of my processes of transcribing directly from a video source. In this instance, I am transcribing directly from my video editor (Final Cut Pro X). Any video player that can slow videos down without changing the pitch will do. I’ll admit that there are way better softwares out there for transcribing than FCP X but I’m just lazy! One of the major advantages of transcribing directly from the video is that you can get the fingerings as you are figuring out the notes. In my previous article, I imported the audio portion of the video into my DAW. When would I use one workflow or the other? I generally transcribe […]

The art of transcribing – Part 2

Be sure to read the first part of this article series. Click here. In this article, I will focus on the transcription work that I do for DC Music School (I’m the owner, in case you haven’t figure it out). I am starting to be able to afford a small team of transcribers and hope that one day my business grows enough that I can hire an even bigger team of sub-contractors! For anyone that is interested in potentially working for me, I can’t guarantee work but I’m always happy to expand my list of potential transcribers. Just so that no one’s time is wasted. I can only hire people who are very familiar with Sibelius, and have a strong knowledge of notation conventions. Otherwise, please read this article and watch the video below to see if […]