I know this was spoken of on the "Forum that was, but is no more" but how do the Cris Crain's and Greg Howard's of the world produce StaffTab for Stick Music. I don't recall but surely there is a product that does this and produces sheet music like you would see in the StickBook or a Cris Crain arrangement.

How does one like myself get my hands of this little tool?

-Curtis

I'm doing something very close with Lilypond http://lilypond.org/web/. It is probably mainly useful for the computer programming geeks among us. I believe that you can do full StaffTab(TM) with Finale and a custom font you can get here: http://www.arthurdurkee.net/stickfonts.html. I contacted Chris Crain about how he does it and he told me that he just uses various graphics applications on his computer. I tried that and I found it to be too time intensive and then there were no checks for correct note syntax and I couldn't hear it. Lilypond gives all of that including a midi, postscript, and pdf version of the piece. All the major notation apps that can add a new font should work for this.

-Eric

Have you figured out a way to StaffTab-ulate LilyPond yet? Perhaps tweak the code so you can designate note shapes and bold portions of the ledgerlines.

So, Cris Crain is jumping around in different application to produce his music, wow, but, most people are using Finale?

By the way, I would love to have a copy of your LilyPond file that produces your Satie sheet music. I like the look of the music LilyPond creates.

Thanks,

Curtis

Not yet, I'm working on it. I'm in a busy semester so this sounds like a summer project.


That's my impression. However, I don't think there are that many people producing StaffTab music.


It is up on my site, the link is in my signature. Here's a direct link to the lilypond file:

http://dovetailcomputing.com/music/wp-content/uploads/2007/12/gymnopedieno1.ly

I'm also in the process of writing a new arrangement of the piece. Based on watching my own video, and from feedback from many, I started over with Classic tuning. I am really liking the results so far and hope to have a new video and pdf in a few weeks.


You are very welcome. It's great to be able to share this with the forum.

-Eric

Hi Curtis,

I use Finale, which makes it very easy to incorporate the alternate notehead shapes, string markers (a special articulation marker) and fret numbers (using the lyrics tool)

I'm still using Finale 2002, because I like it just fine, but I'm getting ready to upgrade.
The one thing I really like is the ability to export the charts as eps files so they are very small and can be easily resized.

If you're going to do a lot of StaffTabbing, I'd recommend getting a program that will support all of the editing in one platform. Trying to do it all with graphics ater the fact is very time consuming.

I'm on another forum that has many professional composers on it. They have just had a thread about Finale and how much they dislike it since the 2002 version. According to them it has become unstable since then. Most of them have switched to Sibelius and like it a lot. I think that Sibelius can add the custom fonts too, but I'm not positive. I don't know either program but I thought I'd pass this on.

-Eric

Hi Curtis and all curious ones,

I’ve been asked this question numerous times. And though it may seem ludicrous, this is how I have been preparing my StaffTab™ arrangements, because these are the tools I have at hand. I should add that my day job as a designer gives me access to a product called AutoCAD. If you’re not familiar with this software, it is a high end CAD program that, among other things, allows programmability of graphical elements.

First, I transcribe a piece with Finale Songwriter. This software is not the full-blown edition of Finale, which allows all manner of manipulation. However, with Finale Songwriter I’m able to generate and check the copy. Then I import the score into AutoCAD, where I have tools that will change the note-heads to the appropriate type, with the click of a mouse. From there, I just add the fret number information above/below the notes. I can generate output to JPG, bit-map, PDF, or whatever – and scale the page to any size.

Another thing I can do with my transcriptions is stretch the spacing between ledger line groups. This allows me to create additional space to place alternate fret numbers for various tunings. For example, in my ”Stick eLessons” book, I can show fret positions for Classic, MR, Baritone Melody, and Deep Baritone Melody all on the same page. I’m not sure if this can be done in Finale or Sibelius, so this may be a non-issue, especially if you’re creating scores for your own use.

That’s how I do it. As has been said, Finale and Sibelius both are full-featured programs that allow you to customize your engraving. With that said, no matter which method you notate – you’ll still have to add fret number info by hand.

While I’m at it, I’d like to publicly thank Greg and Emmett for developing StaffTab. I know the idea spawned from Emmett’s cruder version used in “Free Hands” and is really a powerful way to exploit standard music notation into a system that can be understood in minutes by a non-sight reader.

- Chris
http://www.ChrisCrain.com
New “Daybreak” CD available for FREE.

Greg,

I've just upgraded from Finale 2006 to Finale 2008. I like it just fine. I've even gone in and modified the midi file to add the Stick. I took the first track off of your CD that accompanies your book (where you play each note once for tuning purposes, I think) and made a wav file of it, then mapped it to the midi chart. Now I can select "Chapman Stick" as an instrument in Finale and when I play the file, it actually sounds like a Stick!

If you do upgrade and are able to get the StaffTab working, would it be possible for you to post the steps you used to make it work? That's the one thing left that I haven't been able to figure out.

Jim

Hi Jim
I imagine there wouldn't be too much difference with the newer version, but I can tell you the steps I go through to make a StaffTab chart:

1. Get the notes in place with the correct rhythms and transposition (I usually use scroll view for this, so that I can space the staves far enough apart to avoid the high bass notes getting written on the trable staff). I try to make sure that all ties and slurs are done before moving on to the next step, so it's a good idea to print out your score and draw these in to make sure they're correct.

2. Figure out the fingering and alter the noteheads accordingly. Since the default notehead is for the first finger, those don't ever have to be changed.

3. Place the string markers on the staff (this is a note expression using the hyphen character that has been alterred in the font. You will need to specify this expression on, preferably on a template, so that it's easy to start each chart fresh.

I place the string markers before writing in the fret numbers because for some reason on my version of Finale, it doesn't like to copy and paste lyrics along with everything else and leave them in the same verse. So if there are any measures that are repeats of other measures, I do all of the notehead and string marker modifications first, then copy and paste.

4. Using the lyric tool I write the fret numbers,with the melody staff as verse 1 and bass staff as verse two.

5. Add any additional expressions, etc., and the chord symbols between the staffs.

A few things you'll want to do on you template before using it:

1. Check the notehead stem connections. Since you are using alternate noteheads, they will attach at different locations to the stems.

2. Set the fonts for the chords, fret numbers, etc, so that they will be consistent from document to document.

for my songbook I'm adopting some conventions from piano notation to make writing simpler, like using the sustain pedal notation to indicate ringing arpeggios, rather than using layers with pedal tones under more complex rhythms.

I think this makes things a lot easier to read. If I upgrade I'll make some templates for everyone to use.

If I can think of anything else I'll let you know.

Hi Chris,

Glad to know you've found a way to implement the notation that works for you. Thanks for the kind comments.