Personal Favourites
- My brother’s web site (he is a sculptor) www.brian-alabaster.com.
- Stratford symphony orchestra website (where I play the cello).
- My son James’s art site.
- My own Luthier site Alabaster Handcrafted Instruments
Music Notation Software
- I originally started with Music@passport bought for a mere $38 which is remarkably good – unfortunately they went bust. The product was taken over by GVOX who have now got products called Music time Deluxe (a basic version) and Encore (high end and will also do midi playback of articulation marks) that both look and feel very similar to my Passport product. Some limited support is available for Music@passport from the linkwww.gvox.com .
- I now use a product called Overture 5
originally from Cakewalk but now provided and supported by Geniesoft – see www.geniesoft.com . I highly recommend this product – the user interface is very intuitive and in the latest (Overture V5) you get excellent playback (of dynamics and articulations for both midi and VST instruments). They also have a cheaper version called Scorewriter which is basically the same engine with a few features removed but still extremely good value for money. - Sibelius www.sibelius.com – if you want to get really frustrated download their free demo but you will need a mortgage to buy it! and now I think Overture 5 is pretty much up there anyway.
VST Instruments
- For piano I use the Pianoteq modelled piano from Modart. I think it is a wonderful instrument and quite unmatched (I would, I bought it!).
- For orchestral instruments I use Garritan Personal Orchestra (GPO) and Amadeus Symphony Orchestra (ASO).
Both of these integrate really well with Overture 5 but you need the corresponding xml configuration files. Many of these come with Overture but I have made my own for Pianoteq and for Muse Authentic Guitar Lite:
PDF file generation
- I use a utility called PDF995 and all the pdf’s on this site of sheet music have been created this way. This utility can be obtained from www.pdf995.com. It is free if you don’t mind the ads popping up (you can get rid of the ads for a nominal fee). You can also obtain PDFedit995 (from the same stable) which enables you to combine pdf’s together extremely easily which is very useful when trying to make up a book for printing.
- If you don’t want to combine pdf’s then I would recommend CutePDF which is free and doesn’t have any annoying popups.
Generation of MP3 files
- Overture 5 can generate mp3 files directly but I also use a freebie called CDex which you can obtain from www.cdex.n3.net. Works very quickly to convert wav files to MP3 and will do a lot more besides.