Transposing Sheet Music?

[DougHulme]

This might perhaps be better written in 'tangents' but here goes anyway.

Here is the scenario... I posses dozens of trombone quartets/ensembles. My trombone section in the brass band I play in are all keen to do some work together as a section - even have the opportunity of some gigs as such. Being a brass band none of them read bass clef... all of my arrangements (of course) are written in Bass clef!

I need to transpose to treble clef the tenor parts.

I don't own any music programmes like Sibelius, Dorico, Photoscore, Finale or whatever. Even if I did I don't have the time to sit down and copy loads of parts or the score by hand into such programmes.

I have heard mixed reports on the effectiveness of software that can scan a pdf or Jpeg image into a programme and read the manuscript and then enable me to do this transposition at a stroke. I don't know the names of any versions of such software and before I fetch Google up for such knowledge I thought I would see what advice anyone on the forum has for me?

I don't want to spend 1000's but don't mind a few hundred $/£. I equally don't want to waste any money and I don't have a huge amount of time to invest in it either (otherwise I would sit down and just re rewrite the parts by hand).

Whats the way to go

Doug

[IanDeterlingComposer]

I own Sibelius and Photoscore Lite - I don't use Photoscore all that often, but it works great when I need it! It seems to me (I could be wrong) but I think it works best when you scan in a single part at a time (instead of all the instruments at once with the full score... I could be wrong, but scanning in an entire score might be a more advanced feature you'd have to pay for where the 'Lite' version is more basic but free). It isn't 100% perfect, but it's close enough where it saves me a lot of time. Basically how it works - you import the PDF into Photoscore, you make any needed corrections as needed, and then you 'export document to Sibelius' and it opens as a Sibelius file. I'd do that for each part, and then copy/paste the parts afterwards into one Sibelius file. I should add that there is a bit of a learning curve to all this, but I think there are a number of YouTube videos that walk you through the process. Also, Sibelius has a subscription option where you can just pay by month. When I taught music tech, my students would just get a temporary subscription - I think for students/educators it's something like eight bucks a month and sixteen for a regular subscription.

[hyperbolica]

I'd be willing to bet that all of them learning bass clef will involve less effort than transposing all of your sheet music. Plus, it will be something that they benefit from in many other situations.

[DougHulme]

"IanDeterlingComposer" - thanks for that, that gives me an insight into the process.

"hyperbolica"... I was just starting to think the same thing

[PhilTrombone]

Musescore is a pretty useful music notation program, available for free (or a small yearly fee to upgrade).
I used it recently to do a similar transposition for a trumpeter in my concert band who doubles on euphonium, but does not read bass clef. In my case, I was not able to scan the source part, but entered it manually as written, and the used the program to do the transposing.

Musescore is here: https://musescore.org/en

I see that there are some additional non-free SW ( ie "Scanscore") available for scanning now.
You might want to look into that here: https://scan-score.com/en/how-to-scan-m ... musescore/

Good luck!

[DougHulme]

Thanks Phil... I'll look.

Doug

[BGuttman]

If you want to do the Bass Clef version, Reginald Fink wrote a book something like "Treble Clef to Bass Clef" intended for teaching bass clef to treble clef baritone horn players.

I also found a phone app (Android) called Clefs (an adjunct to an app called Perfect Ear) that will train reading in C Treble, Bass, Tenor, and Alto clefs. The full program had a cost (US $2.00; don't know what it would be in UK) but you can get pretty far for free.

[sungfw]

For high quality scans of scores, I've had relatively good success (> 90% accuracy) turning scanned scores into editable electronic scores using OMeR plugin for Harmony Assistant. Harmony Assistant is ok for quick-and-dirty editing and basic printouts, but its scoring and layout tools are pretty limited. Fortunately, HA will export to musicXML, which can be imported by all the usual suspects (Finale/Sibelius/Dorico/MuseScore/etc.) [Caveat: my experience is with the Mac version of OMeR and HA; ymmv with the Windows version.]

For PDF scores generated in a notation program, I've had great success (> 95%, and often 100%, accuracy) with PDFtoMusic, which exports directly to musicXML. (Ornaments, ossia, and mixed meters tend to trip it up, and it's about 50/50 on clef changes.) Same caveat as above.

With either method, I find it best to save individual pages as separate files rather than saving the whole score in a single file. That way if it screws up the layout of one page you only have to fix that page rather than everything following the screwup.

[MrHCinDE]

I had some reasonable success with the free online Musescore converter. It needed some adjustment but still saves time compared with doing it totally manually. It worked much better with non-scanned pdfs than scanned ones.

A friend scanned a few parts in Capella for me with Capella Scan. It worked better than Musescore for me and costs a significant but not ridiculous 150€ or so. It can save as MusicXML which can be edited in almost anything, or of course Capella itself. You can download a free trial version here:
https://capellasoftware.com/program-downloads/

[DougHulme]

Thank you for all of this, I'm sat here investigatinge each suggestion as it comes, very gratefuland not ignoring anyone... Doug

[Pezza]

Give the music to the other players. It's their choice to either transpose or learn to play bass clef!

[brassmedic]

Yes, Musecsore can do exactly that, and it's free. The sucessfullness depends on the quality of the pdf's. Sometimes it works; sometimes it doesn't. Might as well try.

[DougHulme]

Thanks Brad I think I might just give Musecsore a go and see how it turns out, especially time wise. I think our scanners are quite good so maybe that might improve the success rate.

I've now had time to google the subject as well... this keeps coming up when you do that https://www.musitek.com/ anyone tried it?

Doug

[AndrewMeronek]

Are these hand-written?

[DougHulme]

No all published/printed.

[hyperbolica]

The conversion of scans I've done has a hard time the more detail is on the page. Articulations really confuse things, and pencil markings or other artifacts in the notation will drive it berzerk. What has often happened to me is that it gets thrown off by a dot after a note and adds a 1/32 or 1/64th note and then starts adding a lot of tiny rests to get things to even out. Repairing the junk takes more time than just writing it all out from scratch. For me, it rarely gives me data worth using.

I still think learning clefs is the best way forward. You can't do this every time there's new music to hand out just to avoid learning a basic musical skill, especially for trombone.

[DougHulme]

Well it certainly would from my time perspective but there are 4 of them and unanimity would be essential and speed of execution is also time based. But you are undoubtedly correct in terms of logic and common sense!... Doug

[psybersonic]

I wrote an app iTransposer to help euphonium players learn bass clef. I extended it to do all the transpositions I could think of. Basically you play a note and it shows you the note on a staff . The idea is you play a scale slowly and watch the screen and subliminally learn a new transposition or clef.
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/itransposer/id976575763
https://m.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1 ... 52149&_rdr

ios only I'm afraid but it's free and only takes up half a megabyte on your phone.

Want to read horn in a Eb, F, or viola parts ? Does most instruments.

[StephenK]

Well it certainly would from my time perspective but there are 4 of them and unanimity would be essential and speed of execution is also time based. But you are undoubtedly correct in terms of logic and common sense!... Doug

Since there are four of them, maybe organise a practical group session for a couple of hours with a tutor to take them through the mechanics of making the switch, where there are practical examples shown and that they work through there and then to get how simple it is. Could be someone say from the local music service, who is used to doing it with students transitioning from brass band to other groups. There would be a cost, but maybe would get more buy in. It's not acceptable to just refuse to put in the work imo.

[BGuttman]

And here I thought that Brass Band music came in transposing treble, tenor, and bass clef. I would think that a brass band trombone player should be able to read all 3.

When I played on a Brass Band here in the US we had parts in transposing treble and also in bass. Then again, most of the players were schooled in trombone starting in bass clef and working out.

I have to say, learning transposing treble as a bass clef player wasn't a very difficult task. It just seemed that way at the beginning.

[DougHulme]

Ah Bruce... If only you were not a colonial you would understand how deeply entrenched the British Brass Band world is, even teaching in schools is very often Treble only and there is such a wealth of music made in that format that they dont often need to go outside that sphere. The Salvation Army is even worse in its pluralism for Treble clef, they say that goes back to Victorian times where it was all about being able to swap players all around the band to maintain a balance and that most of the 'converts' were uneducated and only wanted to cope with the most simple of musical challenges. Not sure that was true and certainly ceased be true even in my fathers lifetime but traditions linger. I am seriously toying with the idea of suggesting we make it a project for them though and try and do it together and I have noted the resources mentioned here that would make my life easier encouraging them to come over to the dark side. Mind you will that mean they all want my seat on Bass Trombone - got to watch my back here

[psybersonic]

Brass Band Treble clef is Tenor Clef and a quick fix of adding a couple of flats to the key signature. Still get caught out by accidentals where the white notes on the keyboard are not separated by black ones.
Some old Brass Band scores have trombone parts in tenor clef.
Should only take a few days to learn bass clef but I know a trombonist who finds it difficult/impossible as she is also a pianist.

[boneagain]

Doug,

Regarding good quality scanner: sometimes I've had a really good scan do WORSE than a poorer one. As noted above, ANYmarks on the page confuse the heck out of the music recognition software. A clean, VERY black and white (NO grey!) scan works best for me. And that "best" is not good enough... I STILL end up with lots of Musescore time (and Finale before that.)

Your idea of some sessions sounds pretty fair to me. Everybody gets some skin in the game.
If each player is either learning the new clefs directly (by working on them) OR indirectly (by either manual or computer translation) everybody comes out ahead.

It might even work better with something like Zoom meetings than in person. People could share desktops as needed with something like Musescore. Working together to get down the tricks of entering notes quickly (yes, that CAN be done in Musescore as well as Finale and Sibelius) should shorten the time for the learning curve.

Once you get the hang of "coding" individual parts you can move on to "coding" scores. IMHO Musescore is behind the other tools in music playback, but it STILL gives a pretty good representation of pitches. This means each player would be able to hear if they entered all the notes in properly before printing out parts. And the group would have scores for the transposed works

I kinda think that by the time you finished four or five tunes everyone would be a LOT more comfortable with the original clefs But, if not, you'd have the parts you could read most easily.

And, yeah, gotta watch that job security stuff!

Dave

[Doug Elliott]

Someone who is really good at Sibelius or Finale (not me) would actually be able to enter the parts very quickly and accurately without the hassles of scanning and fixing the many errors. It would be cheaper to pay for that service than to spend tons of time figuring it all out yourself.

[jthomas105]

Ok, I'll volunteer to transpose one from bass to Bb treble parts like trumpet.

Choose one that is no more than two pages per quartet part and send scans of them to my email.

[email protected]

I used to do this all the time on Finale when I was a band director when needing to change parts for an ensemble or putting in band scores that were not available on SmarMusic Classic and we wanted parts our kids could practice on and be tested on.

I'll start with one and go from there based on work schedule. Should be able to knock one out in a couple of days.

[soseggnchips]

Ah Bruce... If only you were not a colonial you would understand how deeply entrenched the British Brass Band world is, even teaching in schools is very often Treble only and there is such a wealth of music made in that format that they dont often need to go outside that sphere.

Yep. I mostly play in big bands and even there it's pretty common to find a load of handwritten Bb treble parts in the back of the pad to accommodate some past trombonist who never learned bass clef.

Something that might not be immediately obvious to people in non-banding parts of the world: brass banders don't just learn treble clef, they learn the trombone as a transposing instrument. So for them, first position isn't Bb F Bb D F Ab Bb... it's C G C E G Bb C. When they learn bass clef it's both a new clef and a transposition: middle line is a D, which is actually their E.

I apologise to any brass banders reading this for talking about you as though you're some sort of strange alien species. Fortunately it's gone 5PM so I imagine they'll mostly be in the pub by now.

[BGuttman]

This "switching out" idea is not new. American bands from the mid 19th Century ("Civil War" bands) also had music written in transposing treble since the battery of instruments was Bb and Eb Saxhorns (ranging from Eb sopranino to Eb bass). Music was written in treble, except for the Eb Bass (written in bass clef) and percussion (if written at all). Again, the intent was that anybody could play any part to cover the ensemble. I have copies of the part books from the 3rd New Hampshire Volunteer Post Band (stationed in Charleston SC harbor) and all the parts are in treble clef, except the Eb bass as noted above. Eb transposed notes look like bass clef notes, except for different key signatures so a bass clef tuba part can be read by a transposing treble player -- much like the bass trombone in a Big Band can read the Eb Baritone Sax part.

[CalgaryTbone]

I can identify with this thread since I also started playing in Salvation Army Brass Bands. When I started high school, I had to learn bass clef. It is easier at the age, for sure, but it's not that difficult. I'm guessing that this won't go over well with your friends, but handing them some manuscript paper and a pencil and a couple of charts would be the best way for them to learn bass clef. I discovered back all those years ago the the act of writing out your own parts, besides being a pain, is a motivator to learn the clef and it starts the process of having your brain make the association between the two notations. Of course, once they learn that, tenor clef is a breeze with the same lines and spaces as B flat treble and the concert key signature like bass clef.

In North America, most brass band folks can read the standard clefs - there's actually a couple of music publishing places that essentially do the opposite, and publish bass clef parts for the low brass for greater comfort for the local players.

Tell your friends that learning a new clef will open up a whole new world of music for them to practice and perform. Some years ago, the Enfield (SA) Band played a concert here and the trombone section and one of the tubas played quartets throughout the intermission to keep the audience entertained. They sounded great, and I'm guessing that they were reading some bass clef charts!

Jim Scott

[hyperbolica]

I can identify with this thread since I also started playing in Salvation Army Brass Bands. When I started high school, I had to learn bass clef. It is easier at the age, for sure, but it's not that difficult. I'm guessing that this won't go over well with your friends, but handing them some manuscript paper and a pencil and a couple of charts would be the best way for them to learn bass clef. I discovered back all those years ago the the act of writing out your own parts, besides being a pain, is a motivator to learn the clef and it starts the process of having your brain make the association between the two notations. Of course, once they learn that, tenor clef is a breeze with the same lines and spaces as B flat treble and the concert key signature like bass clef.

In North America, most brass band folks can read the standard clefs - there's actually a couple of music publishing places that essentially do the opposite, and publish bass clef parts for the low brass for greater comfort for the local players.

Tell your friends that learning a new clef will open up a whole new world of music for them to practice and perform. Some years ago, the Enfield (SA) Band played a concert here and the trombone section and one of the tubas played quartets throughout the intermission to keep the audience entertained. They sounded great, and I'm guessing that they were reading some bass clef charts!

Jim Scott

We really need a "thanks" or +1 button here.

[DougHulme]

I have been away from the computer and phone all afternoon and evening, I have noted these replies and the kind offer as well. I shall respond in more depth in (my) morning. Thank you for all the responses... I knew we wern't alone!!... Doug

[CalgaryTbone]

We really need a "thanks" or +1 button here.

Thanks!

JS

[DDoghouse]

Someone who is really good at Sibelius or Finale (not me) would actually be able to enter the parts very quickly and accurately without the hassles of scanning and fixing the many errors. It would be cheaper to pay for that service than to spend tons of time figuring it all out yourself.

My wife is such a person, a master engraver in Sibelius. DM if you would like a quote.

[robcat2075]

Remember when we used to hire people to "type" our papers for classes?

Now we all type! It wasn't nearly as hard as we thought. Imagine if we were still having to get someone else to type for us.

Likewise for music notation.

The time spent learning a modern notation program is time well-spent, I think. Anyone who is an at-all active musician will have recurring needs to arrange, edit and print notation.

Might as well get started on that useful skill now!