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musicProfessional Orchestration:
By Peter Lawrence Alexander Professional Orchestration is a ground-breaking scholarly revision of the great work by Rimsky-Korsakov. Updated and revised for students and professionals writing for film, TV, recording, the stage, concert hall and other projects, Professional Orchestration is the first multi-volume series in orchestration from an American publisher that teaches the devices and orchestral combinations, supported with audio from the Naxos Music Library, which heretofore have been known by only a privileged few. With its affordable one book/one price approach, each Professional Orchestration title comes with book, complete audio package (furnished by the Naxos Music Library) and workbook called the Personal Mentor™. With four of eight planned volumes shipping throughout 2006 and 2007, Alexander Publishing’s vision is to provide sufficient materials so that any school can offer a minor or major in orchestration. The Professional Orchestration Series is supported by additional coursework like How Ravel Orchestrated:Mother Goose Suite, Writing For Strings Level 1, Writing For Strings Level 2, Writing For Woodwinds, Writing for Brass and Writing for Full Orchestra. Because of industry demands for working composers to be accomplished in recording, additional recording modules are in development. While Professional Orchestration, and all other orchestration courses within the series, work cooperatively with Finale and Sibelius’ Kontakt players, Alexander Publishing is the first academic textbook publisher to help bring to market an orchestral sample library designed for students and school computer labs. Working with E-MU Systems (a division of Creative Labs, makers of the SoundBlaster cards), Alexander Published co-produced the Modern Symphonic Library which comes with an 8-10GB library, professional audio card, and all the software needed to launch or update a music technology program. Software bundled with the MSO includes the Overture 4 notation program, Cubase LE, Sonar Lite, Ableton Live Lite and Wavelab Lite. Thus, the MSO package contains everything the student needs to write, produce, record, and burn music to CD. To further support MSO, our TrueSpec Systems division is a leading developer of affordable digital audio workstation packages for both the individual and the school. Thus, Alexander Publishing provides you with a complete turn key solution for learning and music production. How Professional Orchestration is OrganizedSeparate from instrumentation issues, Rimsky-Korsakov built his work around what Alexander Publishing calls the Eight Keys to Learning Professional Orchestration. Each Key represents a building block that teaches the student specific orchestral devices and combinations (coloration) used in professional work and in which register (common practice) these devices are most frequently used. To accomplish this, starting with Volume 1: Solo Instruments and Instrumentation Notes, all examples are organized by the low, medium, high and very high registers. This unlocks the door to understanding orchestral coloration techniques. For example, a common orchestral doubling is French horns with cellos. It’s one thing to know the doubling, but from common practice, in what registers are the horns and cellos respectively written to achieve the most sonorous sound possible? What’s the dramatic impact of writing Vlns 1 + Vlns 2 – Violas + Cellos in each of the four registers and what type of accompaniment is used with that technique? Professional Orchestration answers those questions. Professional Orchestration also re-examines practices which Korsakov once held taboo, such as doubling French horns and trumpets. This is a very common practice in 20 th Century writing, but in what registers does it achieve its best result? Students learn the answer in Professional Orchestration. Film Scoring InstructionProfessional Orchestration is the heart of any course in film scoring because it teaches those techniques most commonly used in professional writing. Here, specific orchestral devices used by John Williams in his published film score suites are cataloged and referenced. Published scores referenced include The Cowboys, Raiders March, E.T. Adventures On Earth, Harry Potter, and Star Wars. The Naxos Music LibraryWith eight planned Professional Orchestration volumes, and four shipping throughout 2006 and 2007, producing multiple sets of CDs containing orchestral excerpts, was not only cumbersome, but caused the ultimate final price of each Professional Orchestral to skyrocket, not to mention the difficulty of keeping track, ultimately, of several dozen CDs! So, rather than produce costly sets of CDs, Alexander Published looked to the new technology to provide a practical, affordable student solution. Using the Naxos Music Library, students are provided with one audio source for all eight volumes. The Naxos Music Library provides students 24/7 access to over 10,000 CDs, representing over 150,000 near CD-quality streaming audio tracks, composed by over 7,000 composers. Thus, audio examples go beyond the “excerpt” by including not just the excerpt, not just the movement the example is from, but the contents of the entire CD! And, for over 7000 composers listed alphabetically. For example, a number of excerpts are pulled from Bizet’s Carmen. Here, the student gets access not only to the book’s examples, but also to the entire opera! In short, with Professional Orchestration and the Naxos Music Library, every night can be a concert night. Students wanting “hard copy” can order the complete CD direct from Naxos (averaging $6-$8 per disk). For portability, Alexander Publishing is setting up an affiliate relationship where MP3s can be legally downloaded for as low as $0.22 per track vs. $0.99 at the Apple iTunes store. As an example, all the Beethoven Symphonies can be downloaded for under $10US. Each student gets his own one-year subscription to the Naxos Music Library, which can be renewed post-graduation for a very modest fee. Take a TourLearn about each of the first four volumes by clicking on the link below each book cover. Volume 1 now shipping. Volume 2 ships September 1, 2006.
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