 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: bmcgar ★2017
Date: 2009-08-10 02:03
So, here I am, in the wilds of Southwest Virginia, looking for new solo and ensemble sheet music.
How do I choose?
If I'm lucky enough to find a recording of some of the pieces I come across in the catalogs, I can buy CDs (at $18 a pop, if the pieces aren't available online, which they rarely are) so that I can listen to the one piece on the CD that I may be interested in.
Or I can fly to Boston or NYC (or Las Vegas?) and rifle through the music in one of the few stores that actually has inventory, or find a really good music library with scads of late-model music to investigate.
Or I can rely on word of mouth recommendations, but this area isn't exactly choked with proficient clarinetists or gaggles of clarinet ensembles to consult with...and tastes vary anyway.
Or I can just order titles that sound interesting or whose covers have really cool graphics, or I can rely on a verbal description by those few sellers who provide them (thank you, Gary, for taking the time to include descriptions).
Relying on the first two options, I could go broke traveling.
Relying on the third or fourth options, I could go broke experimenting, what with modern single short compositions going sometimes up to $30 a pop, and some short collections, such an arrangement of Piazolla's "Historie" going for nearly $80 at some places (thank you, Gary, for offering it at lower cost).
Sheet music publishing is the only "manufacturing" business that I can think of just now that requires buyers to shell out money, yet provides them almost no relevant information about their products! (I'd say that we at least know that we're buying music, but that's debatable for some compositions.) Heck, the customer can't even be sure that the music will be readable, given that some publications are just photocopied from the hand-written manuscript!
What are publishers thinking of? Do they not want more customers, or do they just not care?
Would it cut into publishers' profits so much that putting a scan of a page or two of $40 pieces of sheet music--or better, a MIDI file-- in their catalogs is out of the question, even with the likelihood of increased sales?
Who knows? Maybe they'd rather go low volume/high price because it's less bookkeeping for them. But it seems to me that, even without lowering prices, with the increased sales volume that they'd have if musicians didn't have to rely on pig-in-a-poke shopping, they'd want to let people know a bit more about what they're selling.
Surely there may be more to this, and maybe Gary Van Cott can enlighten me. But given my experiences with some well-known publishers like Ricordi and B&H, it seems to me that most publishers either don't care if they make more sales or they simply don't know what they're doing.
Straighten me out, folks.
Make me understand why I should be willing to spend lavishly on sheet music even though I can't find out, with reasonable effort, what I'm buying, and the publishers won't help me.
B.
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Author: davyd
Date: 2009-08-10 03:15
One possibility: avail yourself of JW Pepper's liberal return policy. They don't carry everything, but you might start there. For some of their music for concert band, they have MP3 files and/or scans of a page or two of scores; perhaps they offer similar samples for solo music.
In Blacksburg, you're probably too far from the DC area to visit stores there: Foxes in Falls Church, VA or Dales in Silver Spring, MD, unless you have some other reason to be in the area. There's also the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, but there are no guarantees that they'll have any particular piece, or that they'll be able to find it if they do.
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Author: lrooff
Date: 2009-08-10 03:36
If I can join in with some kvetching of my own about publishers... Why can't the publishers put the sheet music together for the convenience of the poor schmuck who has to play it? If the transition from page one to page two occurs in the middle of a sixteenth-note run, don't put page two on the back of page one. Use two pages. Woodwind players need both hands for the instrument, and we can't turn the page with our feet. For what you charge, there's no reason you can't use a second page. Similarly, what's with the repeats that require flipping pages back and forth? Paper isn't in such short supply that you can't just print the darn passage twice. With computers, it's as simple as cut-and-paste. And when the composer in his insanity repeats the same measure 149 times in a row (think of the bassoon part in Bolero...) number the measures, for crying out loud. If the player blinks or glances at the conductor, as we're wont to do from time to time, it's hard to find our way back to the right measure when there are sixteen lines of identical measures going on and on without numbering.
I have an additional suggesting for publishers on behalf of all of us who've struggled to turn a page when the two pages seem stuck together... Fold the pages at the factory so that one page is an eighth of an inch wider than the other. Then, we can flip them without having to dog-ear the pages or stick paper clips on them.
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Author: mrn
Date: 2009-08-10 04:29
In the good old days, the music stores employed pianists ("song pluggers") to preview sheet music for customers. George Gershwin worked as a song plugger for a time.
Some music publishers do provide audio previews of their music, mostly band music (because that's what sells).
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Author: EEBaum
Date: 2009-08-10 04:34
It is my experience that many large music publishers have very little interest in enticing people to purchase their wares, with some even making it extremely difficult for me to give them money in exchange for something very specific that they have that I want, that it is supposedly their very business to sell me. It is for this reason that I am self-publishing (shameless plug: online shop opening soon!).
What really pisses me off is that the same publisher that makes it nearly impossible for me to give them money in exchange for music to play will then print that whiny anti-photocopying notice, lamenting that illegal photocopies mean lost sales, leading to pieces becoming unavailable. Quick, someone call a waaaaaaahmbulance!
The biggest cause of lost sales of sheet music is the sheet music publishers themselves. I practically had to exhume Theodore Presser himself in order to get my hands on a wind quintet they "publish".
I like the page turn offset suggestion. Might have to try that!
-Alex
www.mostlydifferent.com
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Author: bmcgar ★2017
Date: 2009-08-10 05:09
Regarding awkward page turns, this is just another bit of evidence that leads me to conclude that the publishers don't care. (In fact, this actually encourages scanning and photocopying.)
I'll bet five bucks that at least a few large music publishers employ people whose sole job is to transcribe manuscript into press-ready form using music notation software, and that editing for page breaks, repeats, etc., is never done.
Also, trying to publish on the cheap as much as possible, page layout is probably determined by trying to avoiding empty space on the standard uncut press-sized sheet, and to hell with the usability of the final product.
B.
Post Edited (2009-08-10 05:15)
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Author: tictactux ★2017
Date: 2009-08-10 07:29
Re sheet music: We're well off here - we have a Sheet Music Database with all the publishers, with score samples and (low quality) mp3 recordings of most pieces.
--
Ben
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Author: John25
Date: 2009-08-10 13:05
As a small music piblisher, I can confirm that I have been doing what lroof suggests for years. This is because I have played through all the pieces myself. I even put page turns after two lines of music (leaving the rest of the page blank) if this is the best place. So we're not all bad! But I agree that many big publishers seem to have no thought for the players - cost seems to be the prime consideration.
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Author: johng ★2017
Date: 2009-08-10 14:47
I am a small publisher of sheet music and for the last few years have been putting in sample pages to view and sample sound files to listen to on my web site. It is time consuming to do, although I have it easier than a standard publisher since I have easy access to the computer files with which to make these samples. Recently, I have been going back through my older publications to produce at least a sound sample for everything (about 600 pieces).
If you think about it, it is only in the last few years that internet band width has improved enough to allow such luxurious use of file storage and band width. For the large publisher, having used more traditional printing processes over the years, having the time and money to produce sample files must be a difficult financial proposition. No doubt they would like to do so....but in the mean time, I and other smaller publishers are happy to be able to provide this service since we can do it fairly easily. I have had exactly the same complaints for many years in my own sheet music buying.
As to page turns, I plead guilty for the first few years I was publishing. I started out with duets which are hard on page turns anyway, but I also figured people would play them to just enjoy and not necessarily to perform. Once I discovered players were actually performing them, I got more attuned to making decent page turns.
John Gibson, Founder of JB Linear Music, www.music4woodwinds.com
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Author: William
Date: 2009-08-10 15:47
Here in Madison, Wi, we are lucky that our Ward Brodt Music Mall store stocks a sample copy of every solo or ensemble--band, orchestral and choral--on our Wisconsin School Music Association's music festival list for students and directors to review before ordering. Perhaps some music store in Roanoke--not all that far from you--might do the same. If it might be of any help, you can review our festival listings for ideas--it is a quite comprehensive listing of many good solos and ensembles for all instruments and voices which is updated every year to keep it fresh. Here is our WSMA's website: http://www.wsmamusic.com/ Sorry, no pages to actually see, just lots of titles--but they are mostly good, especially the Class A (top level) listings.
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Author: EEBaum
Date: 2009-08-10 18:30
johng wrote: "No doubt they would like to do so"
I have my doubts about that. I think that on some level some publishers probably prefer to sell their music sight unseen, as it facilitates the continued sales of mediocre products.
-Alex
www.mostlydifferent.com
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Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2009-08-10 18:48
Shameless plug: For newly-composed music, see what's available through Sibelius:
http://sibeliusmusic.com
The address for my page is below my signature. The site recently suffered an upgrade that's been driving the composers nuts, but I think the software geniuses have gotten rid of the worst of the bug infestation now.
That catalogue is spotty, with a mixture of amateur and professional composers, ranging in quality from totally incompetent (these may include me: I'm an amateur giving away scores for free) to brilliant (professionals who quite rightly ask for money). They've all got one thing in common: Visitors to the site can view the complete scores for free before deciding whether to buy the right to print out, and can listen to the score play back with computer-generated synthetic instruments. How close to real the audio sounds depends on the composer's computer and also on the listener's computer, but at least you can get some idea of recommended tempos, etc.. Some composers with better recording setups also post MP3 audio with the scores performed by real musicians.
An advantage to asking customers to print their own is that the self-published composers have no cheapskate incentive to cram as much as possible onto a page to save money on paper or postage. I think nearly all of us do try to make sure page turns occur in feasible places and so forth. Also, if you prefer reading music on white paper, gray paper, cream paper or screaming orange paper, you can print out on whatever you want.
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
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Author: Grabnerwg
Date: 2009-08-10 21:00
Here's another plug. Go to the U of Oklahoma Symposium or Clarinet Fest and visit Howard Klug's Woodwindiana booth.
You can look at all the music, and then listen to recording of many, if not all the pieces Howard has for sale.
He has a lot of great stuff that you can't get anywhere else. Most of it is very accessible. I have performed many pieces that I have bought from Howard in past years. He deserves a lot of credit for this contribution to the clarinet world.
Here is a link to the website: http://store.woodwindiana.com/
Walter Grabner
www.clarinetxpress.com
Basset Horn and Bass Clarinet Mouthpieces
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Author: clariniano
Date: 2009-08-10 21:11
Maybe the future of music publishing is having scores available online, especially for major works. I download some scores from the net available through finale and sibelius and have found a number of good arrangements that way. I know the sibelilus one allows you to change the solo instrument and key of the piece (like one Christmas arrangement that would be much more suitable on the A clarinet.) Though I find most publishers are pretty considerate, and the examining boards here allow you to photocopy for the purpose of a bad page turn.
I mostly have problems with some of the older piano collections of pieces, which have lots of mistakes, even the Celebration series for piano has a number of mistakes and poor fingerings.
Meri
Please check out my website at: http://donmillsmusicstudio.weebly.com and my blog at: http://clariniano.wordpress.com
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Author: lrooff
Date: 2009-08-11 03:31
One more short rant, and I'm sure I'll get a lot of "amen" responses... Who in his right mind publishes books of sheet music using a "perfect" binding or signature binding that tries to close itself the moment you take your hand off the music? Yes, my music stand has wires to hold music in place, but anything more than two pages long requires page turning which, in turn, means stopping, putting my horn down, and resetting those wires to hold the new pages in place. Oy! There should be a law that music books must be published with comb binders, ring binders or wire loop binders.
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Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2009-08-11 13:49
Amen indeed. Perfect-binding drives me nuts, expecially in big fat piano scores. The only way to deal with those scores is to break the back -- and then wait for pages to start falling out.
I wouldn't want professional publishing to go away, though. I like being able to choose a modern, well-edited edition of something. I also like being able to buy a horrible edition for comparison. I own several editions of the Mozart concerto and the Brahms clarinet and piano sonatas, for instance. Seeing different editions is interesting, especially when I'm listening to an old recording and can figure out which version the clarinet player probably used.
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
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Author: bmcgar ★2017
Date: 2009-08-11 18:50
Walter,
Yes, I've liked the Woodwindiana catalog pieces very much. But still, everything I've bought from Woodwindiana that I haven't already heard somewhere else is a blind purchase! I, and I think most of us, unfortunately can't go to Oklahoma or wherever the C'fests are held when we want to choose material.
Even with so relatively few publications, Woodwindiana follows the big publishers' and big retailer practice of "don't ask, just buy." Very terse descriptions (when there are descriptions at all), and no preview of the music, either graphically or with a sound clip (which shouldn't be any problem considering that much of their stuff Howard has already recorded or had a hand in recording).
As much as I like most of the music I've purchased from them (some I would not have purchased, had it not been guesswork), and as much as Howard has been very helpful in customer service, the problem that I was ranting about applies to Woodwindiana as well as publishers that I have less respect for.
Yes, very good stuff! But if I didn't see or hear the pieces before hand, how would I know?
B.
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Author: Lynn
Date: 2009-08-13 00:39
Bruce,
I can certainly commiserate with you, but you may have already discovered a possible answer to your dilemma. (you referred to it many times during your initial post) Gary van Cott has an outstanding collection of clarinet music available, along with descriptions, and prices that, I think, are certainly in line with 21st century economics. Just don't look at the price tags on music that was printed twenty or thirty years ago.....it'll make you sick.
I can heartily recommend VCIS, and NO, you don't have to travel to Las Vegas, either. Give Gary an email or phone call and you'll find him to be informative and helpful.
Another recommendation that's already been mentioned is to join ICA and take advantage of their extensive lending library. It's a huge and tremendous resource for clarinet music, and I've been able to find a number of things that have been out of print for years. Give it a try.
Best of luck to you in finding sources for music, though. It's something we all have to deal with, but persistence will likely pay off for you.
Best wishes,
Lynn
Austin, TX
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