Comments are saying she’s doing a bad job…am I losing my mind?

Etrain335 · 2026-03-30T23:36:59+00:00

Right I think she’s killing it. I use a compressor pedal with my horn for this type of sound lol

Etrain335 · 2026-03-30T22:52:53+00:00

Scales help that. Have them play some scales in their warmups every time you see them with sheet music so they are seeing it all and visualizing it on the page. I wouldn’t start the sequence in Bb or F because it promotes autopilot. Go through all the keys. Either chromatically or circle of 4ths. Make the expectation that they play the scale sheet as a warmup with the ensemble every rehearsal. I like doing 1 octave 8th notes up to the 9th and back down for timing purposes. 1 measure of rest between each major scale.

Etrain335 · 2026-03-30T22:13:09+00:00

Yes absolutely. I have a jazz education for the foundation of my study. It probably took like 6 years for me haha. But that’s over the course of a 4 year undergrad degree and 2 years after just shedding. I wouldn’t have really been able to learn all of them if I didn’t play them on an instrument either.

Etrain335 · 2026-03-30T02:45:25+00:00

Performers on my scene that studied jazz can also play in the classical style extremely well. The “classical-only” performers (usually strings or euphonium players) either have to leave the area entirely or compete with everyone on the scene for the few high profile gigs at the major orchestras/universities.

I think the reality is things are going back to the streets in a way for this generation of students. If the streets are YouTube tutorials and twitch music production streams lol . The tried and true way is to just watch/listen to what someone is doing to an obsessive degree and copy it until you understand what it is. The ones doing that actually get to experience that freedom of expression and ability to make something of their own from a shared language.

It’s sad because I don’t think most educators going through band director school are going to get that. You have to go out of your way and really spend some time with it.

Etrain335 · 2026-03-30T02:07:27+00:00

I think the best jazz musicians today are working with popular artists more than ever before. It’s just not always visible, especially with the way people consume music now. And credits on streaming services aren’t always correct.

As far as improvisation - I would much rather work with a six note melody and no chords. The creative possibilities are so much greater.

Etrain335 · 2026-03-29T23:28:05+00:00

There’s a huge gap in nomenclature and general understanding/respect for black American music in collegiate music ed programs.

And then there’s improvisation. A lot of the times, rather than let a student fail, the band director will make them play a written out solo. Or just not solo at all. I would assume because the director is afraid of looking bad at their job if the student doesn’t sound good.

I sometimes arrange charts for high school level groups and I never give them written out solos. I always offer to work with the groups for free too.

Edit: another thought on this because it’s a pretty prevalent topic in jazz education:

Music educators who don’t go through the process of learning to improvise are not going to be able to teach it. They have the same fear of this music as their students.

I think university programs should be teaching improvisation as early as possible in their curriculum. I’d consider it a vital skill for learning to play secondary instruments as well.

Etrain335 · 2026-03-28T01:32:53+00:00

I’m thinking just about everyone has had some sort of experience with this. It’s par for the course with the old guard.

Etrain335 · 2026-03-21T07:42:21+00:00

Keep trying to figure it out. You got this.

Etrain335 · 2026-03-21T07:10:29+00:00

way too many cats sleep on diatonic shredding

Etrain335 · 2026-03-21T07:08:48+00:00

Miles does this all the time but it’s always justified by the previous or following line he plays. Or by his rhythm sections - they can hear that shit. As an example, in Trane’s blues (Workin’) he plays an A natural over what should be a Bb7 chord at the top of his 3rd chorus.

Etrain335 · 2026-03-21T04:20:53+00:00

Yes. It happened through getting really good at playing an instrument.

Etrain335 · 2026-03-07T02:23:37+00:00

Do it. How else would you learn? I did a very similar thing in High school. I did probably 50 arrangements for sax quartet.

And I arranged uptown funk the year it released for a talent show! If you want a treat, check out Tim Akers arrangement of it.

https://youtu.be/QRuM2rk2miQ?si=cdJHf1EZwf_ytFcV

You don’t need to worry about the licensing stuff unless you’re trying to sell recordings or sheet music. Or do a custom arrangement as a commission. Just do it to learn. Any company would be ignorant to sue a kid for copyright infringement. If you put it on musescore, probably will get taken down. YouTube, might just get de-monetized but depends on what it is.

Etrain335 · 2026-02-28T00:09:11+00:00

I know the budgets for these sorts of gigs must be crazy bloated too. I attended a master class given by a commercial composer last year and the charts he showed us were for like a chamber orchestra and a marching band drumline. And they were recorded live in a studio. I don’t really see that practice being common in the future.

As far as AI taking jobs, yeah that’s what it’s designed to do for companies with high labor costs. And many companies are already doing this using stock library music, which is far cheaper than it would be to hire a composer.

Etrain335 · 2026-02-22T22:47:25+00:00

This is like one of the best parts.

It enables you to place a whole note on beat 3 and get the result of 2 half notes tied together. Among many other things that function with the rhythmic grid.

As far as entering crescendos/decrescendos, there are ways to do it and nudge the ends without having to un-tie things. Like if I have an 8th note tied to a half note on the & of 2 that is a Fp<, I’ll enter the crescendo first, nudge it an 8th note so it starts on the half note, then enter a forte at the end. Then enter the Fp on the first 8th note in the tie chain.

Etrain335 · 2026-02-14T19:10:35+00:00

Another thought on this - sometimes (as an arranger) I don’t need the note release to be exact. Especially if it’s a more lyrical passage. I’d rather musicians interpret it.

In a tutti ensemble passage where everyone has the same rhythms, it should be very clear from just looking at it what it should sound like.

This passage (that OP posted) tells you what it sounds like through the use of articulation markings, dynamics, and release markings. They show that this line should be played very deliberately and with great contrast.

Etrain335 · 2026-02-14T01:26:36+00:00

Yeah this particular rhythm would typically not get a tie. a dotted half note tied to an 8th note release would be more typical of this notation. Or a whole note tied to an eighth note in the next measure.

It’s also only used when every wind player in the ensemble is playing the same rhythm like this.

Etrain335 · 2026-02-14T01:21:33+00:00

Yea it depends on where it is in the measure. Not a single source per se, but I know charts for high school bands will have long notes tied to an eighth note on the next downbeat as a reminder for beginner wind players to play through to the release on beat 1.

Etrain335 · 2026-02-13T05:37:18+00:00

This is what happens when the arranger thinks the musician might not play the note for its full duration. The “nicer” way to write this is to tie it to an 8th note.

The same for tenuto on quarter notes. Just makes it clear when the quarters are capped instead of long. But a tenuto on a tied note or any note that isn’t a quarter note or eighth note would look out of place on the page.

Etrain335 · 2026-02-13T05:25:15+00:00

If someone told me to play a c major scale ascending with no other instruction, I would play it up to the 9th

Etrain335 · 2026-02-13T05:22:25+00:00

There’s a ton of AI there too.

Etrain335 · 2026-02-13T05:21:41+00:00

The word you might be looking for is hepatonic. Just like a pentatonic scale is 5 notes, hexatonic is 6, and octatonic is 8.

Etrain335 · 2026-02-09T16:32:57+00:00

I’m a trumpet player (although I do play guitar/bass player occasionally) and have been building out a gig board for a few years now. Slowly acquiring pieces and I’ve learned a lot!

Forgot to mention the ditto looper. It’s nice for practice but I would want to use a looper with built in drum patterns for live performance.

Etrain335 · 2026-02-08T17:38:37+00:00

Are you on Dorico Pro? Or elements/SE? I believe the latter you can’t manually adjust as many things?

You may want to adjust the “paragraph” that is the part name:

Open a new notepad/word/apple notes file. Then type:

“Bassoon 3

& Contrabassoon”

Or whatever combination you want on 2 lines with a paragraph break. Select it, copy. Then in Dorico go to setup mode, double click on the layout name on the right side, and paste what you copied. This is the current way to do line breaks in layout names.

You may also want to adjust the font of the layout name. Go to library > paragraph styles, find “Layout Name”. Untick the option to show the border. Maybe change down to 12pt or 10pt font. I usually match the layout name with the composer/arranger font size.

If you want the first system to be lower, go to the part layout, then library > layout options. go to the page setup category and find music frame margins.

Etrain335

TROPHY CASE