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Messages - tony smedley

1
General Discussion / Re: How Old are You?
I had my 89th birthday on  November 20.  Many public buildings had flags flying in my honour. We live in England and November 20 is also the anniversary of the Queen's wedding. Just a coincidence!

Tony
3
General Discussion / Re: Invalid instrument tree
The entry in Noteworthy Composer Options reads:-

(File Types) Instrument Trees  (Location) M: Noteworthy Composer 2.1\itrees


However I note that the reference in Noteworthy Composer Options for Noteworthy 2 is exactly the same - it references the v 2.1 folder. But the Instrument function works perfectly in V 2.0!

Tony
4
General Discussion / Re: Invalid instrument tree
My PC has three hard drives, each of which is partitioned into two drives, They are labelled C,D,L,M,N and O!
 Noteworthy and associated files are on the M drive.

Tony
5
General Discussion / Re: Invalid instrument tree
i am sorry, my explanation did not get over clearly.

I cannot select another itree in the "I" instrument option window  "Change List" actually opens up my Music folder!

The NWC 2.1 itrees folder contains several itrees. Some, such as "Classic" are copied from NWC2.0, where they function prefectly.

"Tools>Options>Folders" lists amongst others  :-
"Instrument Trees -  Location- M\NoteworthyComposer 2.1\itrees"   which is where the program is located.

My last resource is to re-download the NWC 2.1 program, but I have already exhausted my entitlement to further downloads because of a series of PC failures. I have a back-up of the last successful download and I have used this for the latest re-install to no good effect.

Tony
6
General Discussion / Invalid instrument tree
I am having problems with instruments, using NWC V 2.1

Opening the “instrument” window with keyboard “I” and then “predetermined instruments”  shows an empty window and the message 
“Instrument Tree - Invalid instrument tree”

In the itrees folder in the NWC 2.1 folder are a  number of itrees including some copied over from NWC 2.0, where they work OK.
In NWC 2.1, I cannot select an instrument for play back

I have tried everything I can think of including re-installing NWC 2.1 with no solution.

When it comes to playing an existing composition with NWC 2.1, everything works normally, with the correct insruments in orchestral pieces for example.  But the Instrument window still shows "Invalid instrument tree"

Tony
7
General Discussion / Re: Sound card
If you are staying with Windows XP then a Creative SB Audigy SE sound card is inexpensive and offers good sounds so long as you couple it to good speakers. ( or good quality headphones) Normal PC speakers are quite inadequate.

With this card you can install alternative sound fonts such as the extensive range avai1able from
 http://www.hammersound.net/

However if you want to upgrade to Windows 7 you will have to be very careful to ensure that the Creative sound card selected has Sound Font Bank capabilities and is compatible with Windows 7

Tony


8
General Discussion / Re: Sound Font Bank Manager and Windows 7
Thanks for the advice.

In have now removed my Creative card and reverted to the onboard sound which is of good quality but cannot import Sound Fonts.
Much trawling on the Internet reveals that the problem is not unusual. I do not intend to spend another £50-£70 for a new Creative card which is still not guaranteed to work!
The suggestion to use SyFonOne with a virtual port looked interesting but following it up scared me off.

With all its faults Creative Audigy was easy to use
a)   download sf sound font
b)   open Sound Font  Bank Manager
c)   select destination bank
d)   select desired sound font
e)   load sound font

and apart from the sometimes laborious process of writing an i-tree the sounds are immediately available

Tony
9
General Discussion / Sound Font Bank Manager and Windows 7
I have recently started with a new PC with Windows 7, using my previous Creative Audigy sound card.
Even with the alleged latest drivers the Sound Font Bank Manager will not nstall and I cannot use my favoured Organ sound fonts.
As usual it seems impossible to contact anyone at Creative.

Tony
11
General Discussion / Re: That Toccata
Rick,

Quote  

"the work is indeed rather Bach-like in its vast architecture that results from extended, quasi-improvisatory chromatic reworking of a single motif. The Toccata is motoric and resplendent; often performed by church organists, it has gained new fans in recent years from its frequent use, due precisely to those qualities, as a wedding-music recessional. It appears on several albums of "Classical Music for Brides" and the like2.

Read more: http://www.answers.com/topic/toccata-from-organ-symphony-no-5#ixzz1ZEd93zJv


Tony
12
General Discussion / Re: Placement of two chord members of the same (overlapping) note pitch
Not quite the subject but close to it, I have a problem with a Widor score.

A note is preceded by two accidental markings, side by side, a natural and a sharp.
They apply to a “G” note head that has a downward stem, part of a two part beamed pair, and  immediately above is a “B” with an upward stem, also part of a beamed pair. 

 Does this mean that the single note head is actually a chord of “G” snd”G sharp” ?


Tony
13
General Discussion / That Toccata
Widor’s “Toccata” is a popular choice of music for weddings, in the UK at least.
However, there are two small problems if it is chosen.
1)   it is a little too long for the average wedding procession, and the organist is left wondering how to come to a dignified finale.
2)   For the not so expert player there are rather too many notes in the upper register, mostly for the right hand but switching at intervals to the left hand.

I am surprised that no enterprising publisher has produced a simplified version for amateur organists of lesser competence!

Tony. 
14
General Discussion / Re: Difficult Widor
Richard,

Thank you for that advice!.
 As is often the case it is a bit annoying when you have to add an extra staff with all the complications of unwanted bars for a very small part of a long piece.!

Tonyl
15
General Discussion / Difficult Widor
It is said that Widor’s favourite piece was his “Andante sustenuto “ from his “Symphonie Gothique” Op 7
I have transcribed this and played it, using NWC2

I have come to the conclusion that Widor used too many notes and that not all of them were useful !! 

The piece is an acquired taste.

In parts it is not easy to notate within the constraints of NWC2. In bar 25 I could not replicate Widor’s writing as shown in the Hamelle score, no matter how I manipulated two staffs.

Tony
18
General Discussion / NWC 2 Latest Version
What is the latest version of NWC 2?
When I access Noteworthy Softare from my NWC2 Help icon, I am told thatI have the latest version, but when I try to open some recent items from the Scriptorium I am told that it requires a later version - 2.5?

Tony
19
Instrument Trees / Re: new itrees
Jeux, English Organ, Jeux d'Orgues 2 and Stefans Cathedra organ can be found in the Scriptorium
I can Email you  others quite easily if you  can let me have an Email address (using ther safety rule of saying "so and so" AT aol.com ( or other internet server) to avoid automatic picking up of addresses by malicious parties.
At the moment I do not have "jeux d'orgues" or "Cinema Organ" because Imlostv them with a hard drive failure which did not have a back up
You will of course need to have the sound fonts themselves installed in a sound card such as the Creative Sound Blaster series.

Tony
20
General Discussion / Why do you use Noteworthy?
There must be any number of reasons why people adopt Noteworthy.
 In my case. Although I  have produced professional quality scores for a local choral society from difficult to read hand written originals, I use the program for my own amusement.
I would have very much liked to become a first class organ player, but for various reasons this has not been my fortune.  Using Noteworthy I can transcribe complex organ works and eventually “play” them, using a decent speaker system and a good quality sound card and sound font. I get an esoteric pleasure from listening to “my” playing!
As an example of what an old fellow of 88 years can produce, have a look at my Boellmann “Suite Gothique” in the Scriptorium, transcribed entirely by hand with no score reading software.

Tony
21
General Discussion / NWC2 Update
I have had to replace a hard drive on my PC. It contained my copy of NWC2
I installed NWC2 from a back up disk I made some time ago. It is version NEWC2. I have tried to update to NWC version 2.1 but the sytem wants an ID that I do not have.
I have my original NWC1 disk dated December 2002 How can I get back to NWC 2.1?

Tony
23
General Discussion / Re: A problem with Widor.
Rick,

In the IMSLP score the difficult bar is the 4th from the beginning on the top line of page 23 . It is in fact all eighth notes 2 + 3,     5 in a bar meant for 4.

Tony
25
General Discussion / A problem with Widor.
Widor’s Toccata from his Fifth organ symphony is well known and has been put into the Scriptorium by Richard Woodroffe. The other four parts of the symphony are less well known and rarely performed.

I am attempting to put these onto Noteworthy but have run up against a problem with Widor’s composing. 

In a number of places there are many quick runs of notes which can only be fitted into the beat if they are played as sets of triplets, (although they are not so marked in  his score).

 But elsewhere I have 5 notes in a bar which if played as scored require 5 rather than 4 beats

There are an eighth note and two sixteenth beamed together and two eighth notes beamed together. Logically the first three notes are played as a triplet but Noteworthy will not allow this. Is there some sort of ‘work around’ to get round this problem .  .

Tony
26
General Discussion / Re: Staff won't layer!
John,

You are so right!  Normally I always tick the Page Set up box, but I did not in these cases. They are very old files, perhaps I did not know how in those days.

Tony
27
General Discussion / Staff won't layer!
I have found an unusual quirk when resurrecting some unfinished NWC files of some years back.
These files have two staffs each for both the "right hand" and "left hand" parts, but when "layer with next staff"is selected, although the check mark shows as a tick,  nothing happens. The two staffs remain steadfastly independent.
This does not particularly concern me as I am rewriting most of the material, but I do wonder why it happens.

Tony
29
General Discussion / Re: Opening NWC BAK files
Whilst I can re-name files I cannot alter the  suffix  .BAK to .nwc


I have NWC V 2.0
Having downloaded the NWC 21 upgrade it tells me that either NWC 2 is not installed or has been altered!
NWC 2 runs as usual and I am not aware of how I can have altered it.
Any ideas?

Tony

30
General Discussion / Re: Opening NWC BAK files
Bill.

After NWC opens and I get the message that NWC does not recognise it, I cannot find a reference to Open Backup. Clicking om <File>  only gives the normal Open option which brings me back to "NWC does not recognise"

I am using XP

Tony
31
General Discussion / Opening NWC BAK files
This is a subject which I am sure has been aired more than once, but I cannot find it by Searching the forum
I want to open a BAk file but NWC says it does not recognise the file type BAK - although NWC created it

Tony
33
General Discussion / Organ Scores
        I have referred in another post to problems with writing Organ music with Noteworthy. Another thing which has caused me to think is the creation of a typical start to a  3 staff organ score – right hand, left hand, pedals.  Usually this consists of a bracket  between the top two staffs with the word Manual centred on the left hand side of the bracket. The Pedal staff has the title Pedal on the left hand side.
        I have not been able to duplicate this format with the ‘Manual’ title in the middle of the two staffsand content myself with coupling the Manual staffs as Upper and Lower Grand Staffs and labelling them Manual I and Manual II with the lower staff labelled Pedals,. Fortunately, if a layered staff is involved this requires no staff label.

Tony
34
General Discussion / Organ Music
      Using Noteworthy for the production of organ scores has its own little quirks, but there is also a problem with playing organ music using Noteworthy.
      One can select, say, "Organ > Church Organ", from the General Midi but this sound font has its limitations.
     Whilst there are a number of good Organ sound fonts, such as Jeux and Stefan’s Cathedral Organ and these have good ranges of stops ,there are of necessity limited numbers of combinations of stops, such as  “Salicional 8, Gamba 8”
   How to accommodate other combinations with Noteworthy requires some work-arounds.  One is to create a number of identical staffs and to use several of these for each individual available stop or combination that you wish to use- rather like scoring for an orchestra. But there may be an easier way!  
   I imagine that it is possible to create additional sound font channels using the existing individual stop data  but this is beyond my capabilities!

Tony.
35
General Discussion / How Old are You?
At the age of 88 and to be 89 in November, I may be the oldest active user of Noteworthy Composer - though not a frequent user.
Any challengers?

Tony
37
General Discussion / Re: Problem with a chord
William,

Strangely, doing what you say works if the note to be added is outside the area occupied by the stem(s) of the existing notes, that is if it is lower in pitch than the existing notes if they are "stem up" or higher if they are stem down. Outside these parameters the extra note cannot be added to the chord.
Tony .
38
General Discussion / Problem with a chord
Having not used NWC2 for some time, I have a problem!
I want to create a chord which has 2 dotted notes with downward facing stems and a single note of the same value but not dotted, with an upward stem  

Inserting the undotted note first and then inserting a second dotted note with the opposite stem direction works OK, but when I want to add a second similar note, the program won’t let me.  What is the answer?

Tony
39
General Discussion / Re: Looking for a Music Library
David,

Thank you for that link.
As you say there are hundreds of music libraries in Google.   However, i have at last managed to recover from  the depths of my fading memory enough information to get me back to the “Werner  Icking Music Archive”

I have no hesitation in recommending this archive although its emphasis is on the classical repertoire.

I have a very tattered copy of Boëllmann’s  “Suite Gothique” and found that I could download free pdf copies.

Tony
40
General Discussion / Re: Notes not sounding
Richard,

How embarrassing.  I have gone back to the piece after a break of some hours and there is no defect!
I suspect that there is something in the way that the Sound card loaded, but now I may never know.

Tony
41
General Discussion / Looking for a Music Library
Before my PC breakdown I had a link to an internet site (American ? ) which offered a whole range of music in free download form and often as Midi or NWC files.
But I cannot remember the name of the site, which was unusual enough that I should have remembered it

Tony
42
General Discussion / Notes not sounding
After various PC problems I have been reloading various programs including NWC2.
I am now notating a piece of organ music. When I Play what I have entered I find that the notes below the lower line on the top stave do not sound. This occurs even if I change the sound font., but it does not seem to happen with other pieces I have notated previously. I am at a loss.

Tony
43
General Discussion / Re: nwc clip
Does Dick want to open an existing NWC clip, for example an attachment to a posting, or does he want to create a clip?
When I click on a clip attached to a posting I am asked of I want to open it with Noteworthy Composer or some other program.

Tony
44
General Discussion / Re: music recognition/transcription?
Going slightly off topic but with some relevance
.It is common  to have a TV news broadcast running a written interpretation of the speaker’s words across the bottom of the screen, often with hilarious results as the computer program can be fooled by all sorts of things such as the speaker’s dialect or country of origin. Usually one can get the basic meaning of what has been spoken.
It is also common that one can get an instant translation from one language to another, again with variable results.
Put these two things together and you can get this scenario
1)   You telephone someone in, say,. China. You know absolutely no Chinese.
2)   The computer turns what it hears you say into a virtual printed script .
3)   The computer translates this virtual script into  one in a suitable Chinese text
4)   The computer then recites this Chinese text in a spoken language that your Chinese correspondent understands. .
5)   He replies to you in the same way and although he knows no English you hear his reply in the language you understand.

I understand that this has already been done in an experimental basis.  In the explanation I was reading it made the point that translation programs no longer work on fixed rules but by learning the association between different words and phrases. It would seem that  this is the possible route for a practical program of the kind under discussion; but it looks a long way off!

Tony
46
General Discussion / Noteworthy Version
I have had to re-nstall Noteworthy 2 after a PC re-build.  The version is now shown as 2.1.0.0
Is this the latest version?

Tony
48
General Discussion / Re: NWC guitar tab?
As far as I am aware, Rick G has been very helpful to many people seeking answers to problems.
I do not think that sarcastic comments are appropriate to this forum

Tony (aged 87)
49
General Discussion / Re: Garritan Personal Orch - has anybody gotten it to work?
I am one of the oldest contributors to these dscussions as I shall be 87 in November. I tell people "If I can do it, You can do it!".
Installing sound fonts onto a Creative sound card is quite easy once you know how, but it can be a rustrating learning curve, like so much to do with computers, which have lots of logic but no common sense
50
General Discussion / Re: Garritan Personal Orch - has anybody gotten it to work?
I have a relatively inexpensive Creative Sound Blaster Audigy sound card installed and using downloaded sound fonts for organ stops I get very acceptable if not true Hi-Fi quality sound.
 I have also installed an alternative to the run-of-the-mill GM sounds which are again far better than the default ones.

Tony