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Messages - tony smedley

151
General Discussion / Weird sounds
In the NWC Scriptorium are many works, covering a wide range of interests. What one likes, another may find uninteresting. But I am intrigued by Jay Hamilton's "Therapy"   Has anyone else listened to this?

Tony
152
General Discussion / Re: Noteworthy Composer Sound Font
If you want a sound card which can load extra sound fonts, the Creative Audigy 7 is still widely available at very reasonable prices.  I have used one for some time (to get better sounding pipe organ notes) and it works very well with NWC

Tony
153
General Discussion / Re: pc sound system broken
It all depends on wnat each of us considers is expensive, but you could instal a Creative Audigy sound card in your PC for less then £20  This would also allow you to download and instal free sound fonts for better sound quality. For example, I have a number of Pipe Organ sound fonts which are far superior to those in the standard sound card or built in sound.

Tony 
154
General Discussion / Re: NEWBIE
Bruce,

      I came to NWC at an advanced age - 80+ years - as a result of a friend's request for help in producing " one finger playable"   versions of hymn tunes for when he had to take a service and there was no organist or pianist. After trying more than 10 alternative programs I selected NWC and have never regretted it.  Although I only intended to do what my friend wanted,  the program " grew on me" and I have used it a lot.
      The simple answer to your query is "what would you like to do?" as NWC will do almost anything which involves putting music on to paper.    Personally I found the "Command Summary" available at http://nwc-scriptorium.org/command.html  --    very helpful - although written for the original NWC  most of it is still valid fot the later versions.  Browsing through the Scriptorium, especially the "Helpful Files" can also inspire you.
     You will of course have gone over the introductory exercise in notating "Jingle Bells"?
. 

Tony
156
General Discussion / Re: Noteworthy vs. Finale
I am an 85 year old amateur and find NWC  very easy to use, the forum help is marvellous and I can produce excellent quality printed scores for choral use, with or without accompaniments.

Tony
157
General Discussion / Re: Hymn won't play back except with General MIDI
I now believe that this is what happens with my set-up. (using XP Pro if that has any effect)
I have two synths in the "Tools>Options> Midi>device used by play back"  box.
By default, when I select 'Play' the program uses the device at the head of the list, so that if Microsoft Wavetable is at the top that is  what will be used, unless I open the 'Staff Properties'
and change the setting.
That does not explain why in the first instance the song would not play using Creative even though that was in the available list. But everything now works so I am satisfied.

Tony
158
General Discussion / Re: Hymn won't play back except with General MIDI
Lawrie,

I have decided to take the easy way out of this. I had both MS Wavetable and Creative synths available in the Options  and assumed that the system would automatically use the one I had specified in the Instrument boxes for the song; this seems to have confused the program.
In future I will ensure that the choices match up with no possible confilcts.

Tony
159
General Discussion / Re: Hymn won't play back except with General MIDI
Lawrie,

As usual, you have hit the nail on the head. I had failed to look at the Staff properties MIDI box., never having had need to do so before. it was set to the Microsoft wavetable synth, but Creative was available and is  now selected.
What I cannot yet understand is that having found for one piece that it was set to the Microsoft wavetable and changed it to Creative, all my other song files are also now set to Creative. It looks as if the Midi selection is an all or nothing setting applicable to all Staffs

What would we do without the likes of you and the other stalwarts of NEC?
 Many thanks.

Tony

160
General Discussion / Hymn won't play back except with General MIDI
I have a hymn setting in NWC2 format, acquired some long time ago.
It will play with Microsoft GM Wavetable synth selected as the playback device, but is silent if I select my Creative Soundfont synth, no matter which voice I select. Other songs adapt happily, playing in whichever Organ voice I select.
Is it possible for a NWC song to be "coded" so as to be unalterable?
By the way I checked and do have the gm dls file in System 32 drivers

Tony
162
General Discussion / Re: Double stems
As one who will be 85 in November, I can only reinforce what others have said about NWC.  I tried evaluation version of 12 programs before I selected NWC ranging from the very cheap to the "professionals only"
Not only is the program intuitvely easy to use, but there is excellent support from others, almost always supplied politely and with patience and tolerance, something not always typical of such forums!

Although written for the original NWC version and not updated I would recommed that you download the  "Command Summary" available at

http://nwc-scriptorium.org/command.html

Most f it applies to NWC2
It is worth the trouble of printing this out and putting it into a binder

Tony
163
General Discussion / Re: New at this - Inserting Choruses?
Anna,
If, like me, you enjoy hymns but are not very good on all this musical theory stuff, you can have a lot of fun by going to the Cyber Hymnal ( it has  been referred to by someone else) at
http://www.cyberhymnal.org/
there are over 6,500 hymns there with words and tunes and some history in many cases.
Most of them can be downloaded as a Midi file, which you can listen to directly , or as an NWC score which you can copy or edit. If you are lucky it might be layered, meaning that you can separate out the different  parts and play them separately.
. And It can be very addictive.

Tony

Tony
164
General Discussion / Re: Timing or Mathmatical Problem
bidderxyzzy,

At 84 and nearlyb85 years of age, I have seen a lot of life and to the best of my ability try to offend no one but put forward my views without  claiming that I am always correct ( even if I know that I am)  I have to say with others that you are being a little too aggressive in these forums and a little less agrression would be welcome. It need not in any way stop you from expressing an opinion, or even a fact.

Tony
165
General Discussion / Re: Question about using NWC with files other than GM
Probably most of the items you can download from the Scriptorium will have been written using the standard GS wavetable soundfont.  They may sound better or not as good with an alternative font because the instrument selected is chosen by its number in the soundfont and not all sound fonts have the same instrument at any particular number.  Some organ compositins in the scriptorium may have two versions, one with the standard font and one for the "jeux" organ font, for example.

Tony
166
General Discussion / Re: Saving files with Vista
Linda,

if you have not already upgraded to NWC2 it is well worth doing so. You can keep both versions on your PC if you like  and if you are happy with NWC2 you can when you wish transfer your existing files to that destination

Tony
168
General Discussion / Re: The Orchestral Staff Attribute Bug
A bit late in the day and probably now irrelevant, but a number of modern programs require the presence of Microsoft  "net.framework"   This comes in more than one version and some programs require a specific version. I am on broadband with a rather modest speed, but I do not recollect the net downloads as being very long. The quoted time for dial-up is just under 1 hour.
I am now on XP but I believe I am correct in thinking that net.framework will not run with 98SE

Tony
169
General Discussion / Re: Partial Layering
Looking at this  from another angle, I have wanted on several occasions to use an additional staff for layering some otherwise difficult-to-notate sections of a piece, without having to produce a full length additional staff which I then have to fill with rests. Or to add an additional Solo line for a small part of a longer SATB piece.

Tony
170
General Discussion / Re: The Orchestral Staff Attribute Bug
As a humble sometime chorister I believe that most of us, for most pieces, prefer to see what the other parts are doing, and what the accompaniment is up to, although the piano reduction is probably more convenient even when accompanied by a full orchestra.
All this seems to suggest that we want a notation program which will do all kinds of alternatives for all kinds of people.  But would most of us be able to handle such a complex creation?

Tony
171
General Discussion / Re: The Orchestral Staff Attribute Bug
bidderxyzzy,


You only tried 5 alternative notation programs? Then you should not be ctiticising one of them . I tried 12 before choosing Noteworthy as by far the best of the bunch for all normal amateur musicians.  Ax for Sibelius, well it might be OK for professionals but I couldn't even get satrted in what I wanted to do.

Tony,  85 next November.. 
172
General Discussion / Re: The Orchestral Staff Attribute Bug
I am an old dodderer of 84 years of age who has found NWC and NWC2 to be highly useful and interesting programs, which do most of what I want without difficulty.
I do wonder why others with greater aspirations do not purchase Sibelius or some other program which I am sure will meet all their requirements.  Incidentally, my car does not have climate control, which means that I have to fiddle with knobs to get an acceptable comfort level in the car ; of course  I could have purchased a Rolls-Royce .

Tony.
173
General Discussion / Re: The Land Sighting Horror
Barry,

I perhaps explained myself too simply. I do not expect NWC to have all the features of, say, Sibelius; and I I would nor criticise a  to me minor omission in NWC  or something that doesn/t work exactly how I would like.
Tony
174
General Discussion / Re: The Land Sighting Horror
In a modest way I too have produced  "proper"  scores from hand written and somewhat complex originals, so I have some sympathy with the complaints registered.    But before buying NWC I used trial versions of around 12 other notation programs. None matched NWC in  ease of use and value for money.
I  would be reluctant to criticise anything but basic faults with the program.

Tony
175
General Discussion / Re: Music not playing back
John,

I may be telling you what you already know, but :-

In the Options window you have on the left a list of devices. - in the window on the right you should have at least one device -  it looks as if you have Midi Mapper and this isn't working..
I suggest that you remove this by  clicking on the Midi Mapper  label. this will highlight a  left facing arrow in between the two boxes; click on this and Midi Mapper wll move to the left. Then in the same way move one of the other devces into the empty box on the right. Try the  Microsoft GS wavetable  . This should work  for you

Tony
177
General Discussion / Re: Sound sucks on Vista or is it something else?
My Audigy 7 sound card cost less than £20   and  is very satisfactory with my NWC 2 running on XP   I have installed an improved general MIDI sound font and a number of Pipe Organ sound fonts on to the Audigy card.  They are not the  same as the sound of a high-fi system, but within the limits of my PC speakers they are mopre than adequate. It should run at least as well on Vista

Tony
179
General Discussion / Re: Noteworthy play back problems...
MikeXP

As somebody who is very much an amateur in using Noteworthy, might I suggest that Notewirthy Composer is a program intended to facilitate  the production of printed scores for music, and it is very good at doing this.
 However, it is also able to do many other things which help would-be composers or arrangers; but it does have its limits!.

Tony
182
General Discussion / Re: "Open Files"
NoteWorthyOnLine

Thank you very much for your reply.  I had not in my ignorance realised that it was up to me to insert an entry in the Song files line!

Tony
183
General Discussion / Re: "Open Files"
Fitzclan

Partial success! I now have a file.  'Samples',  in the Song Files option.  but Noteworthy2 still always opens at the itrees folder. I am still trying to find what determines the default setting for opening up.
Noteworthy always opens at 'samples'.  I would like both to open at 'My Music' to save a few unnecessary key strokes.
Incidentally, when I open the itrees folder in Explorer it contains itrees and the Samples file contains samples. But when I open the irees folder which shows up after Noteworthy2>Open it is empty.

Tony
184
General Discussion / Re: "Open Files"
Neither in my Noteworthy 2 or my Noteworthy folders is there an entry for "samples" and the system does not  appear toallow  for adding a folder, though I can modify an existing one.

Tony
185
General Discussion / Re: "Open Files"
kahman

Tools -Options Folders shows me where Print Previews, Config Files,  New File templates, Auto Save and Instrument trees are to be found. It does not seem to instruct the program to open  by default to any of these locations. What I would like to know is why is it always opening to "itrees"?
Tony
186
General Discussion / "Open Files"
I have not used Noteworthy for a little while and have had to rehearse a number of instinctive actions. but I have no yet solved a very simple problem.
When I open Noteworthy and click on 'Open' to obtain an existing music file, it always opens in 'Samples'
But when I use Noteworthy2 it always opens up the 'itrees' folder
There must be a very simple way of making it open to 'My Music' - where i keep my NWC music files - the default action. But how do I do this?

Tony
191
General Discussion / Re: Music search engine
Lawrie,
I excuse my memory lapse on account of old age !  In my mind I had been running through all sorts of words beginning with 'p' and missed the obvious one.
I first made contact with this after I had spent a lot of time on devising my own "same pitch" , "up", or "down" system to identify hymn tunes in the Methodist Hymn Book. I found it too time consuming and had difficulty in making my entries line up in an orderly fashion.

Tony
192
General Discussion / Re: Music search engine
There is a program such as you describe and I had it on my PC, but I have lost it and cannot recall the title.

You could insert your ideas in a number of ways,

if you had a   microphone you could whistle or sing it;
you could insert the rhythm of the piece by tapping it out on  any key on your keyboard;
you could enter it by keying in 's', 'u'  or 'd'  ( or some similar convention) to indicate whether each note was of the same pitch, higher or lower than the the one before

there may well have been other ways which I cannot remember
 It seemed to work remarkably well with the input of surprisingly  few  notes.

Tony
194
General Discussion / Re: Latest update to NWC2
It is something of a nuisance that so often Windows makes life diffcult if you want to have a program on other  than the drive where Windows is located!

Tony
196
General Discussion / Re: Latest update to NWC2
I deleted all my Noteworthy files and started from scratch as suggested.  Intriguingly, when I  loaded the Noteworthy files on to my D drive, where there is plenty of room, I had the same response, that the program was not installed, when I tried to update. When I loaded on to my F drive, which is where my Windows is located, it worked, and I have the latest versionof NWC2.
I can of course copy all the  Noteworthy files on to my D drive, but it is not something  I would want to do every time there is an update.

Tony
198
General Discussion / Latest update to NWC2
Having downloaded the latest up date to NWC2 it will not install; instead I get a message claiming that NWC2 is not installed on my PC. However, NWC2 is running perfectly well on my PC.
I have reinstalled NWC on to my drive but still get the same message, that it is either not installed or has been altered in some way. The only alterations have been the official updates.
Tony
199
General Discussion / Re: Merging Staffs
Does this tool mean that I can "layer" just a few bars of a piece without having to enter an infinty of empty bars?

Tony
200
General Discussion / Re: Converting NWC to MP3 or WMP
Lawrie,

from the RipVinyl Help pages:-      




How can I record to MP3 format?
If you have an codec installed on your system that allows you to record in MP3 format you can simply select the desired MP3 format on the options tab. Windows 95 and 98 came with a codec that can encode up to 22,050 Hz, which you can use. Microsoft stopped shipping the encoding codec with later versions of Windows.

There are other freely available codecs installed with windows, and more will be generally available soon. Frauhnofer control the license for MP3, and require a minimum of payment of $15,000 a year to distibute code using their codecs. For this reason, we do not supply an MP3 codec, as it makes our entire product unviable. Bear in mind that all MP3 codecs are required to pay this fee to cover patent royalties.

We have tested with the Codec provided by Cyberlink, which retails for $9.95 at the time of publishing this. You can find out more or buy a copy from CyberLink by clicking the link for MP3 PowerEncoder.

If you install a third party codec, bear in mind that it must be an ACM codec. These can sometimes be installed by right clicking a .inf file that comes in the distribution. Simply copying a DLL file to the RIP Vinyl directory does not work. If you do install a new MP3 codec we recommend that you move it to the top of the priority list in the audio codecs section of the sound/multimedia portion of the control panel for best results.

Back to top

What other formats can I use?
RIP Vinyl uses the Microsoft Audio Compression Manager (MSACM) to encode files. A selection of encodings are available with the operating systems. As the ACM interface is public, other drivers for new formats will become available. As a result, RIP Vinyl is ready for any new formats that conform to this interface. RIP Vinyl limits the maximum frequency to 44,100 Hz, as that is the frequency at which data is recorded, and there is no point in synthesizing samples.

A new open-source format named Ogg may soon be available. You may be interested in checking out http://www.riphelp.com which will have links to this driver in future, but doesn't at the moment.

Also, we have tested with the LAME v3.95 Win ACM codec which you can find out more about by searching on google or clicking the link above.



Tony