Professional Score Production

Curriculum guideline

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Course
MUSC 3183
Discontinued
Yes
Course code
MUSC 3183
Descriptive
Professional Score Production
Department
Music
Faculty
Language, Literature & Performing Arts
Credits
1.50
Start date
End term
202010
PLAR
No
Semester length
15 weeks
Max class size
26
Contact hours
2 hours per week
Method(s) of instruction
Lecture
Learning activities

Lecture/demonstration. Students will work on in-class exercises in the Technology Lab, and will complete regular exercises and assignments outside of class time.

Course description
Through lecture/demonstrations and hands-on lab work students will create professional musical scores and parts. Topics include score and part formats, data entry, notated and graphic representations, proofing, playback, part extraction, instructions and diagrams, score aesthetics, publisher formats, and binding and presentation.
Course content
  1. Standard score formats and representations
  2. Score layout and considerations
  3. Manual score preparation
  4. Graphic-based vs. rule-based representation
  5. Entry and/or importing data
  6. Transposition and Ranges
  7. Scanning and data conversion
  8. Local and global score data
  9. Notational practices for rhythm, clusters, accidentals
  10. Complex and graphic notation, tab, chord symbols
  11. Score instructions/graphics
  12. Part extraction
  13. Part preparation and score binding
  14. Publication formats
Learning outcomes

Through lecture/demonstrations and hands-on work students will learn to produce professional quality scores and parts. A variety of software packages will be examined and used as part of understanding the strengths and weaknesses of different approaches to music representation.

On the successful completion of this course students will be able take hand-written scores or sequenced data and quickly create scores and parts useable by professionals in situations ranging from studio recording sessions to symphony orchestra performances. Students will be able to provide score and part excerpts for the publishing industry, including lead sheets, children’s books, and academic journals.

Means of assessment
Weekly assignments 30%
Quizzes (minimum of 2) 15%
Midterm project 15%
Final project* 40%
  100%

* The Final Project constitutes one component of the graduation portfolio requirement.

Textbook materials

Heussenstamm, George. The Norton Manual of Music Notation. W.W. Norton & Co. New York, New York.

 

Prerequisites

Music Technology Certificate program entrance or permission of instructor