Professional Orchestration Volume 1:
Ultimate Learning Package
The First Key: Solo Instruments and Instrumentation Notes
Book/eClassical 12-hour MP3 audio package/Professional Mentor, 875 pgs, Ill, $99.95
Click to order
PDF Sample Pages
- All about the Ultimate Learning Package
- Professional Orchestration Volume 1 Prospectus
- Detailed Table of Contents
- Preface
- Professional Mentor: Lesson 2
- Pan from the Vienna Symphonic Library
Now in One Package You Get:
- Professional Orchestration Volume 1 - Retail Value - $74.95
- 12 Hours of Digital Rights Management Free MP3s covering a majority of the examples - Retail Value (compared to iTunes and other vendors with DRM-free MP3s) - $89.00
- Professional Mentor Workbook - Retail Value - $24.95
- Strings Positions Booklet in 4 Color PDF - Retail Value - $10.00
- 13 MP3s with Matching MIDI Files of Solo Instruments teaching you MIDI Mock-up skills courtesy the Vienna Symphonic Library! - Bonus!
TOTAL RETAIL VALUE - $198.90
Ultimate Learning Package Price - $99.00
You save $99.90!
Combining traditional orchestration and electronic scoring, Professional Orchestration™ Volume 1 is the most complete orchestration training program ever created.
Professional Orchestration™ Volume 1
Recommended by winners of the Academy®, Grammy® and Emmy® Awards, Professional Orchestration is the first multi-volume series in orchestration from an American publisher that teaches the devices and orchestral combinations, which before now have been known by only a privileged few. It’s also the only orchestration book whose instrumentation notes were checked and edited by members of the Hollywood studio musician elite.
This 875-page, 8.5 x 11 monster is the only oversized orchestration book with full page/full score examples. Why does size matter?
Because with other books, to keep page counts down, you’re given a technique for an instrument with only a single line from the score to illustrate. Professional Orchestration is different in three important ways. First, you get the technique within the context of the full score. This way, you know exactly what’s happening. Second, you learn specific writing techniques for both the solo instrument and the full orchestra. Third, with our new Digital Rights Management-free MP3 audio package, you can import an MP3 into your sequencer, locate the position that matches the book, then using your sample libraries, you can do a MIDI mock-up of the example. So from one book you learn:
* Orchestration
* MIDI mock-up skills
* Recording skills
No other orchestration book on the planet does so much for you!
Book Examples Audio Package
12 hours of music in DRM-free MP3 Format! That’s right, 12 hours of full orchestral music, recorded live in Europe, licensed from eClassical.com! Why so much music? Well, it all has to do with the teaching philosophy behind Professional Orchestration. Listening to a snippet that’s only a few seconds long is, on one hand, very efficient. But how does that example fit into the whole score? What’s the dramatic impact when you hear it? How did the composer set up the example? And how did he exit? These are all questions professionals ask when they study a typical orchestration text. Before now, to answer these questions was a first class pain in the butt! You’d have to find the score, then the CD. All time-wasting, time consuming stuff. But not with Professional Orchestration. That’s because you get the complete symphonic movement the example is found in! So not only do you hear the example, you hear it’s place and dramatic impact in the work. Something every film/TV composer not only wants to know, but must know if their writing is to be effective.
And value? Well, one orchestration book on the market today only has a single CD that comes with the book, while another has a separate CD package, snippets only, that costs over $100. But with the Professional Orchestration™ Ultimate Learning Package, you get all 12-hours of music included for the one price.
But that’s not all. Thanks to the way Alexander Publishing has developed the audio package, you can build your MIDI mock-up skills the same way professionals do. Just import the MP3 into your sequencer, open to the matching full page/full example in the Professional Orchestration™ book, and start your sequencing.
So not only do you build your MIDI mock-up skills, but also your recording skills, too!
Do you know the term, DRM? Well, DRM stands for Digital Rights Management. When you download MP3s from some sites, they’ll only work on the Mac, the iPod or selected players. You can’t just play them anywhere. To be DRM-free, means that once downloaded, these MP3s can be imported into your sequencer and played on any MP3 player: iPod, computer (Mac or PC!), even your cell phone. You can even burn a CD and play these MP3s on your car CD player (if it reads MP3s, of course!). The big benefit for you is that you can listen and learn wherever you go. No restrictions.
The Professional Mentor™ – much more than a workbook.
The Professional Mentor is the heart of Professional Orchestration Volume 1 because it turns Professional Orchestration into a complete home study course that you can do on your schedule at your own pace. There’s never a rush. Here’s how it works. With the Professional Mentor, rather than taking a self-test to see if you know the material, you write one piece for each of the 13 solo instruments covered (the equal of roughly a semester’s worth of work at college) before you do your “final” project – a full symphonic orchestration. With this approach, you create 13 publishable works that become the basis for your own publishing company, and, you can go to the next step, and create your own CD by doing a MIDI mock-up of your piece.
Now, here’s where the Professional Mentor goes to the next step.
The good folks at the Vienna Symphonic Library, and composer Jay Bacal, have allowed us to give you, at no extra charge, 13 solo compositions with MP3 and MIDI files created by Jay for the new Vienna Instruments sample library. Just load the MP3 and MIDI file into your sequencer. You’ll see how Jay created the composition by studying velocity, expression, and mod wheel data. By the time you’ve gone through each instrument, including solo strings, you’ll know what you need to not only write for each instrument, but how to approach doing a MIDI mock-up. It’s a professional education you can apply to any library, too.
Bonus! Strings Position Booklet
The 4-color Strings Position Booklet originally came with our Writing For Strings™ course. However, with the launch of Alexander University’s new online orchestration training classes, all of the classes have been restructured. So now, you get the Strings Position Booklet as part of the Professional Orchestration™ Ultimate Learning Package.
Dover Scores!
Virtually all the score examples are found in low cost Dover editions. You can now order each score individually or all of them for single block price.
Orchestral Sample Libraries
Need a great orchestral library? We represent (in alphabetical order) EastWest QLSO, E-MU Systems Modern Symphonic Orchestra, the Miroslav Philharmonik from IK Multimedia, Notion from Notion Music, and the SONiVOX Symphonic Orchestra from SONiVOX. We also represent Sibelius and Overture 4 notation software packages.
Putting It Together
With the Professional Mentor, eClassical.com MP3 package and Professional Orchestration, the student is now prepared to write one to two pieces per week. Using the instrumentation notes within Professional Orchestration, each writing assignment requires specific techniques to be included. As a result, the student gains practical familiarity in writing for each instrument.
Kicking It Up a Notch
Depending on the resources of your school, the ideal is to have available an instrumentalist who can perform the solo work, then give the student constructive critiques as to the playability of the piece. In the absence of available soloists, the student, using the basic orchestral players within Sibelius or Finale creates the work and has it performed in class.
The best educational experience is for both to happen. The student hears the sampled orchestral instrument playback, then the live performance.
What The Student Has At Semester’s End
When a student leaves school to make his way as a composer, he enters a highly competitive, entrepreneurial environment. With the Professional Orchestration curriculum, the student graduates with:
An average of 10-12 pieces for solo instrument available for immediate publishing or self-publishing
A potential audio recording of each work giving the graduating student roughly a 20-30 minute CD of solo works.
But What If You Like Your Current Text?
Orchestration education begins with book 2, Orchestrating the Melody Within Each Orchestral Section. At present, Volume 2A, Strings is shipping, with Volume 2B, woodwinds and brass, shipping in early 2007. Our recommendation is to adopt Volume 2A which also comes with an optional eClassical.com package, to support your current text selection.
Conclusion
Only Professional Orchestration puts it together for both faculty and student in a practical way. Click here to order.
