Year: 2008

SmartMusic 11 Released

Posted on By ericdano No Comments on SmartMusic 11 Released

MakeMusic released SmartMusic 11 on Thursday. After nearly 3 hours of downloading at a whopping 10k/sec, I got it. Installed it. And…….well, it looks the same. No interface changes. Can’t really tell what they did to it.

Certainly not worth a 11 release. Maybe a 10.2 or something.

They really need to change the interface, fix the green follow line (STILL lags behind on my iMac 2gigahertz Core 2 Duo on up tempo songs), and all the other things I’ve complained about before.

Oh, and add Grainger’s Children’s March to the Concert Band library………

UPDATE: I also get this message on my Mac:
“Warning: you do not have write access to all files and folders under ‘/Library/Application Support/MakeMusic/SmartMusic Studio’. Certain aspects of SmartMusic may not work, including Impact assignments. To fix this issue, contact your network administrator.”

First thing is that the program installs SmartMusic in the System Library, not the user area. Why? Dunno. And looking at the directory permissions I see: “drwxrwxrwx 7 ericdannewitz admin 238 Sep 13 11:46 SmartMusic Studio”

So……what gives guys?

UPDATE: Oh, found another thing. You can continue to use the program while it downloads new music. That certainly qualifies for a 11 release (tongue in cheek).

News

MakeMusic To Charge For Finale Notepad 2009 Downgrade

Posted on By ericdano 6 Comments on MakeMusic To Charge For Finale Notepad 2009 Downgrade

MakeMusic announced today that they are going to be charging for Finale Notepad 2009, which for almost 8 years has been a free product.
“In the next few weeks we plan to release Finale NotePad 2009 with even more features, including an all new Expression Tool and the ability to import/export MusicXML files. It will continue to include free online support. At the same time we will begin charging $9.95 for the NotePad 2009 download.”

Ooo, Online support? XML importing? Wow. Sign me up. NOT.

Meanwhile, get Finale Notepad 2008 while you can. Finale 2009 is a downgrade. Staff Lists limited to 4 (used to be unlimited). Most of TGTools handy utilities do not work (Align/Move, which I use a lot) because of “new” Expression tool. *sigh*. Just avoid it. Unless they are going to be including Garritan sounds with it (hahahaha, yeah, right), $9.95 for their new expression tool and XML importing?

MakeMusic needs to cut down on the number of products it has. It has Finale, Finale Allegro, PrintMusic, Songwriter, Notepad and SmartMusic. Just keep Notepad free, drop Songwriter, drop the price of PrintMusic to $60, and drop Allegro to like $150. Simple.

Articles

Don LaFontaine Dies

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Don LaFontaine, the man who provided the sonorous voice for more than 5,000 movie trailers, died Monday at age 68. LaFontaine was known as the “king of the movie trailers,” having done the trailer voiceovers for films such as Terminator, Fatal Attraction, Cheaper by the Dozen, Batman Returns and his personal favourite, The Elephant Man.

Yeah, I know, not really saxophone related, but this guys voice was amazing.

News

Saxophones from Taiwan Aiming for the Pros

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I came across this article at the NPR. It is about Taiwan saxophones.
“Just how Houli became the world’s unsung center of saxophone making is largely an accident of history. The story dates back to just after World War II. It stars a larger-than-life character named Chang Lien-cheng. He was a farmer’s son who abandoned the family land to become a painter and jazz musician, says a spokeswoman for his company: “No one during that time was actually playing any kinds of Western instruments. But he was fascinated by this instrument called saxophone.””

There is also a “Listen Now” for this article that is worth checking out, as it goes into more details than the written article.

Articles

Looking For A New Server

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I’m looking for a new server to host Jazz-Sax on. The current server, a 1997 Dual Pentium II 450 with an Adaptec RAID card and two 40gig hard drives works ok, but it is huge, eats lots of electricity, and generates a lot of heat and noise.

What I’m looking for is perhaps someone who wants to donate a G4 Mac Mini, or perhaps an older Shuttle Mini PC or something. Something smaller, that eats less energy, generates less heat, and is relatively quite.

Actually, I’d pay a little for a Mac Mini……I’d love to get something small and stick a SSD in there…..

News

Johnny Griffin Dies

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Sad news today
“US jazz tenor saxophonist Johnny Griffin, who played alongside such luminaries as Lionel Hampton, Art Blakey and Thelonius Monk, died Friday in France, his agent Helene Manfredi said. He was 80.

Nicknamed the Little Giant, Griffin was due to perform Friday evening alongside US organist Rhoda Scott, French saxophonist Olivier Temime and drummer Julie Saury.

Griffin died at home in Mauprevoir, a village in the west-central La Vienne district, where he had spent the last 18 years of his life. The cause of death was not disclosed.”

News

iPhone/iPod Touch Music Applications

Posted on By ericdano 2 Comments on iPhone/iPod Touch Music Applications

Unless you have been living in a cave for the last week, you know that the new version of the iPhone is out. The iPhone 3G. The other thing that is out is new software for previous iPhone/iPod Touch owners. The new version of the system software supports applications. There are lots of games and stuff out. But there are TWO music ones that are worth a look.

The first one is Karajan Beginner. Theory trainer and stuff. There is a paid version of this as well which I imagine expands on the drills.

The second one is GuitarToolkit. Yes, it is more geared towards guitar players, but the tuner and the metronome are excellent. I thought it was a good $10 spend for a tuner and metronome, though it would be nice if you flipped the iPhone over, it would flip the tuner over. Perhaps the next version.

Articles, News

Finale 2009 – Defining Mediocrity

Posted on By ericdano 10 Comments on Finale 2009 – Defining Mediocrity

Continuing it’s yearly practice, MakeMusic announced Finale 2009. Basically, they are not raising the bar at all, again, with this. For $99, you finally get:

  • Engraver Slurs fixed (which really should have been fixed 5 years ago)
  • a Baritone Sax in the included Garritan sounds (plus, vintage electric piano, electric guitar, electric bass, vibraphone, handbells…and other instruments…yawn)
  • Virtual Drum Line……..yeah. Woot!
  • Improved SmartMusic Tools. Finally, TWO versions after they put in support for linked parts, they let SmartMusic support it. But it will probably be like what happened before, where Finale comes out in August, and SmartMusic isn’t updated to support the new file format for 6 months+. Oh, and you STILL are stuck with the 90s video game sounds instead of Garritan sounds.
  • Better Markings…..Something that maybe should have been added in Finale 2008.
  • Two Page Editing. Finally, a new, useful feature. But this really should have been added a long time ago.

Basically, MakeMusic hasn’t done anything new or exciting in this release. No Ideas Hub, like Sibelius has. Nothing really…..at all. Looks like I’m still going to be stuck with 2007……

News

50 Tons Of Records Donated

Posted on By ericdano 1 Comment on 50 Tons Of Records Donated

CNN has an interesting article:
“The more than 200,000 records represented the entire inventory of “Records Revisited,” a landmark Manhattan store owned by Morton Savada, who died in February of lung cancer at age 85.

The collection, valued at $1 million, weighs 50 tons and represents more than a half-century of American music history.”

Wonder what gems one would find in there. Albums that aren’t produced anymore. That is one of the great things about going to an old used record store, finding that album that was only done on LP…….

Articles, News

Samson Q1U USB Mic

Posted on By ericdano No Comments on Samson Q1U USB Mic

I just picked up a Samson Q1U for a student as a going away present. He wants to do some webcam lessons or something (we’ll see how that goes…….yeah). Anyhow, there are a number of USB microphones out, or adapters for Microphones to USB. The Samson was a well under $100 mic that includes a little stand as well (I think I paid like $65 or something).

For the money, this mic is great. It sounds good, and it is stupidly simple to set up. On a Mac, you plug it in, and it shows up right away. You simply select it as the input, and off you go. It can be used in Amadeus, or whatever your recording program is. There is a noticeable latency though when you record.

I really didn’t do that sort of testing with the mic, I just simply plugged it in, and did some sound quality/tone tests with it (as it was a gift and I had to wrap it up and give it the next day). It really sounds great. Like a Shure 58, but not quite. Sounded pretty close to my Shure 58 that I have (keeping it fair, just recording the 58 in 48K, 16 bit). Maybe closer in sound to their Performance Gear 58, though I’ve never seen one of these in the wild. The frequency response graph for the Samson looks better (ie more flat, which is a good thing).

Verdict: For $65, this is a great mic. Sounds great. Simple to use. Comes with Cakewalk for you Windoze people. Brainless setup on the Mac side (plug it in, and it shows up). If you can deal with the latency (or not have to hear yourself while recording), then this mic would be ideal for someone wanting to record but not wanting to spend hundreds of bucks on an interface, mics, and cables. 9 out of 10.

Reviews

Great Idea….Bad Timing??

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Alesis ProtrackFinally, a professional mobile solution for recording on an iPod. The Alesis Protrack sounds good…

ProTrack provides convenient, direct-to-iPod stereo digital recording to iPod in a portable, handheld form factor. Users can capture live audio anywhere and anytime with their iPod or iPod nano. ProTrack’s smart design integrates the iPod into the recorder, with included sleds to securely mount supported iPod models to the recorder.

But only records 16-Bit, 44.1kHz or 22kHz stereo, supplies 48V phantom power to inputs when wall-powered (not on the 4 AA batteries it needs), and it only records to iPod (Classic or 5th Generation), or iPod nano (2nd or 3rd Generation). The last one is the kicker. With Apple due to refresh the whole iPod line anytime, it is rumored that the Classic iPod will be dropped…..and who knows about the Nano.
If this product was released like…….two years ago, it would have been great.

News

The Lamest Product Ever

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I was watching Versus Network (cycling sundays….yeah), and I saw an ad for this thing called Guitar Idol. I thought Guitar Hero was stupid. This is a whole new level of stupid. Really. Singing in the car rates way higher than this. Singing in the bathroom rates higher. Watching American Idol rates higher.
Somehow, I feel the dumbing down of music is somewhat insulting.

Articles