Class Ensemble Project MuseScore Tips  MUS 111 Schedule  William Wieland
Writing music well for a unique ensemble is a useful skill. You will create a piece for instruments available in class. We will perform these in class at the end of the semester. You will not perform on your own work but instead listen from an “audience seat”. You must score your piece for the entire ensemble—excluding yourself.
January I create a balanced MUS 111 ensemble. Students usually perform on their major instrument. I consider MUS 110 attendance.
January & February Choose one of three options: an original composition, an arrangement, or a transcription.
  1. Composers — Begin today. (I start with pencil and paper.) One of my graduate school professors, Dominick Argento, believed that clarinets (for example) should only perform music originally written for clarinets.
  2. Arrangement — Choose a piece and begin creating a short score soon. For example, how will you voice chords from a jazz lead sheet?
  3. Transcribers — Select music and figure out tricky conversions. For example, how will piano music be written for wind instruments?
Before Spring Break Short Score DUE — NOT a full score
Tuesday of Week 14 Full Score DUE — NO parts — Your software can display in concert pitch, copy, paste, and transpose.
Tuesday of Week 14 Ask the experts.
Weeks 15 and 16 Revised Full Score and Parts DUE — Your software can extract parts.
Weeks 15 and 16 Performances
Before the Final Exam Reflection DUE
Useful links: • Instrumentation Tips
• Very Comfortable Concert Pitch Ranges
• Brass Instruments and the Overtone Series
• Scales for Instruments
• Scoring for Student Ensembles
• Tips from Frank Erickson's Arranging for the Concert Band
Good books: • Samuel Adler. The Study of Orchestration. 3rd ed. New York: W.W. Norton, 2002.
 NSU Library: Main MT70 .A3 2002
• Alfred Blatter. Instrumentation and Orchestration. 2nd ed. New York: Schirmer Books, 1997.
 NSU Library: Main MT70 .B56 1997
Grading Rubric