Re: general question for composers

[Kieren MacMillan]

Hi Tobin,

> this is a general question for composers using lilypond.  at what point in 
> your process do you generally start engraving?  Like most composers coming 
> from the consumer notation softwares, I'm accustomed to working in pencil 
> first, but not to completely separating the engraving and composition tasks.  
> Curious about composer perspectives about this with lilypond.

Because of my [non-optimal] work process/behaviour, I almost always end up 
composing right into Lilypond: under deadline pressures, I [almost certainly 
erroneously] feel that I don’t have time left to write out a pencil score and 
then engrave separately.

However, it is my opinion that the more fully one can compose away from any 
engraving software (perhaps especially Lilypond**??), the better. All other 
things being equal, I’d rather start engraving with a complete hand-written 
score — full separation of composition and engraving tasks.

> are there strategies for working with a lilypond file while still composing?

Especially if there’s a lot of quoting or cutting-and-pasting or \repeat 
unfold-ing in the score I’m working on, my strategies include iterative 
printing: engrave a little, print out the score (with skips for gaps), do 
pencil-work to fill in the gaps, repeat.

Hope that helps!
Kieren.

** There are many reasons I say “especially”, but the biggest one is how 
difficult it is to change the fundamental structure of a piece in Lilypond. 
Working with, say, 40 staves (plus globals, etc.), if you want to (e.g.) add a 
measure between m. 25 and m. 26, there is usually a whole bunch of grunt work 
that needs to be done. In other engraving applications, it’s a simple “add a 
measure here”, wait 2 seconds for the app to do it, and move on.
________________________________

Kieren MacMillan, composer
‣ website: www.kierenmacmillan.info
‣ email: address@hidden