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Best page turning for big band pieces?
#1
I've seen a couple of threads here that mention this briefly, but nothing very detailed.  So ...  The basic question (for big band players) is the best way to set up paging for those pieces.  I've run through three different attempts now, but would like to hear what others' experiences are -- realizing that different instruments will face their own peculiar demands.

The context is that a big bad "piece" is usually only one or two pages in length.  Sometimes three, but that's relatively unusual, and sometimes a "medley" piece may be four pages or so.  But there are often "D.S. al coda" portions that are spilt across two or three pages, and there are often repeats that are spread across two pages.  This is no real problem in itself, but then add to that that (a) you're often playing close to every measure (with only brief multi-measure rests that may not be conveniently placed for page turning), and you're often playing at a demanding tempo in a demanding rhythm which makes planning and executing a digital page turn a little dicey.

In my own case, this is while holding a double-valve bass trombone that doesn't allow for very fast/effective finger tapping or swiping.  You often need to turn the page as you're playing (or to already HAVE turned it so you can continue without missing any), and in the middle of a fast jazz/rock/pop passage.  If the bass trombone drops out for a couple of measures, that will often be noticed. Huh  I originally thought that vertical scrolling offered the most flexible approach, but that turned out to be to tricky to execute at the "right time" while not moving too much or too little -- and I found that I was spending way too much time being distracted about when to hit the pager.  Full page turning isn't at all reliable because in a lot of big band pieces your demanding passage is split over the bottom of p. 1 and continues immediately on p. 2.

Right now I've got it set up with a peddle to do half page turning.  I'm thinking this may work best since it always gives me a large enough display (top or bottom) to play from, and a good "margin" in which to bump up the next half page. Returning to a repeat sign or to "the sign" for a Coda will have to be accomplished (if necessary) by a finger tap.  It would be great to be able to also accomplish this with a peddle action (keeping both hands on the horn), but that doesn't seem to be currently supported (unless maybe I get a four peddle set?  or maybe I've missed something).

Anyhow, I'm wondering if there are any other big band players out there and how they handle things.
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Gary H. Merrill
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#2
I would think that your best bet is to edit the page order so that you don't have any backward jumps e.g.
Edit song
Files
Page order: 1-2 change to 1,2,1,2   (2 pages going to 4 pages)

Then display the song and crop the individual pages as required (or white out areas you don't require).

As you have a pedal, you can use that to change pages forward.
Alternatively, you could use it to start/stop scroll

Another option is that you use link points and set the pedal to jump to next link point (you wouldn't need to duplicate pages doing this)

Suggest you try each of these appraoches and decide which is easiest/best for you .

Geoff
Samsung Galaxy Tab A6
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#3
I'm not real keen on editing most of the pieces in the library we play.  I understand that it's a practical solution, but a pretty burdensome one.  Just to give some perspective ...  We currently have 359 pieces in our library and we'll typically run through a dozen or so at the weekly rehearsal.  Of course, we don't play all of the 359 pieces all of the time, but for performances we may select pretty much any of them.  Spending my time doing cut/copy/paste/etc. editing is not something I look forward to.

I don't see link points as being a solution for this.  I'll think about it more, but I don't see how it can retain the advantage half-page turning offers in providing a time period (rather than an instant) during which you can make the turn while not having to do it at a specific point and also not abruptly replacing  one page (which you're still playing) with another.
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Gary H. Merrill
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#4
Solution deleted
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#5
What are your assumptions about the relative positions of start, end, DS, and Coda?

You seem to assume that the DS is at the "top" and Coda is at the end (neither of which may be true).  But what do "start", "top", and "end" mean?

I'm looking at a medley right now ("50's Medley" -- no indication, on the 4th trombone part, of the publisher or arranger) that has two segments that each contain a D.S. Al Coda and a Coda.  I'm not sure what function positions like "start" and "end" play in that scenario.
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Gary H. Merrill
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#6
Just trying to succinctly offer a suggestion, not start an argument about music theory. Obviously the sign and coda can be anywhere. The coda on Rob McConnell’s 8 page “T.O.” starts on page 1. You said yourself most of your charts have the sign on page 1 (the same page as a DC) and coda on page 2. So I think my suggestion is very useful. Forgive my gross generalization for the sake of brevity. I won’t do it again. You can just keep fumbling through charts for all I care. Good luck
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#7
Thanks for the clarification.  I can't disagree that in a lot of cases just hitting the pedal to go back or forward one page works great.
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Gary H. Merrill
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#8
As a bigband pianists who has much longer scores than you and who has prepared his 200+ scores exactly like suggested with using the page order to duplicate (and whiting out the unneeded parts) I would advise to try it out. IMHO it's the best way in combination with vertical scrolling and half page display.

It's not that much effort and even can be done (especially for your short scores) during rehearsal if you want.
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#9
(07-17-2024, 11:10 PM)BRX Wrote: As a bigband pianists who has much longer scores than you and who has prepared his 200+ scores exactly like suggested with using the page order to duplicate (and whiting out the unneeded parts) I would advise to try it out. IMHO it's the best way in combination with vertical scrolling and half page display.

It's not that much effort and even can be done (especially for your short scores) during rehearsal if you want.

Okay.  Thanks.  During rehearsal isn't an option for me.  Also, if I'm going to do that sort of editing I would probably do it directly in Wondershare PDF editor on my big screen.  I just wanted to be sure there wasn't some approach I was unaware of.
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Gary H. Merrill
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