Composition tools - The conductor view  

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The conductor view [Professional] [Composition Light] [Composition Pro]

The conductor view has been designed to be your music composition desktop. As you may have several scores in a music document (Pizzicato Professional only), there must be a tool to organize and manage them and to play them easily and in many combinations. This tool is the conductor view.

To work with the conductor view and so that the lessons happen as they should, we strongly advise you to switch on the menu option found in Windows, Windows management, Based on the conductor view. This mode is oriented around the conductor view and the examples and applications of the following lessons will behave the way they should. The other two modes have a different way to handle the windows behaviour.

This window is divided in two parts:

  • The left part is the document manager and its configurations. You can get a full explanation in the lesson about the document manager. Its various configuration contain items representing instruments, music libraries and virtual keyboards as well as other musical objects that may be used to compose music. Each one of them will help you to compose and will be the subject of a specific lesson.
  • In the main part of the window, you have a time scaled view of all the scores present in the document. This area is where you will add, remove, play and manipulate music scores. Its predecessor was the main view (still available). However, the conductor view has much more features to make your work more easy and it adds the time dimension of the scores.

This view has some particularities compared to other views :

The rest of this lesson will explain how to use the main area of the conductor view.

  • The first 8 items may be used to open a view of the score from which you call this menu. The first one calls the score view, which has the same effect as a double-click.
  • The Play options... item calls the play options dialog box associated with the score. It is the same dialog that is called from the score view with the "..." button. You may change the tempo, the measures to play, the metronome,...
  • The Change name... item lets you change the name of the score, which is here Score 1. The name of a score is displayed just on top of the orange rectangle.
  • The next item lets you duplicate a score inside the document. You get a new independent score which is an exact copy of the original. You may then modify it as you want without affecting the original score.
  • With the next item, you can create an alias of the score. An alias of a score looks like a copy of the score, but it has in fact the same content. It appears to be an independent score in the conductor view because you can move its rectangle without moving the original one. If you double-click it, you open in fact the original score. A score may have as many aliases as you want. The use of aliases will become more clear in the lesson on musical libraries. Basically, you will be able to organize a music composition by combining several scores and playing them together in the conductor view. If a score represents a percussion rhythmic pattern, you may need to use this score several times in your composition. If you duplicate the original score several times, the copies will be independent. If you decide to change the pattern, you will need to change them in each instance of the score. The other solution is to create one pattern and then make several aliases of it. The change in the original score will then be effective in each instance of its aliases. An alias score may be recognized by its name written in italic.
  • The next menu item is used to delete the score. If the score is an alias, the alias disappear without confirmation, but if you delete an original score, Pizzicato ask for confirmation before deleting the score (this may not be undone).
  • The next 4 items gives you a fast way to add measures to a score without opening it. The measures are added to the end of the score.
  • The last menu item is used to add an audio track to the score. See the lesson on audio tracks later in the manual.

The five icons that you notice on the upper left border of the orange rectangle are in fact shortcuts to the most useful of the above menu items. With a simple click on these icons, you can:

  • Icon 1 (little note): open the score view
  • Icon 2 (sliders): open the instruments window with the sliders to control volume, reverberation,...
  • Icon 3 ("+" on white background): create a duplicate of the score
  • Icon 4 ("+" on yellow background): create an alias of the score
  • Icon 5 ("x"): delete the score with a confirmation. If you also hold down the CTRL key, the score is deleted without the need of a confirmation.

Some of the above options can also be reached in the document manager. You can use both of them indifferently.

Let us apply this with some examples.

Using the conductor view [Professional] [Composition Light] [Composition Pro]

In the conductor view, a score is represented by a colored rectangle. The numbers in the upper part of the main area show the measure numbers of the score. Vertical lines separate the measures through the main area of the conductor view.

It is called Score 2 and its name is written in black. The active score title is displayed in red. Up to now, there was only one score and by default it was the active score.

When you use the recorder of the conductor view, it is the active score (with name in red) that is played.

Playing and grouping scores [Professional] [Composition Light] [Composition Pro]

The conductor view lets you play a score by selecting it and using the recorder. But you may also group different scores and play them together. Here is a simple example to show you how this view will help you compose and create music like a construction set game.

This new block is a group of scores. It may have four coloured squares in its top part. We will explain them further in this lesson. The group is now empty and we will drag scores into it.

The group has been resized automatically. You can see that the Arpeggio 2 score now displays 4 measures. But there is in fact only 2 measures in the score (if you double-click it, the score view only shows 2 measures). The real measures are displayed in the original color and the additionnal measures are displayed in a lighter color to show the full duration of the score, taking into account the number of loops of the score.

Notice that if you drag the bottom right corner of the group while holding down the SHIFT key, any score that was reaching the right border of the group will be automatically multiplied to fit the new size of the group.

You may change the position of the arrows while the group is playing. To remove the stop arrow, click it outside the group limits.

We have explained here how to use the conductor view to arrange and dispose a music composition. Even if the example is very simple, it shows the mechanics of it. In the next lessons, we will explain the use of instruments, of the music generators and other music objects and also the use of music libraries in combination with what we have seen here. Be sure you understand this lesson before continuing to the next one.


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