Part One 8/20/05

As a musician with limited resources, I have come to depend on my computer and a few music programs that have allowed me to inexpensively and effortlessly compose and record countless pieces since I began writing just over a year ago. Just recently, I've been swarmed with questions about the programs I use and which programs are best for them. Well, that answer depends on quite a few things.

I've used only a few programs that have proven very successful for me. With these programs, I was able to demo my music for the organization called ASCAP (www.ascap.com for more details) and was accepted in a matter of weeks. It felt great because the songs I used were my first pieces and even to this day I have never had any professional recording, but so far no one can tell...

Personally, I recommend Finale (CodaMusic.com) for beginners because this program is very user friendly. In addition, you can download demo versions of their software from their site. The demo's were great for me when I started because I couldn't afford the full versions at the time.

Coda Music products offer many different choices of music notation software that can aide in developing their musical abilities.

Afterwards, I stumbled over a product under the name of Sibilius (Sibilius.com). This program is even better than the best Coda Music software programs, but unfortunately you have to do quite a bit of reading just to get the program started for the first time. It took me three weeks just to get the feel of all of the controls. This is why I would recommend this product for more experienced musicians.

Once you get used to the Sibilius software, it's a walk in the park. From plug-ins to instumentation, you get so many choices to choose from when writing a song. It doesn't matter if you're rock, pop, techno, electro; whatever you do, Sibilius software can and will produce a professional grade sound with any and every note.

Both Finale and Sibilius software works great with most computers, but both are fairly large programs and both work at their poorest when used with Microsoft Millenium Edition (Windows ME) operating systems. They do still work, but not as good.

Speaking of Microsoft, believe it or not the best players and converters for almost all music programs come from this company. As a musician, you should learn these programs:

Microsoft Sound Recorder
Microsoft Windows Media Player

Most people don't have a clue to all of the powers of the good old Sound Recorder found in the "Accessories" and "Entertainment" section of any Windows start menu. You wouldn't believe how much this simple program could help you as a musician make flawless WAVE (*.wav) recordings.

If you aren't familiar with this program, you can email me directly or sign up for my newsletter and I'll explain this simple program step by step.

The Windows Media Player is every musician's best friend. Most people write if off because unlike some players, it doesn't cost an arm and a leg to purchase. In fact, this program comes installed with any Windows operating system.

Part 2 Coming Soon