Tapspace Then & Now, Welcome tech support specialist, Justin Phillips, See us at Musikmesse in Frankfurt, VDL Tip: The Power of Templates, Artist Spotlight - Jesse Monkman

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March 2014 Newsletter

THEN AND NOW

Upon returning home from the 2014 Texas Music Educators Association convention (thanks to everyone who came out to say "Hi"), we took a moment to reflect on our business and how it's grown over the years. Tapspace was born in 1998â€”mostly as a hobbyâ€”to promote our marching percussion music for which there seemed to be a small demand in the drum corps community. As the years came and went, our little side project turned into a semi-serious endeavor that forced us to learn about accounting, inventory management, website development, and other things that turn on MBA types.

Entering into our 16th year of operation, we are proud to bang our own drum a little here and acknowledge that good things happen when you focus on quality, good customer relations, and hard work. To those of you who have been with us from the start (you know who you are!), thank you so muchâ€¦we hope we've made you proud!

Contrasting one of our first tradeshow booths against our recent annual February visit to San Antonio for TMEA.

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What's Happening

Tapspace welcomes Justin Phillips - Tech Support Specialist!

That's right; we put a ring on it! A longtime friend, peer, and supporter of our operation, Justin is now the lead technical support specialist for our sample software. In this role, he'll be expanding our knowledgebase and managing support tickets.

In addition to his diverse background in percussion, Justin is a nationally recognized expert in computer notation software and has given numerous clinics across the U.S. on Finale, Virtual Drumline, and Garritan Virtual Instruments. He was employed with MakeMusic Inc. for a number of years as the Senior Product Manager for Finale Notation Software, and has since moved into project management roles with a number of SaaS technology start-ups.

Justin resides in the Minneapolis suburb of Eden Prairie, MN with his wife Emily and two sons, Jackson and Emerson.

New Service Available

FESTIVAL SCORE 3-PACKS!

Competing at state-sanctioned festivals often requires the performing group to provide the judges with scores of the music they'll be playing. Festival Score 3-Packs are available for any of our duets or ensembles and are good for one event on the date you specify.

Simply fill in the requested information and place your order. We'll then assemble a set of 3 customized scores specifically for you and your ensemble! Each score also contains a signed letter of permission stating that the scores were obtained lawfully.

See us at Musikmesse!

If any of you jetsetters happen to be in the Frankfurt area next week, be sure to stop by and witness the biggest music industry trade show in the worldâ€”Musikmesse. Full disclosure: We won't be there in person. We are, however, thrilled to have much of our catalog on display via our partner in the UK, Southern Percussion. SP is a class outfit. Have a butcher's. You'll be gobsmacked. And may even learn some new slang too.

Featured Items

Thenâ€¦

PARKING LOT ETUDES

by Murray Gusseck

An oldie but a goodie, Parking Lot Etudes was the second book ever published by Tapspace. Drumline guru Murray Gusseck helped start a trend of drumline "parking lot" shows in the 90s with the compositions contained in this compilationâ€”Martian Mambo, Electric Wheelchair, Poof!, and othersâ€”a few of which were written while he was still a marching member of the Santa Clara Vanguard Drum & Bugle Corps and most of which are still quite popular today!

Look / Listen

â€¦and now!

TRACK & BURN

by Matthew Lemieux

Track & Burn is an extraordinarily creative collection of 8 street beats and 6 stadium grooves for the experienced drumline. Sophisticated rhythmic voice leading and an expert groove sensibility make these mini-compositions among the best of their kind out there on the marching battery scene today. Seriouslyâ€¦if your drumline is bored, get 'em this.

The collection includes a CD-ROM containing parts for snare, tenor, bass drum (4-9 players) and cymbals as well as reference recordings of each piece.

Look / Listen

Virtual Drumline Tip

THE POWER OF TEMPLATES

We often hear new Virtual Drumline users ask, "What is a template, and why do I need one?" This question usually comes from those who may not have delved into the full VDL library yet and hasn't discovered the level of detail they can obtain from each instrument. So let's break it down, shall we?

Here's a snapshot of the Manual Snareline keymap from the VDL User Guide. This is just a partial illustration of the numerous sounds that are included in just ONE instrument (in this case, the snareline instrument). Notice how the right hand (RH) and left hand (LH) hits are mapped to G#4 and F#4 respectively.

VDL User Guide Keymap excerpt

With these sounds and pitches in mind, you could get a very convincing sound of paradiddles with the realism of VDL samples by entering something like this into a regular old pitched staff.

Unmapped Example

It was entered this way with the intent of playing back VDL's RH/LH hits and a RH shot on count 3. It'll sound great since it'll be triggering the VDL samples, but it doesn't look like much of a snare drum part, does it?

This illustrates one of the primary challenges of writing unpitched percussion music within a notation program while still striving for accurate playback. To address this issue, both Finale and Sibelius (the two leading notation programs) have a feature commonly referred to as percussion mapping. What percussion mapping does is this: It takes a pre-defined list of sounds and adjusts the way they display on screen. By doing this, you'll HEAR the part played correctly (as in the example aboveâ€”remember, these are the pitches that call the correct sounds for our snare part), however it will DISPLAY like this:

Mapped example

While both Finale and Sibelius give you the capability to create and edit percussion maps for any unpitched percussion instrument you're using, you may quickly find that working with them is a very tedious undertaking, especially when considering the depth of detail to which a library like VDL goes.

Enter the good folks from The Write Score. They have gone to painstaking efforts to develop templates for VDL so you can focus on making music rather than the drudgery of developing methods for percussion mapping to work reliably.

These template packages include scores in either Finale or Sibelius format containing every sound in every VDL instrument mapped to an appropriate staff location with appropriate noteheads. Furthermore, they've built in functionality that can control enhanced mod-wheel/keyswitch commands via plain English words such as "at edge" or "puffies" without needing to enter cryptic controller information. To make all this work smoothly, there are associated .xml files that interact directly with the score itself, and which they've dialed in to a seamless working environment. If this all sounds technical, it is! Fortunately, these templates come with detailed documentation that walks you through the entire setup process so you can bypass the need to spend hours and weeks building your own templates. If you're a more visual learner, consider checking out Virtual Drumline Demystified - an onscreen training course for using Virtual Drumline with Finale or Sibelius.

If you're a Sibelius or Finale user, and are just getting your gears turning with Virtual Drumline, we can't emphasize enough the benefit of using these pre-designed templates. Available from The Write Score, use the promo code TAPSPACE10 and they'll give you a discount on your VDL template product.

Artist Spotlight

Jesse Monkman

Those of you who have followed us for any stretch of time have surely heard the music of Jesse Monkman. His popular marimba solos like Parody and Nocturnal Dance are mainstays in our catalog and have been performed thousands of times around the world. Originally hailing from Boston, Massachusetts where he earned degrees from the New England Conservatory, Monkman currently maintains an active career as an percussionist and composer in Savannah, Georgia.

This month, we caught up with Jesse amid his busy music schedule to learn more about his fear of heights and his thoughts on fantasy, the universe, and human stupidity.

Who would you want with you if you were stranded on a deserted island?

My wife Erica. I could not imagine my life without her. We are best friends and we face everything together.

What's been your latest victory?

Lately, I have been arranging for orchestra. I am very excited to premier an original composition and several of my arrangements with my band Velvet Caravan next month. It will be featured with the Hilton Head Orchestra under John Morris Russell. The greatest pleasure is being in the presence of such amazing improvisational talents in the band. Improvisation is the fundamental essence of composition.

Who is your favorite author?

Patrick Rothfuss, hands down. I am a bit of a fantasy genre fan and I love his writing style. It's epic and he is a great storyteller. Of course, I could note authors such as Tolkien, but I have a soft spot for people who take risks in a genre that has become so formula-driven.

What is your biggest fear?

Heights. I grew up on a farm swinging around rafters until I fell on a baler from 20 feet up. It hurt, but the 6-inch spike two inches to my left would have been fatal! At any rate, it had an impact on how I handle heights and the choices I make when taking chances.

What is your favorite quote?

â€œOnly two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and Iâ€™m not sure of the former.â€ â€“ Albert Einstein

Browse all of Jesse Monkman's music!

Video Submission of the Month

For his graduate recital at the University of North Texas, Matt Jordan performed Jim Casella's "Prime Ordinals" for djembe, prayer bowl, and live electronics.

To share videos of your latest performances of Tapspace music, click here. We'll look forward to hearing what you're doing with our music, and maybe we'll feature you here!

Share Concert Programs

Like our music? Want to help make sure more music like it is created in the future?

By letting ASCAP know that you performed our pieces in concert, youâ€™ll be supporting composers and Tapspace, and it doesnâ€™t cost you a thing! Every year ASCAP collects monies from orchestras, bars, radio stations, karaoke clubs, even sports stadiumsâ€”nearly every place and space where music is played. These funds are distributed based on reported performances. If you donâ€™t report this performance, thatâ€™s one or two more pennies that will go to Britney Spears.

So please, take a few minutes, visit our Submit Concert Programs page and help us support creativity in percussion.

Use your social skills

Are you following us on Facebook or Twitter? If you are, you already know that we send the latest and greatest there first. And we also run flash-promotions to save you some quick cash! Plus, we like to engage with all y'all (and your dog videos), so come join in and don't miss out on those benefits!

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