Review: “Fanfare” by Sample Logic

Brian Ralston gets down to brass tacks with a comprehensive run-through of Sample Logic’s FANFARE.

SCOREcast 2011 Holiday Deal Guide

The holidays are here, and there’s a plethora of deals and discounts floating around the Web for composers. Here’s our list of the best ones, constantly updated with links and details!

SCOREcast 31: Total Request (Sorta) LIVE!

In our first Q&A episode, we open up Twitter, Facebook, and a hangout on Google+ to hear what’s on your mind about writing, producing, “politiking”, and navigating the business.

SCOREcast 28: Richard Bellis

Emmy Award-winning composer Richard Bellis hangs out with SCOREcast for an in-depth look at the state of the film music business.

SCOREcast 27: The Long Winter

Deane Ogden and Brian Ralston co-host an edition that is so crammed with new goodies you’ll forget all about the fact that we’ve been in hiding for 10 months!

Is “Score Design” Dead?

Composers LOVE to say that they use all of their own sounds. We call B.S.!

POLL: GEAR OF THE YEAR – 2009

Despite the long tail effects of a sharp economic downturn here in America, 2009 seemed to be a barn-burner year for music production software. Many companies delivered on promises made at the 2009 NAMM Convention back in January by coming through with products that have advanced the composing game a few steps ahead yet again. Although it is difficult — if not impossible — to whittle the year’s releases down to a small group of five, we’ve given you what we think are the top five most important releases of 2009, based solely on sales data from one of the leading musical instrument retailers in North America. Cast your vote in our GEAR OF THE…

Jim Well: Get Smart With SmartSheet

This month’s theme is Gear and Software. I’ll bet you think I’m gonna talk about the latest and greatest library, synth, hunk of rack gear, or atomic banjo tuner – but I’m not. Instead, we’ll explore a game-changer that addresses something you might be overlooking: glue. The kind you can use to keep your projects well-organized and the members of your film music team on the same page through the obstacle course of score concept development, cue prototyping, orchestration, and production, in the face of a barrage of revisions, even at the last minute. Previous SCOREcast Online articles have mentioned a few tools and services that fit into this category. Deane Ogden, for instance, has…

"My Perfect 3": Brian Satterwhite

Editor’s Note: In the spirit of December’s theme (Gear and Software), we asked our contributors to weigh in with their Top 3 gear finds and why they like them, and we are bringing them to you in a series that we are calling “My Perfect 3″. Here are the three that Brian Satterwhite chose, and a short rundown on why he picked them. I’m not trying to be different merely for the sake of being different, but the honest truth is, I’m not a huge gear-head. Yes, it’s true I have gear. I use it daily and rely on it heavily for my personal welfare and the advancement of my career. But for me, it…

"My Perfect 3": Jim Well

Editor’s Note: In the spirit of December’s theme (Gear and Software), we asked our contributors to weigh in with their Top 3 gear finds and why they like them, and we are bringing them to you in a series that we are calling “My Perfect 3″. Here are the three that Jim Well chose, and a short rundown on why he picked them. Reaper In case you don’t know, REAPER is a low-cost, high-function, constantly-improving digital audio workstation (DAW) program.  I’ve included REAPER in my top 3 not because I’m heavily using it myself (I’m not, so far), but because I feel it offers so much value for so little money that it’s simply not…

"My Perfect 3": Lee Sanders

Editor’s Note: In the spirit of December’s theme (Gear and Software), we asked our contributors to weigh in with their Top 3 gear finds and why they like them, and we are bringing them to you in a series that we are calling “My Perfect 3″. Here are the three that Lee Sanders chose, and a short rundown on why he picked them. Digital Performer I imagine a lot of us will include our sequencing app on this list—and that’s probably appropriate. If you write music at the computer, your sequencing platform informs everything else you do. Its importance is paramount. It has to be solid, flexible, and powerful… and above all, it has to…

December Theme: GEAR AND SOFTWARE

FACT: Composers love gear. It’s like we are born with a gear gene or something. Or a sickness… depends on who you ask! That’s why this month at SCOREcast we are talking all things gear and software. Other than our continued coverage of the Los Angeles composers unionization effort, everything you see at SCOREcast for the month of December will be gear-centric. Suggestions, tips, tricks, hints, warnings, praise, criticisms, and of course… deals (as evidenced by Houston Haynes’s very useful post this morning). We’ve even asked our contributors to weigh in with their Top 3 gear finds and why they like them, and throughout the month we’ll be bringing those to you in an ongoing…