IMSLP Forums

I know not many people will have the time (or the energy) to do this: but when a graphic scan is converted to PDF for uploading, the resulting file is unnecessarily large. Traffic (and bandwidth) both ways slows down. If users can be encouraged to create PDFs directly from .MUS or .SIB scores using embedded fonts the resulting files should:
a) occupy less storage space
b) upload/download faster
c) take up less bandwidth

Having said that, KUDOS to IMSLP for starting such an ambitious project. Long may it prosper.

While what you said about MUS files being much smaller (and much more legible too) is very true, there are several reasons why IMSLP has mainly scans:

1. Scans are MUCH less work than retypesetting; that's part of the reason why IMSLP can have as big a collection as it has now. Imagine retypesetting an entire Brahms Symphony (!)
2. Scans mean that there will be no possibility of human error insofar as representing that particular edition is concerned. I know this will please musicologists and professional musicians *a lot*

Nevertheless, submitting MUS files is very much encouraged if you have them

it might be alittle difficult for everone to dowload hundred clients for every score format there is. sibelius, lilypond, finale, to mention a few... it would be easier if they're converted to pdf, like mutopia.

I found the orchestration to the Pictures at an Exhibition but when I zip everything together, it becomes 127 MB! Soo...any tips??
Retypesetting the entire thing is a lot of work. I have already started doing it with Finale PrintMusic 2006 though...

Sphemusator wrote:KUDOS to IMSLP for starting such an ambitious project. Long may it prosper.

Yes may it live long and prosper.

kongming819 wrote:I found the orchestration to the Pictures at an Exhibition but when I zip everything together, it becomes 127 MB! Soo...any tips??
Retypesetting the entire thing is a lot of work. I have already started doing it with Finale PrintMusic 2006 though...

How large would each of the files be if you posted the movements separately?

It would be advantageous for anyone who wanted to examine a single movement rather than having to download the entire suite.

Also, I understand part of Feldmahler's goal is to make available established critical editions which would (hopefully) be more useful to a musicologist than files created ad-hoc by the enthusiast, with the risk of errors. At this early stage in the life of the library, though, I believe that it is more important to add works even if we have to make our own transcriptions using tools like Sibelius and Finale.

Thankfully PDF seems to be a very stable format while Finale seems to incorporate new changes to the Enigma Transportable Format with every new release. I hope, very much, that at some point in the future, a standard for encoding musical notation electronically will be accepted.

Yeah, what Sphemusator said

As long as the problem is not that you are not willing to upload large files, anything can be adjusted. I can even increase the file size limit to 1GB. Currently IMSLP is using too little bandwidth (less than 5% of limit), and not the other way around, so bandwidth is not an issue. On the other hand, I do slightly perfer scans over retypesets just because I know that professional musicians will only use published material, and not retypesetted material done by an anonymous person (no offense meant, just that it's the truth). But as Sphemusator said, at this point, any addition to IMSLP is welcome. Even retypesets are good for an introduction or a causal learning of a piece.

On the other hand, I do slightly perfer scans over retypesets just because I know that professional musicians will only use published material, and not retypesetted material done by an anonymous person (no offense meant, just that it's the truth).

Not always

I'd say if the version is correct (and I can tell, so it's not an issue) then I don't mind who did it. I think more and more professional musicians are doing that, this is why sometime you hear bands play a song slightly wrong, trust me, it happens.

Believe it or not, alot of scores have mistakes in them, especially in the chords.

But that's mostly rock music. In symphony music, that holds true.

ReignMan wrote:But that's mostly rock music. In symphony music, that holds true.

Lol. I forgot about the other side of the equation, probably because IMSLP is so classically oriented.

Funnily enough, I actually don't mind IMSLP including pop/jazz (this was within the original conception of IMSLP), as long as it is music. But being a classically trained musician means that I'm not fitted for submitting or desiging the pop/jazz section of IMSLP.

ReignMan wrote:

On the other hand, I do slightly perfer scans over retypesets just because I know that professional musicians will only use published material, and not retypesetted material done by an anonymous person (no offense meant, just that it's the truth).

Not always

I'd say if the version is correct (and I can tell, so it's not an issue) then I don't mind who did it. I think more and more professional musicians are doing that, this is why sometime you hear bands play a song slightly wrong, trust me, it happens.

Believe it or not, alot of scores have mistakes in them, especially in the chords.

But that's mostly rock music. In symphony music, that holds true.

Being interested in "historically informed performance" (The other HIP music) I have learned of at least two scores that are regularly performed in a version that the composer would not recognize, were they alive today.

Allegri's celebrated "Miserere" in the best-known version was assembled from two slightly different aural transcriptions, and differs significantly from the original manuscript, rediscovered in the Vatican library in the 1990s

and

Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" has, almost since its first performance, included an erroneous quickening of tempo which was only discovered when the original score in the composer's hand was relocated and compared meticulously with the score commonly in use.

For better or worse, most people know, love, and expect to hear the familiar versions now, rather than the "correct" versions!

ReignMan wrote:

On the other hand, I do slightly perfer scans over retypesets just because I know that professional musicians will only use published material, and not retypesetted material done by an anonymous person (no offense meant, just that it's the truth).

Not always

I'd say if the version is correct (and I can tell, so it's not an issue) then I don't mind who did it. I think more and more professional musicians are doing that, this is why sometime you hear bands play a song slightly wrong, trust me, it happens.

Believe it or not, alot of scores have mistakes in them, especially in the chords.

But that's mostly rock music. In symphony music, that holds true.

Being interested in "historically informed performance" (The other HIP music) I have learned of at least two scores that are regularly performed in a version that the composer would not recognize, were they alive today.

Allegri's celebrated "Miserere" in the best-known version was assembled from two slightly different aural transcriptions, and differs significantly from the original manuscript, rediscovered in the Vatican library in the 1990s

and

Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" has, almost since its first performance, included an erroneous quickening of tempo which was only discovered when the original score in the composer's hand was relocated and compared meticulously with the score commonly in use.

For better or worse, most people know, love, and expect to hear the familiar versions now, rather than the "correct" versions!

Wow...sucks for Ferde Grofe...

Well, I'm having problems. I can scan to .JPG, .PNG, etc, but not PDF. I need a good way to make images into a PDF.

Perhaps I could recommend PrimoPDF. It is a small program that "looks like" a printer to programs on the computer, and produces a PDF file rather than hardcopy.

It has the advantages of (a) being freeware, and (b) not adding annoying watermarks to printed documents.

To convert a scan to PDF, all you would need to do would be to load the image in your preferred viewer, then print using PrimoPDF and if there is more than one scan to be incorporated, use PDFTK (another freeware utility) to concatenate a group of PDF files.

(Thanks Feldmahler for introducing me to PDFTK).

Try CutePDF...it's the same basically...there's also an advanced version but you have to pay for it.

Anyways, someone put the Pictures at an Exhibition orchestration pdf on IMSLP!...the whole thing...under 127 MB!, in fact, only 8 MB!

How the heck is that possible??? If I knew I could possible post the movements seperately with smaller sizes...