Hi composers, it’s my first time engraving choral music. How can I make the score look more professional? Thanks in advance for the feedback
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1V0OZf1lDaZzP6sySV6-8TOxvSPbLQg8T?usp=sharing
First thought are:
Garamond isn’t a great font for lyrics – the x-height is quite small, and it’s not very legible at small sizes (unless there are specific ‘optical’ styles designed for small sizes!)
If you are going to use that font, then it needs to be bigger, which may cause the music to re-flow over more systems.
Print out the score and hold it in front of you, and see if you can read everything clearly.
You seem to be missing punctation generally. Use all the punctuation in the poem, and use commas to mark where the text is repeated for the music, e.g. petal, petal, petal; flower of the heart, flower of the heart, flower of the heart. And also where text is missing.
You’ve got some missing and incomplete word extensions in bars 8, 10, 12 -14; and – worse – you’ve got extension lines where you shouldn’t in bar 30. Extension lines join one note to the next note with the same syllable. Check the whole score.
I’d also suggest adding slurs for syllables that have more than one note.
You’ve got staff changes, so having staff labels is of some use. It is possible to use the Divisi staff labels so that each staff can have a full label on page 1. (Soprano 1, Soprano 2).
I’d prefer braces, rather than brackets, to join the two parts of each voice together, but that’s just me.
However, I’d lose the “For rehearsal only” on every piano staff after the first one. Not only does it take up a fair amount of space, but … no one is going to be confused mid-rehearsal (or mid-performance!) when they turn the page.
Delete that rest in bar 87 in the piano, which will help to bring the staves closer together.
I would add system objects like the tempo marks to the piano staff. There is a school of thought that the Altos, Tenors and Basses might like to know about tempi, too.
Bar 25, tenors: Tenor 1 has tied quarter notes, Tenor 2 has a half note. Make them both the same.
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