One of the things I love about working at Power Music is talking to musicians from all over the world.
Ralph lives in Switzerland and Germany and has been a Power Music user for many years. He makes use of the Parts feature of Power Music Professional which is one of the lesser known features. Parts lets you store as one song, different instrument scores of a piece of music (eg guitar, bass, drums, keys) or versions of the music in different keys.
I asked Ralph to write a short piece about his use of Power Music, so here is what Ralph says…
I use 2 different setups. One is the 27 inch monitor with playbacks (backing tracks), when I am playing music as an entertainer. There at the moment I do have over 400 different songs with playback.
Selecting the key (Schlüssel)
Additionally I do need to have each piece of sheet music in at least 3 different keys, as I am a woodwind player (flute is in C, clarinet in Bb, saxophones in Bb or Eb, Alto flute in G).
Some weeks ago I got a very interesting email from Power Music: the 13 inch monitor with 2 licences and stand and page flip. So this thing I am using when I am playing with other musicians. It saves me to carry several fake books with me to rehearsals or gigs. There I do not have any playbacks (backing tracks), but only the sheet music (sometimes in different keys- see above). Mostly these pieces are on one page, so there it is enough to have a “small” tablet of 13 inches instead of 27 inches.
Right now I am using 4 licences of PM Professional on 4 different computers. One in my office to prepare my music “normally”, one on my laptop to work on the road, and two for my performances on the 13 inches and 27 inches tablets.
Backing tracks (Playbacks)
If I could place a wish it would be that it would be easier to transfer music with playbacks (backing tracks). Right now I can transfer (via PMZip) music sheets very easily from one computer to another – but the playbacks I have to add manually.
Otherwise I can only recommend PM Professional. It is just great.
Power Music Professional is localised (multi-lingual) – English, German and French. Ralph uses the German version! He is happy to help anyone using the German or French versions of Power Music – contact him via [email protected]
One of the things Ralph mentions in his article is not being able to transfer a backing track along with a song between different devices. The reason we do not implement this is mainly for copyright reasons. In Power Music it is the link to the media file that is stored not the file itself.
One thought on “Multi-instrumentalist Ralph Hirs on Power Music”
Thanks for the article. I also use parts to switch between saxes, clarinet and flute. I would love to see an option to switch between different parts while in full screen mode.
Many thanks
One of the things I love about working at Power Music is talking to musicians from all over the world.
Thanks for the article. I also use parts to switch between saxes, clarinet and flute. I would love to see an option to switch between different parts while in full screen mode.
Many thanks