Happy New Year to everyone! I've put together a new score cast video to show off the interface between Notion and Studio One! It's an arrangement of a Burt Bacharach classic for small orchestra. I've loved this song since I was a kid, and that's been over 50 years now! I find it almost achingly haunting, and I've tried to capture the drama and passion I always heard in it.

My workflow was to write the work in Notion using the Notion instruments. I then set it up for export by applying rulesets for the Virtual Instruments I wanted to use in the recording and exported the notes to Studio One. I set up all the instruments in Vienna Ensemble Pro, and used Vienna MIRPro to place the instruments on a virtual soundstage and tie them together sonically. Then I went back and forth between the piano roll and the notation, making fine grain adjustments for phrasing, note length etc. Because it was constantly a work in process I did more back and forth adjusting between the two programs than normal, and they really work well together! I moved parts between instruments, adjusted tempo, and recorded automation envelopes for the parameters in the instruments (mostly modulation, expression and vibrato control). Then I added a post-processor (Ozone 8) for mastering inside the DAW, which is something I've been finding of value lately as it allows control of the final sound throughout mixing.

Some stats: There are 22 separate instruments, 44 audio outputs, and over 60 automation tracks. The amount of instruments required use of 2 Vienna Ensemble Pro instances to house all the AU plug-ins, and they were connected by setting one up as a VEP Event Input.

I rarely write for brass, so I'm sure there's lots of room for improvement. I don't often write my own arrangements, but I've enjoyed this immensely over the last couple of days! My hats off to the development teams at Presonus that perfected the interface between these programs! It's really amazing what it's allowed me to accomplish, a guy with no formal music training. At one point I even decided that - what the heck! - I needed a scale change, and I transposed the entire last portion of the song up a minor 2nd! It was really simple with Notion and was just perfect for the song!

Enjoy, and feedback is always appreciated.



Note: Second take posted to correct some off notes!