I’m currently enjoying accompanying rehearsals for the BBC Singers and the Berkshire Youth Choir under the direction of Robert Hollingworth, as they prepare for a performance of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas. A masterclass and performance takes place February 15th, 2013 at Greyfriars Church in Reading, with St. James’ Baroque accompanying.
The project has also involved me getting to grips with the Figured Bass functions in Sibelius 7 as I take a shortcut to creating a rehearsal score at A=415hz Baroque pitch (i.e. down a semi-tone)! Transcribing this score into Sibelius has been a great way to appreciate the detail of Purcell’s vocal and instrumental writing, and I highly recommend this as a method of study for your favourite score. Sibelius has made all aspects of score writing much more efficient, and version 7 was a major re-design of an already powerful package. If you write music and you haven’t explored this software yet, it should be on your list.