Hi Gang;  Our Little five-year-old boy kept asking me  "Do me a
Aristocat roll, Daddy."  Since the "Aristocat" video is his favorite,
I figured that I would give it a shot.  Boy after looking at the score,
I wish he had picked something simple!

I used a different method of creating the MIDI files on this project.
To learn the music, I converted the sheet music using MIDIscan 2.0,
which really turned out 'blah' at first, but at least the music was
in time with the measures.

Next, I slowed the tempo down to a crawl and added all the embellish-
ments by hand, playing on our MIDI equipped Foster piano.  Since the
"foundation" of the music was in time with the measures, it was a
simple task of figuring out where my hand-played notes should go.

Of course, I could have done all the extra notes with the mouse, but
I feel there is a major difference between a "arranged by" versus a
'played by" roll.  If there is no piano keyboard involved, the phrase
"Played by" doesn't have much meaning.  I like to be sure that there is
an actual keyboard interaction in any project I do.

I am not saying that "arranged " rolls aren't any good (I've heard some
outstanding arranged rolls).   Real-time-recorded player piano music is
not very common anymore because of the fact that it is impossible to
play exactly on the measures.  Almost every single note needs to be
overhauled, and its a lot of work.  If you are doing a four-hand
arrangement by the keyboard,  you must be precise in your timing or
otherwise it's disaster.

I recorded our "Waitin'..." roll in this manner.  I didn't take that
MIDI file very seriously; I was mainly just goofing around with the
piano at the time.  Chris edited it, first in Cakewalk and then in
Richard Brandle's 'Wind' program, and then had the roll made.  It is
ironic that that roll is our number one seller to date!

Hopefully, if I don't fall off the piano stool from fatigue -- or
go blind from looking at those notes on the computer screen trying
to figure out where they should go (my psychic can't seem to locate
J.  Lawrence Cook's ghost for assistance!) -- we hope to have some new
titles by maybe February 1998, including the Aristocat theme.  I have
put one of the theme songs on our home page.  I would really appreciate
some feedback on it.

Merry Christmas to all

Andy Taylor
http;//members.aol.com/TEMPOLA/index.htm