Hello again, SynthZone colleagues and Jaybirds friends! First, a thank you for the fine complimenary and constructive comments you have been sending to us (some of them to me directly), concerning our JAYBIRDS link on Cees wonderful KESO site. Among several questions was the inquiry, asked several times, as to how on earth we get the music printed in a format that can be seen and followed along in the Technics KN 7000 keyboard window, as the songs are playing (actually Joyce and Joy are the experts who do that). Here is a brief response I received from Joyce, that may either answer your question, or just confuse you even more. But I wanted to share it with you. Please direct further questions about this technique, or anything else you have to say about our work, either to this SynthZone board or directly to me via e-mail; I can forward them on the the others). Here is what Joyce wrote:

"a) The written music for each playalong is first produced in a music writing software program on the computer.

b) Two things then happen to it: first, it is “cropped” into two-stave sections and converted into bitmaps which are then loaded into the sequencer; second, it is transferred in its entirety into an Acrobat Writer program so that it can be converted into Acrobat Reader format for people to download.

c) Contrary to what most people imagine, at no stage in the production of the on-screen music or the PDF music do we ever use printed music. Our music never touches a sheet of paper! It exists only on the computer – we never scan anything in from a printed score."

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Now, if you are still confused, imagine how Colin and I feel, as creators of the music that you are seeing, and even WE have no idea how to do that magic they perform!



A special note to all my fellow American friends:

I wish you all a glorious Memorial Day weekend. Bless all the men and women who have died to make us all free. Without them, there could be no SynthZone for free expression of our ideas, and the Jaybirds could never have met, even in cyberspace. For it is they who have made freedom ring loud and clear throughout history!





A warm hug to all our musical and other friends who share our passion for song!

Ted Rose (the Yankee Jaybird) for ALL the JAYBIRDS (Colin, Joyce, Joy and me)