Category: Steinberg

Hillside It’s been a while since my last post here, and for that I apologize. A lot has happened. I’ve had to deal with illness, including problems with my replacement knee, as well as other things that you just don’t want to hear about. So, we’ll leave those behind for now and get on with things that you do want to hear about, like new music.

I have completed a new work of music for concert band which I would like to share with you today. That piece is titled, “Fantasias on a Hillside Theme,” and it is put together in a three-movement format (a “Theme and 1st Fantasia” movement, a “2nd Fantasia,” and a “3rd Fantasia and Finale” movement). The whole thing runs about 13 1/2 minutes long, and would be ranked as probably a Grade 4 on the grade school band difficulty scale.

You can listen to a recording of the work at this YouTube link:
“Fantasias on a Hillside Theme“

Despite the English-sounding title, there is nothing British behind the origin of “Fantasias on a Hillside Theme.” Instead, I pictured some of the better memories of my youth when I devised the theme for this work, and those memories usually happened when I was in the company of my grandparents, who usually lived in properties on the side of a hill: their home on Frazier Avenue in Austin, Texas, or their lakeside property near Lake Travis in Spicewood, Texas.

With some nice imaginative scoring touches and musical invention, I found this to be quite enjoyable and engaging even though I’m not that into band music. Good job Lee.
– Mike Hewer, Award-Winning British Composer, on hearing
“Fantasias on a Hillside Theme” (from the TalkClassical forums)

A couple of things about the video: first, I apologize for the score being so small. It’s done at 11″ x 17″ tabloid format, which is very hard to squeeze into a video frame. Second, as you may be able to guess, it is not a live recording. I enlisted the aid of the players of the New West Synthetic Wind Ensemble, provided courtesy of NotePerformer and the Steinberg Dorico Pro application, all of whom went beyond their runtime to bring your this realization of the piece. 🙂 Finally, at the 11:54 mark (during the Finale), there is a “glitch” in the recording, for which I apologize. I tried to fix it, but I could not. Please ignore it if you can.

I hope you will enjoy listening to my music. If you are in the concert band line of work and would like to perform it, please contact me so that we can work out the details. Thank you for stopping by!

I have been a user of Cakewalk Music MIDI writing software for many, many years now, since Cakewalk for Windows 2.0 was released back in the early 1990s. I’ve stuck with them through renamings and reorganizations, but no more. At long last, after almost 30 years, I am making the switch away from Cakewalk to Steinberg‘s Cubase Pro for Windows 13.

I purchased my copy of Cubase Pro yesterday and installed it on my laptop. My reasons were many. First, BandLab, the company now controlling Cakewalk (now known as Cakewalk Sonar), has refused to separate the license of Cakewalk from BandLab membership. I have no desire to join whatever “Social Music Creation Network” that BandLab is trying to put together. I just want to make music without additional terms added onto the software I’m using to make it.

Second, BandLab membership is a subscription that runs $149.50 every year (it’s on sale as I write this, but it likely won’t be on sale as you read this). So, every year, you’ll have to renew your membership in order to keep it (and your copy of Cakewalk Sonar)) active. I don’t want to do that.

Third, I’ve picked up on using Steinberg’s Dorico Pro for Windows 5 lately. I appreciate the level of support I’m getting from the company – it’s better than what I used to get through the Cakewalk channels, relatively speaking.

So, I am switching to Cubase Pro. The main reasons begin with the license. It’s not a subscription, and it’s not linked to any other product as Cakewalk Sonar is. I managed to get a full, non-subscription, non-crossgrade copy for just a hair over $180, thanks to a “40th anniversary discount” plus a “loyalty discount” for owning Dorico and Wavelab. Also, as I mentioned earlier, I feel that Cubase Prowill have better support than Cakewalk Sonar does, based on what I’ve been able to get for my copies of Dorico and Wavelab lately. Last, I see Steinberg finally headed in a strong, positive direction, after many years of reports of negative reviews. The changes to their licensing system to allow copies to be used on multiple home systems was one of the final things that pushed me in Steinberg’s, and in Cubase Pro’s, favor.

I realize I’m going to face a lot of negativity from the Cakewalk community for making the switch. I’m sorry, but I had to make a move, and I think I made the right one for me. I want to thank you for all of the help you’ve given me through the years. Bob Bergen, Mike Enjo, Scott Garrigus, Tony Giannelli, and J. Chewii Wookiee Smith, not to mention Greg Hendershott and a bunch of others I’ve forgotten through the years (my mind isn’t what it once was, thanks to the TIA I had in December of ’23) – I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, whether you realize you’ve done it or not. Thank you all very much for everything. I hope we can all remain at least acquaintances, perhaps even friends.

In the meanwhile, I hope I’ll be making some new friends rather quickly in Cubase Land. I’ve already made several acquaintances in the Continent of Steinberg, mainly in the Dorico Land, since that’s where I spend most of my time nowadays. I assume that Cubase Pro is going to have a hell of a learning curve, so friendship-making is going to be s prerequisite to any of my online studies of it. All I ask is for someone to help guide me through the gloom of night and the jungles of the day so that I may learn how to use this powerful piece of software to its fullest.

Here’s to the future, then. I hope it’s a fun one.

New Music – “Fantasias on a Hillside Theme”

Goodbye Cakewalk, Hello Cubase