• Harmony. The rules of the game are to first input a bass line, and then to harmonize it. This means that you have to choose the 4 notes required per chord for the bass, tenor, alto and soprano lines. You must proceed according to the chiffrage information that specifies the chord inversion to be used, located below each chord. The system can be configured to automatically give you each chord degree.
• Melody. Your task is to come up with a melodic voice that is compatible with classical principles. Once introduced into Arezzo, for instance in the bass line, you can ask Arezzo to check whether it is well formed.
• Counterpoint. Arrezo is able to deal with first species counterpoint (note per note, with one note per bar) up to 4 voices. Enter the voices into Arezzo, for instance in the bass and soprano line, then ask Arezzo to check if they are correct.

Once you think you created a proper harmonization, melody or counterpoint, you can check it, ask for advice if you're stuck, listen to it or save it on the Arezzo server.

Arezzo also offers communication tools that enable:

• e-mail posting of your scores to ask for advice, or to print them;
• sharing of scores with other users for group work ;
• chating with other users using the integrated chat system. We also recommend the use of voice communication systems over the Internet, such as Microsoft NetMeeting.

Optimal use of Arezzo requires a login name; you can get one free by sending an e-mail to Arezzo, using the address provided at the end of this manual. Note that this identifier will be used as a reference to your files. When you try Arezzo latter on, you'll be able to retrieve your own files. The "guest" login name account contains some examples you might want to look at.

Usage

The score is displayed in the usual way. Each bar is annotated with its number and the number of its first chord, given in parenthesis. This may be handy when analyzing the system's messages.

Various items can be selected, and color coded, with a left mouse button click or via the arrow keys:

Chords in green	Notes in red	Digits, within an inversion, in red

Beside selecting items, here are the various operations permitted by Arezzo.

The File menu :

• New a clean music sheet.
• Load a particular file.
• Revert the music sheet to its last saved version.
• Delete a particular file.
• Save your piece in the Workbench system. Only one version is kept per client site.
• Save As asks for a particular file name to save your work into.

The Operations menu :

• The Check menu allows you to focus on:
  • Harmony. You'll get indications on what might be harmonically wrong with your work.
  • Melody. You'll get indications on how to improve a single melody line of your choosing (e.g., the bass).
  • Counterpoint. Once you select a set of voices (up to 4), you'll get indications on where counterpoint errors occur.
  Errror messages are printed in the bottom window.
• The Advise menu can be used if you don't know how to eliminate particular errors on the selected chord (for Harmony) or given melody (Melody). Advise messages are printed in the bottom window.
• Play your music on your local MIDI player. You can choose which voices to listen to, which helps if you want to focus on, for instance, innner voices. Note that if your Web browser is not properly configured to recognize .mid files (MIME type is "application/x-midi"), you must load the file on your computer first.

The Communications menu:

• Mail :
  • your Score to a selected person -- this will automatically start the Web browser of the receiver with your score in it. You can thus get in touch with various teachers and ask them questions;
  • as a PS-formatted file (this file will be mailed to the logged user in order to enable its printing -- this is required since direct printing from Arezzo is not allowed);
  • as a MIDI-formatted file -- you can thus send your MIDI compositions to whoever you want;
  • as an ABC-formatted file (check this site for more information on abc).
• Share your score with other users (your score, and modifications to it, will be displayed on all computers that share the same channel. Only mouse events and actions on menu items signaled with a "*" are automatically propagated to machines on the current channel. For other modifications, e.g. tonality changes, please use Synchronize):
  • by creating a New sharing channel;
  • by joining an exiting channel (Join).
• Synchronize your shared score with other users. Only mouse events and actions on menus whose labels begin with a "*" are automatically propagated to users of your channel. For other modifications (e.g., a tonality change), use the Synchronize operation.
• List current channel Participants.
• Exit the sharing mode and go back to Local mode.
• Chat with other users (a chat box will be opened and all text written in it will be displayed on all computers that use the same chat channel):
  • by creating a New channel.
  • by joining an existing channel (Join).

The Preferences menu :

• Modify the score Tonality :
  • changing the Mode (Major or Minor) ;
  • changing the Alteration (bb, b, , #, X) ;
  • changing the Note (do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, si).
• Modify the score time Signature.
• Modify the score Tempo.
• Choose your General MIDI Instruments. You may either use the Piano, or select a particular sound for each voice, thus helping you distinguishing it from others.
• Choose the Language (English or French) in which messages are displayed.
• Select various Display options.
• Select which particular harmony, melody or counterpoints Checks are performed when using the Operations menu. Please refer to your music theory manual for a deeper explanation of these notions, or feel free to contact your instructor.

The Alteration menu :

• Alter the selected note (b, bb, , #, X). Can also be applied on elements of chiffrages.

The Inversion menu :

• Change the selected chord inversion (8, 3, 5, 5 3, 6, 6 3, 6 4 and sevenths). Sevenths (7, 6 5, 4 3, 2, 7+, 6 5/, +6, +4) are gathered within their own menu. Note that diminished sevenths are not supported in this version of Arezzo.

The Duration menu :

• Change the selected chord duration (1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32). In practice, when a selected note is modified, all notes in the given chord are modified too.

The Insert menu -- to insert a new chord (resp. a new note) after the closest chord (resp. note) by clicking on the right mouse button (or use the left mouse while holding the Control key down) :

• For the insertion of a Chord, you can either get a new chord with a single Bass note, or a Full chord, with one note per voice.
• Lowest Note allows you to add the lowest possible note in an existing chord.
• Bass, to add a note in the bass voice.
• Tenor
• Alto
• Soprano

The ? menu :

• The Glossary can be used if you don't understand a particular word used in the bottom window. Select the word with the mouse and click on Glossary. An glossary box will be opened in which you can type a word and press Enter. A word selected with the mouse in the glossary box bottom window will be explained too (click on the Explain button).
• Manual loads this html page.
• A propos... gives you information about Arezzo.

It is also naturally possible to perform some operations :

• On notes:
  • Move a note in a chord by dragging it with the left button.
  • Delete the selected note by hitting [Delete] or [Backspace].
  • Create a note in a chord by clicking it with the right button (or use the left mouse down while holding the Control key down) at its requested position in the chord. Use the Insert button first to select either "Lowest Note" to create the lowest possible note in the current chord, "Bass", "Tenor", "Alto" or "Soprano" to choose a particular voice.
• On chords (You can use the scroll bar below the score to slide the current position):
  • Delete the selected chord by hitting [Delete] or [Backspace] (deselect the selected note first if need be). You cannot delete the last remaining chord.
  • Insert a new chord after a chord by clicking on the right button (or use the left mouse down while holding the Control key down). You need to select "Chord" with the Insert button first.

Important note

Some actions only work if a dedicated server runs. If it doesn't seem to be running, please contact pierre.jouvelot@mines-paristech.fr.