Question about Tremolos

Hi out there, I'm hoping for some advice about Sibelius, but any information about Tremolos in general would be great as well... I'm working on a piece for Bluegrass Quintet, and as you might already know, one of the best sounds in the world is the tremolo technique on Mandolin... The only issue is how to notate that... When I try to write a tremolo in Sibelius, it ends up sounding completely unnatural, like a 5-year-old banging out down-strokes on the same note over and over and over again, instead of the lulling, rolling sort of sound I'm going for... As far as I understand, Sibelius is capable of producing this, with its advanced new sound set, so maybe I've just got something wrong on the technical side of things, but even if this isn't the case, then I must just not know how to notate this sort of tremolo... So I'm hoping to learn what the right way is, and hear it (at least in my head) so I can know I'm writing it correctly... Any advice in this matter would be greatly appreciated.

I believe what I'm referring to is a single-note tremolo, even though it consists of a 2-note "chord", because the notes are played simultaneously and not alternated.

Is there normally a sincopation in the tremolo rhythm? Because at first I thought there was, but after examining it more closely it seems to be pretty uniform...

Also, what is an "unmeasured" tremolo?

Thanks a million!

Don't worry about the way it sounds on computer. Just make sure you notate it correctly.

Place the symbol with three signs over the note:

Tremolo - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

There are different types of tremolos in Sibelius, depending on how fast you want them to be. Make sure you pick the right tremoloing speed.

On 3/1/2009 at 7:33 AM, Rylandish said:

Hi out there, I'm hoping for some advice about Sibelius, but any information about Tremolos in general would be great as well... I'm working on a piece for Bluegrass Quintet, and as you might already know, one of the best sounds in the world is the tremolo technique on Mandolin... The only issue is how to notate that... When I try to write a tremolo in Sibelius, it ends up sounding completely unnatural, like a 5-year-old banging out down-strokes on the same note over and over and over again, instead of the lulling, rolling sort of sound I'm going for... As far as I understand, Sibelius is capable of producing this, with its advanced new sound set, so maybe I've just got something wrong on the technical side of things, but even if this isn't the case, then I must just not know how to notate this sort of tremolo... So I'm hoping to learn what the right way is, and hear it (at least in my head) so I can know I'm writing it correctly... Any advice in this matter would be greatly appreciated.

I believe what I'm referring to is a single-note tremolo, even though it consists of a 2-note "chord", because the notes are played simultaneously and not alternated.

Is there normally a sincopation in the tremolo rhythm? Because at first I thought there was, but after examining it more closely it seems to be pretty uniform...

Also, what is an "unmeasured" tremolo?

Thanks a million!