Pricing

Music typesetters typically charge in the neighborhood of $20 per page. Highway robbery, if you ask me. With the formulae below, you can calculate what your typesetting project would cost if I did it. You'll find that it costs considerably less than $20 per page. And if you don't believe you can expect good quality at such low rates, look at any title in the Sheet Music for Sale catalogs on this web site to get an idea of what your music might look like.

If you own a laser printer or have access to one at work, this is ideal. I can simply e-mail you the PDF files of your music and you can print them yourself. However, if you prefer, you can receive hardcopies of your project by mail, printed in crisp 600 dpi resolution.

Being able to communicate via e-mail is essential, as it is often an iterative process to get the client's music finalized to his satisfaction. Therefore, even if you don't have a laser printer, you still need e-mail so you can receive and examine the proofs and reply with any changes you want. A scanner is helpful in this regard. Simply print the proof on whatever printer you have, write in the changes/corrections, scan it and e-mail it back to me.

Formulae for estimating your typesetting cost

First add up the Number of Beat Notes in each staff of your score system:

(Number of Beat Notes) = (Time Signature Numerator) x [(Score Length in Measures) - (Number of Empty Measures)]

If your piece has several different time signatures, calculate the Number of Beat Notes for each section and then add them up. If your score system has more than 4 staves, add a $2.50 staff fee for each staff in excess of 4. Also, if this is your first project with me, add $5 setup fee if you want a specially designed format for which I would have to create a template. Waive this fee if you're happy with the default.

For simple instrumental music with no lyrics or chords:

Price of each staff = (Number of Beat Notes) x $0.06

If your music has lots of tuplets, dotted-eighth-and-sixteenth rhythm patterns, or many notes with articulations, use $0.08 instead of $0.06.

For music that has lyrics (lead sheet, vocal solo, choral):

Use the same formula, but use $0.08 for any staff that has lyrics attached.

For music that has chords:

Use the same formula, but use $0.08 for any staff that has chords attached.

In other words...

Plain and simple is $0.06 per beat note, 2¢ more for complicated rhythms, articulations, lyrics or chords. Worst case example:

SATB (each voice on its own staff) with 3-staff organ, guitar chords, generous pedal markings (articulations), lots of tuplets in the vocal parts, 32 measures long, 4/4 time.

Number of Beat Notes for S, A, T, B staves = 4 x [32 - 0] = 128. Cost for each staff = 128 x $0.10 = $12.80
Number of Beat Notes for organ top staff with guitar chords = 128. Cost for this staff = 128 x $0.08 = $10.24
Number of Beat Notes for organ middle staff = 128. Cost for this staff = 128 x $0.06 = $7.68
Number of Beat Notes for organ pedal staff = 128. Cost for this staff = 128 x $0.08 = $10.24

Total cost to typeset this piece = (4 x 12.80) + 10.24 + 7.68 + 10.24 + (3 x $2.50) = $79.36

Since this 32-measure piece would probably take up at least 4 pages, you can see that my service can be very affordable, especially for music that has a lot of empty measures or is considerably simpler than this worst case example. Plus, you don't pay until you're completely satisfied. And even after you pay, you can request minor changes to a project at no charge. (The foregoing assumes e-mail delivery of PDFs; extra postage applies for hardcopies.)