Welcome to Daniel Eng Music Production and Big Engband!
If you are looking for professional, high quality Big Band charts that are different from the regular stuff – both in sound and form – you have come to the right place. In the Web Shop you find information about the various charts, view extracts and listen to recordings of many of them. If you want to buy any chart, payment is easily made directly by credit card or a digital wallet (no PayPal or Stripe), and you download your purchase directly. Please note that all prices in the Shop include Swedish VAT.
My writing is deeply rooted in the jazz traditions, combined with my personal touch and voice.
If you have any questions, a contact form can be found under the header or in this link: “contact”.
This autumn has been warm, very warm. It’s not until now, at the end of October, that attributes of the normal automnal processes fully show and manifest; leaves turn yellow and red and fall in droves, the weather turns rainy and grey, with interspersing clear days of frosty mornings and low trajectory sunlight, and migrating birds cross the skies in long stretched v-formations. Finally, autumn is setting in, and I love it.
My composing work continues on the Japanese-themed concert program. A composition, titled “Demon Under the Bridge”, will soon be completed for editing, and it will be intriguing and exciting to delve into the new notation software Dorico, after the announcing of the termination of Finale. I have to learn the program from the ground, but I hope I somehow can apply my expertise in Finale to smoothen up and facilitate the transition – and that I can produce equally good layouts.
For now, I have a few days of light vacationing, which means some practising, some composing and raking of heaps of leaves.
I wish all of you visiting here, a really nice and happy October ending!
The Summer Sale ended together with August, but summer itself is only now finally giving in, albeit very slowly, to the colder, murkier and rainier weather of autumn. In Sweden we have had an unusally warm September, and although you can see the leaves reddening on some trees, much of the over all foliage where I live is still dark, late-summer green. Remarkable! I believe that various weather and climate monitoring services, like the European Copernicus, say that their statistics show the summer of 2024 to over all be the warmest ever measured.
What also ended with August, is the product line, the development and support, of Make Music’s notation software Finale. I have used Finale since around 1996-1997, and I am so used to it and its functions that the news of its cancellation shocked me. Over the years I have developed routines, settings, short-cuts and processes that have made me very fast in editing full scores that produce many separate parts, that I now wonder how long it’s going to take me to get used to a new notation software. The cancellation of Finale came as a total surprise to me, and I guess many, but with the cancellation I got a deal and an offer to migrate my notation work to Dorico, which I, after some agonizing consideration, in the end did.
Finale was the first and only notation software that worked properly as a typewriter and “blank-sheet” editor at the same time, and its functions to adjust literally everything and anything, made layouts, once adjusted, visually the most clean to be had. I am fully aware of that every software – and for sure, Finale had its quirks and flaws – has its lifespan, and that at some time every software’s possibilities to develop, adapt and adjust inevitably come to an end, and I hope that the transition to Dorico will be smooth and dynamic. That I quickly and easily can develop the same speed in editing and layout as I had with Finale. Still I will, most likely for sentimental reasons, miss my old notation buddy.
Good bye, dear Finale! We’ve had a really good and long lasting run, we two, and you have been an invaulable asset to my note work. Thank you for everything!
The 3/4 meter is – to me – a tricky division for composing. In higher tempi the meter can feel cramped and confining, and the bars go by so quick that it takes much concentration and focus to get a grip on the overarching form and timespans. In lower tempi, it can be suggestive and expressive and be so captivating that it gets hard to restrain all the ideas that spawn from it’s seemingly simple, but enticing, three beats per bar. I have not done very much composing in 3/4, though that which I have written mainly is in lower tempi, or as tag-bars to smooth out lyrics or phrases.
Therefore it is with some satisfaction I now announce that my latest composition is a medium jazz waltz for a female vocalist, with Swedish lyrics, titled “Strax Efter Nyår” (translated “Shortly After New Year’s Eve”), and that it from today is available in the web shop. I have since long had a plan to compose a four movement suite about the annual seasons, depicting them more from a psychological and emotional viewpoint, rather than a programmatical descripitve, and some years ago I composed two pieces intended to be the second and third movement in that suite, but did not then label them so. Now when this new piece, which is the first movement, is published, I will label them appropriately and as originally intended. When finished, the suite will consist of the following pieces:
Movement 3 Summer: “Den Första Juni” (The First of June”) and the fourth, which is not yet composed:
Movement 4 Autumn: “Regn Klockan Åtta På Morgonen” (Rain at Eight o’clock in the Morning”)
Because the Summer Sale is on until August the 31st, this new composition is published at a discount. Take the opportunity to buy great – fun, interesting, fantastic sounding, stimulating, fresh, groovy, innovative, and so much more positive – Big Band charts at nice prices. The sale means a discount of 30% off on all compositions, and 25% on all arrangments. Jump on it to give your band an invigorating addition to its repertoire for the autumn rehearsals; to give your vocalist(s) something new to phrase and interpret and your rhythm section some new grooves to swing! The genres, the meters, the grooves, the lyrics, the compositions and arrangements found here have a hard matched span of diversity, so there is something for everyone. Remember: Now, payments are made through credit card, a digital wallet, or – from Sweden and Norway – with Swish and Vipps!
I wish all of you visiting here a really nice and happy August!
The Summer Sale is still on for more than a month! Until August 31st all charts in the web shop are at a discount of 30% off on all compositions, and 25% off on all arrangements.
The big news is that I have taken down the options of payment with PayPal and Stripe, in favour of direct payment with regular credit cards, digital wallets and Swish – the latter the local Swedish equivalent of Venmo (whereas Venmo for now isn’t possible to use with the payment services provided from my bank). However: Visa, AmEx or Master Card – to mention some common examples – are now all accepted!
Other than this major change in the functionality of the web shop, I work on editing my latest composition. A piece that I’ve since long planned on writing to create a four movement suite out of two already composed pieces, this is the first movement in “Årstidssvit” (“The Seasons Suite”); four movements for Big Band and a female vocalist with Swedish lyrics, that picture the yearly seasons more from a psychological and emotional viewpoint, rather than a descriptive. This first movement, titled “Strax Efter Nyår” (“Shortly After New Year’s Eve”) will – of course! – be published here upon completion.
I wish all of you visiting here, a really nice and happy July, wherever you are!
Now, summer has firmly established itself here in Sweden; with sudden, intense showers, towering afternoon thunderclouds, blindingly blue skies and heatwaves. Equally established, but without all these traits, is this year’s Summer Sale – by now into its fourth week. Take the opportunity to buy great big band charts at reduced prices until the end of August! The discounts are 30% off on all compositions, and 25% off on all arrangements.
I will, on my part, have one more week of light work before I take a much needed vacation and I wish all of you visiting here a really nice summer (or winter if you live “down under”) and may you all have great vacations whenever they come!
As it is said in the Renaissance ballet: Now is the month of maying! The time when Spring matures into adolescence while the world is still light green, leaves and straw still look newborn, and the ferns have those small, curled chameleon-tail rolls slowly unfolding into a waist-high foliage. The old Swedish verb “maja” actually means to decorate or adorn something with leaves or greenery, and this is surely true of the month of May – the world gets dressed in greenery. I wish you all visiting here a really nice month of May, and that your summer (or winter depending on where you are, of course!) will be rewarding and relaxing.
Aside from the regular work of performing and conducting, I have also begun composing a new piece for big band, and the completed chart will of course be published here. A movement in a four-part suite about the annual seasons for big band a a female vocalist, this new piece will concern the days immediately after New Year’s eve, when the new year seems fresh and empty of content, and the view of the oncoming year still is unclouded and filled with – sometimes vague and half conscious – hopes, wishes and expectations.
As every year, there will be a Summer Sale. The discounts will be 25% off on all arrangments, and 30% off on all compositions. For what you will get in music and playing for your band, there will between June 1st and August 31st be great prices on great charts. Music that will truly get your band playing and the attention of audiences!
This coming Sunday, May 5th, I once again will have the honour and joy of leading the fantastic Immanuel Big Band in concert! This time, they will perform the concert program “Standard Story”; the telling of a love story through arranged and narrated arrangements of jazz standards. The fantastic and soulful Viktoria Glans will be the vocalist illustrating the events; filling the songs with meaning and emotions throughout the unfolding of the story.
The concert will be held at Immanuelskyrkan, Kungstensgatan 17 in Stockholm. Start time is 19:00 hrs and concert length is just above one hour. Free admission!
Ten of the arrangements in the story will be performed, all of which are available in the web shop:
My latest composition, titled “Ghost In the Rain”, is now available in the web shop. Based on Japanese modes and scales and with lyrics of mine that concern grief and mental unhealth, this piece is a ballad for a male and female vocalist duet. Compared to the chart completed before, this composing process was more drawn out and complex, but also personally very rewarding. Partly because the tonality and complexity of the piece were more challenging and demanded more processing work, but partly because I also have had a period of much other work, splitting my focus and the periods of concentrated writing. I do not claim to have any deeper knowledge of Japanese traditional music, but my aspiration is to merge and synthezise what I percieve is characteristic of Japanese music, and culture, with my own cultural context and environment, into something that is a fruitful and meaningful combination. I, myself, am pleased with the outcome, and I hope that others can find meaning, content and enjoyable music in this chart.
On Saturday April 20:th at 20:30 hrs at Immanuelskyrkan, the eminent Immanuel Big Band with the equally fantastic Viktoria Glans, will perform a five piece concert of about thirty minutes entirely with my music and lyrics, as a part of the event Kulturnatten at Immanuelskyrkan. The concert is free of admission and will include two instrumental and three vocal pieces, all available here in the web shop:
Click the picture above to see the whole city wide program for Kulturnatten.
Other than that: Sunday May 5:th has been set as the date when Immanuel Big Band will perform the concert program of my arrangements of jazz standards, titled “Standard Story”. A concert telling about a love story from the beginning to the end, and a bit thereafter, by the arrangements, and arranging, of jazz standards and their lyrics to form a narrative. More information will be published closer to concert date.
To all visiting here, I hope that your oncoming April will be a great month – with a nice spring coming on for us on the Northern Hemisphere! If you can make it to any, or both of the coming concerts: A warm Welcome!
Once again, the eminent Immanuel Big Band is doing me the honour of performing my music in not one, but two events coming up this spring. The first is on Saturday the 20:th of April, when they will perform five compositions of mine at a short concert as a part of the Stockholm-wide event “Kulturnatten”, while the second will be the concert “Standard Story” in May but where the date is not set with hundred percent certainty. On both occasions, the fantastic vocalist Viktoria Glans will give voice and soul to the lyrics. More information about these two events will subsequently be posted closer to the dates.
Furthermore, on April 27:th at 16:00 I will have the great honour of conducting the wind orchestra EMP Orkester in their 70:th anniversary celebration concert at Teater Reflexen in Kärrtorp. They will perform a two set concert, and there will be some celebratory mingling and socializing both before, during and after. For more information and tickets: Kulturbiljetter.
Other than this, composing continues and work on a male and female vocal duet, titled “Ghost In the Rain”, is coming to completion and the chart will – of course – be published here when finished and edited.
I wish all of you visiting here a really nice and fine February and that you have warmth, company and comfort, in this on the northern hemisphere usually coldest month of the year.
