Sounds like Reason 4 might be what you are looking for. It has some of the best sythesizers available. It has an awesome drum machine. It has epic samplers with very impressive super-sampled instruments. Also, it has effects, mixers, arpeggiators, step sequencers, and loop players. You can import midi to a track easily. There is a great mastering suite. Any time signature is available. All note lengths, great quantizing options. There are a ton of ‘refills’ to find online, pretty much infinite capabilities. The program does not record audio. If I was going to put a guitar into a song, I would record it in Audacity, then load it into a sampler in Reason or find a good NNXT guitar sample and record it in midi. Here are a couple songs I’ve made recently, all with Reason 4.

Sony soundforge very expensive but used by pro recording studios.

I like PowerTab, but I’m not sure if it’d be good for multiple tracks and instruments… I’ve used GarageBand on Macs before, and it’s great, and beyond easy to use.

Well, I don’t know how reliable they are, because I can’t say I’m using them. I’ve just installed them to see what they do, but, since they are free, you can try them out. The first one is called PianoRollComposer. You can read more about it and download it from here:

Another one (and probably a better one) is Easy Music Composer Free. Read more about it and download it from here:

Might not be the specific ones you are looking for but… You can find plenty of sheet music for download at these websites. They have over 1000+ of them. Good luck!

You’re normal, and quit worrying about it. Bodyfat % needs to be computed by an expert. The devices are not that accurate for some people.

NEVER think of getting a mac they suck at gaming very hard!

get a gaming pc @

ibuypower.com

they have very powerful pcs that can hold up to 128 GBs of RAM and very fast processors!!

or build your own, if you can, wait for the core i5, core i3, or the core i9(6 cores and 12 threads!!)!! they are released next year!

In the “just over a thousand dollars” range, you could get yourself a wicked Windows laptop, or a nice Mac laptop. Macs are nicer, but yeah, for under $1500, you’re not going to get a wicked Mac, unfortunately.

I prefer windows computers though – over the last decade, the Mac/Windows musical playing field has leveled out to the point where PC versions are usually better-maintained than mac versions. And unless you depend on software piracy to find programs, you’ll have no trouble finding mac apps.

Macs have nicer built-in soundcards, too, but since you’ll be likely getting an outboard sound device, that shouldn’t be a deciding factor. I’ve done production on Windows computers and Macs for years and the only noticeable differences I’ve noticed are that Macs have nicer soundcards but crash more. But now that OS X is getting more stable and Windows is going from bad (XP) to worse (Vista), the stability situation is levelling out a bit.

If you get a Windows laptop, make sure to get it with XP and NOT Vista. That’s just general advice – Vista’s not good for any kind of production environment, it’s still too unstable as of this writing.

At least a gig of memory and processor hz, and a couple for hard drive space. Preferably more. As much memory as you can afford, really.

You want a good sound card, one capable of 24-bit recording and playback. M-audio is good.

Saul

In the main, you would be wiser to write a new piece on each occasion, specifically shaped to meet the brief of each specific competition. It can of course be that you have an existing piece that happens to slot neatly into the parameters set by a specific competition, but that should be classed as a fluke.

As to competition briefs with no time limit, these are few & far between, for obvious reasons, as each jury member — having sat on many panels and chairing one now myself — can simply not be asked to have to audition and scrutinise 60-100 entries of, say, 30-50mins each in the elimination rounds and still retain a shred of comparative sanity in the outcome.

Composition competitions set strict briefs — they have to, not to flounder miserably in apples being compared with motorbikes, never mind pears — and any scores submitted that fail to meet the criteria of such briefs effectively eliminate themselves at the outset. It’s practically impossible to ‘make allowances’, for obvious reasons.

Take a look at the returns of this simple google query (and don’t just read three relevant ones from the first page alone!) and see what you come across that may meet your requirements and the standard of work you are currently able to deliver.

All the best, and good luck!