Percussion notation in piano sheets?

[Gamma-Ray]

Hello everyone,

what is this site's policy on including drum/percussion notation in piano sheets? Should percussion parts be left out completely, or included in full length? If so, is that even possible in Notepad/MuseScore (as I have not yet come across a way to do it)?
The track in question is Star City from Diddy Kong Racing, which has 2 bars of percussion intro and 4 bars at the end of the loop.
It guess that could be handled by writing "percussion break", as it was done in the sheet for Fossil Canyon from the same series. Though i'd think it would make sense to at least point out the length of the percussion part.

Thanks in advance for any feedback.

[Dekkadeci]

No clue what the official policy is. It's possible that we don't have an official policy and allow arrangers to choose many paths between them.

In the NinSheetMusic version of the Star Wolf theme, there are rests instead of unpitched percussion breaks.

Zeila tries notating unpitched percussion as knocking on the piano in her unsubmitted version of Meta Knight 's theme from Kirby's Epic Yarn. I'm trying to pull off something similar for The Defender from Shovel Knight (this transcription is very incomplete so far). Heck, I think that the NinSheetMusic version of the Attack of the Koopa Bros. theme from Paper Mario also has knocking on the piano.

Most of the time, though, I assign pitched notes to unpitched percussion. I have examples of this in the left hand parts of Archetype from Castle Crashers (in submission) and Galacta Knight's theme from Kirby's Return to Dream Land (unsubmitted). I think NinSheetMusic recommends assigning tonic and dominant notes to unpitched percussion for those who choose this path; I believe that the occasional exception is acceptable.

Sometimes, I'll actually express unpitched percussion accompaniment by chopping up the melody or other accompaniment into more notes accordingly.

(All unsubmitted works can be found in our Personal Arrangement threads.)

[mikey]

Percussion is usually pitched I'd recommend continuing that

[Latios212]

Percussion notation is generally fine, so long as a pianist can play it. It often helps to include how you intend it to be played.

Besides tapping and stuff along while playing music, it's cool to fill in percussive breaks. Example: Title Theme from Super Mario 64

There are also a bunch of DK sheets I can think of.

[JDMEK5]

The only big rules for percussion in my books are:

1) It has to be possible at the piano with no extra equipment or personnel.
2) It has to be clearly notated.
3) It has to be neatly and concisely formatted. Make sure it looks nice.

All other things are more dependent on the particular instance.

[Sebastian]

The only big rules for percussion in my books are:

1) It has to be possible at the piano with no extra equipment or personnel.
2) It has to be clearly notated.
3) It has to be neatly and concisely formatted. Make sure it looks nice.

All other things are more dependent on the particular instance.

I totally agree. There are some instances where you can use extra equipment (within reason of course).
Examples:
http://www.ninsheetmusic.org/download/pdf/2639
http://www.ninsheetmusic.org/download/pdf/2939

[JDMEK5]

^Those are actually really creative. I'm impressed.

[Sebastian]

I was looking for one I did with an egg shaker thing, but I couldn't find it.

[cashwarrior1]

Then we have Bespinben asking us to find a nearby hollow chunk of wood while sight-reading.

[Tobbeh99]

There isn't any "rule" or "policy" about it, it comes down to how the arranger want's the arrangement to be done. There are several cases where I'd notated percussion, I like to use 4ths, 5ths and octaves for it, because of how consonant they sound. 

Here's an example by me, in measure 4 I notated the drum notes: http://www.ninsheetmusic.org/download/pdf/2857

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZzZ6RLnOf4&index=49

[InsigTurtle]

Do remember that most people only have 1 head, 2 hands, and 2 feet. I wouldn't recommend writing out a percussion part where you need to slam your head into the piano, though. Some people might have qualms about that.

[JDMEK5]

^I played one custom arrangement for my piano final last year in uni where I used both hands and my nose to get a complete chord sound.