The Scoring Samurai is a blog about what it actually takes to do serious orchestral work at a professional level—not just the craft, but the whole ecosystem. The tools that remove friction. The habits that protect the hours. The philosophy that keeps you at the desk when nothing is urgent and everything feels far away. Written by a working orchestrator for anyone who takes the work seriously.
Project Management 104
So far in this series, I’ve covered my to-do system and how I manage project notes. The third core element in my setup is what I call the production sheet — a spreadsheet that tracks all the moving parts of a project, from instrumentation and approvals to version numbers and delivery status.
I use Google Sheets for this. It’s shareable, works on any device, and gives me the flexibility I need without overcomplicating things. You can, of course, use Excel or Numbers if you prefer.
What’s Your Territory?
There’s a quiet joy in having a room where things are just mine.
Not mine to own, but mine to work in.
In The War of Art, Steven Pressfield calls this your territory – a place you return to, not for applause, not for permission, but for sustenance. Arnold Schwarzenegger had the gym. A painter has the studio. A runner has the trail. A monk has the mat.
I have the score.
Trust The Player (and Outsmart the Playback Engine)
Over the past few weeks, I’ve been spending some of my downtime following Michael Barry’s YouTube series Inside the Composer’s Mind. If you haven’t seen it, it’s a goldmine. Analytical without being dry. Practical without being prescriptive. Highly recommended.
In an episode on Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No. 3, he points out something small but telling: the snare drum has a crescendo to f—but no explicit starting dynamic.
That tiny omission is not an omission at all. It’s intent.
Project Management 102
If you’re working on a creative project—whether it’s an orchestration, a concert arrangement, or a full score prep job—your instinct might be to just sit down and start writing music. And sure, the music is the core. But over time, I’ve learned that if I don’t manage the before, during, and after of a project properly, I pay for it later.
So let’s talk about the humble to-do list—and why it matters more than you think.
Espresso, Orchestration, and the Discipline of Small Things
There’s a saying I keep coming back to: The way you do anything is the way you do everything.
At first, it sounds like motivational fluff. But over the years, it has quietly become one of the most practical ideas in my life. Not a rule, not a pressure – just a lens. A way to see the connection between the small and the large. The trivial and the meaningful.
This post is about how I’ve come to believe in that connection – through shirts, espresso, phrasing, and a few burnt collars.
Year’s End Reset
December is noisy: deadlines, shopping, family logistics. But once the concerts are played and the cookies are eaten, there’s a pocket of silence. Everyone has their out-of-office set until the first Monday of January anyway, so the world slows down. Those quiet days are my favorite time for a “Year’s End Reset.” It’s not a reinvention. It’s more like defragmenting a computer—clearing the buffer so future projects run smoothly.