EN | UA
ARSEN YAKOVENKO
Precision reveals sense
fine music engraving | editorial & publishing preparation | piano reductions | notation workflow
Twenty years of putting music on the page. I work in Dorico and Sibelius, on anything from a single line to a full orchestral score, and set up notation workflows for publishers and musicians.
WHAT I DO
ENGRAVING
Full scores, vocal scores, and orchestral parts, ready to print. Sources in any condition: an autograph manuscript, a composer's own file, a scan of an old edition. Parts with page turns that fall where a player can take them and cues that arrive in time to be useful, to MOLA conventions. Where a house style exists, the material comes back in it.
Full scores, vocal scores, and orchestral parts, ready to print. Sources in any condition: an autograph manuscript, a composer's own file, a scan of an old edition. Parts with page turns that fall where a player can take them and cues that arrive in time to be useful, to MOLA conventions. Where a house style exists, the material comes back in it.
Proofreading that reaches the errors already in the source, not only those that arise along the way. What I find is either put to you or settled on my own authority — whichever the project calls for. Prelims, contents, prefaces and editorial notes. Full score, vocal score, and parts come from one file, each cast off for its own format; so a correction made once reaches every place it belongs.
Written by a pianist who plays them. Comfortable, idiomatic, ready to perform. Density follows the purpose, not the size of the orchestra — from a spare rehearsal reduction to a two-piano arrangement that holds the whole score intact.
NOTATION WORKFLOW
I turn a publisher's notation specifications into working settings and templates — a standard that outlives the project and survives a change of personnel. Migration from Finale, and cleanup of MusicXML imports. Where a publisher's project has passed through several engravers, the final consistency pass that makes it read as one.
Written by a pianist who plays them. Comfortable, idiomatic, ready to perform. Density follows the purpose, not the size of the orchestra — from a spare rehearsal reduction to a two-piano arrangement that holds the whole score intact.
NOTATION WORKFLOW
I turn a publisher's notation specifications into working settings and templates — a standard that outlives the project and survives a change of personnel. Migration from Finale, and cleanup of MusicXML imports. Where a publisher's project has passed through several engravers, the final consistency pass that makes it read as one.
READING FROM THE INSIDE
My engraving practice grows from three roots: a pianist's complete education; a composer's training, formed over ten years of study with Alla Zagaykevych; and a full working life in music, from the concert stage through teaching to the opera house.
Add fluent sight-reading, strong inner hearing, and perfect pitch, and a score reads the way it was conceived. Errors surface while I am still reading, not when the layout has already settled.
Add fluent sight-reading, strong inner hearing, and perfect pitch, and a score reads the way it was conceived. Errors surface while I am still reading, not when the layout has already settled.
SELECTED CLIENTS & PROJECTS
ONGOING COLLABORATIONS
Notengrafik Berlin — music engraving studio, Germany.
Full scores and orchestral parts: note entry, layout, and final editing, to the studio's documented standards.
Nicolai Pfeffer — clarinetist, Germany. His own editorial work includes several clarinet concertos for G. Henle Verlag.
Piano reductions of works for clarinet and orchestra and of orchestral clarinet excerpts; editing and proofreading of his own reductions and arrangements.
Lviv Organ Hall
2025 | Mykhailo Verykivskyi — Piano Concerto. New engraving of a modern orchestration, with correction of errors in the source.
First performing editions — full score and orchestral parts, engraved from the composers' autograph manuscripts:
2024 | Mykola Dremliuha — Symphony No. 4 “Life”
2023 | Mykola Dremliuha — Piano Concerto
2019 | Pavlo Senytsia — Symphony “De-ne-de topoli” (Poplars Here and There)
EDITIONS & LARGE-SCALE COLLECTIONS
2025 | Chants of the All-Night Vigil — complete preparation of a large collection of Ukrainian liturgical music. Part of an ongoing collaboration with Oleksandr Tarasenko, Chairman of the Mykola Leontovych All-Ukrainian Choral Society.
2018 | Ukrainian Piano Music of the 20th–21st Centuries — three-volume anthology, Muzychna Ukraina, Kyiv. Contributing engraver.
Notengrafik Berlin — music engraving studio, Germany.
Full scores and orchestral parts: note entry, layout, and final editing, to the studio's documented standards.
Nicolai Pfeffer — clarinetist, Germany. His own editorial work includes several clarinet concertos for G. Henle Verlag.
Piano reductions of works for clarinet and orchestra and of orchestral clarinet excerpts; editing and proofreading of his own reductions and arrangements.
Lviv Organ Hall
2025 | Mykhailo Verykivskyi — Piano Concerto. New engraving of a modern orchestration, with correction of errors in the source.
First performing editions — full score and orchestral parts, engraved from the composers' autograph manuscripts:
2024 | Mykola Dremliuha — Symphony No. 4 “Life”
2023 | Mykola Dremliuha — Piano Concerto
2019 | Pavlo Senytsia — Symphony “De-ne-de topoli” (Poplars Here and There)
EDITIONS & LARGE-SCALE COLLECTIONS
2025 | Chants of the All-Night Vigil — complete preparation of a large collection of Ukrainian liturgical music. Part of an ongoing collaboration with Oleksandr Tarasenko, Chairman of the Mykola Leontovych All-Ukrainian Choral Society.
2018 | Ukrainian Piano Music of the 20th–21st Centuries — three-volume anthology, Muzychna Ukraina, Kyiv. Contributing engraver.
SAMPLES
Symphonic scores and parts, vocal scores and piano reductions, chamber and solo: six works, several pages from each, with a short overview of the projects at the front.
→ View samples (PDF, 23 pp.)
A selection. Complete scores on request — from these projects, from other work, or matched to a particular repertoire or brief. Dorico and Sibelius project files are equally available where a fuller view of the working method is useful.
→ View samples (PDF, 23 pp.)
A selection. Complete scores on request — from these projects, from other work, or matched to a particular repertoire or brief. Dorico and Sibelius project files are equally available where a fuller view of the working method is useful.
HOW I WORK
Working together. Your guidelines are followed exactly. Where I see a reason to depart from them, I raise it rather than decide it. Work moves in agreed stages, so the material is visible as it develops and nothing arrives as a surprise.
Deadlines. Fast note entry and settled routines let me hold to concert and publishing dates, tight turnarounds included, without trading away accuracy.
Files. Clean and fully editable — logical structure, no stray objects. Whoever opens the file in five years can work in it.
Tools. Dorico Pro, Sibelius Ultimate, licensed. MIDI keyboard for high-speed entry.
Languages. Ukrainian — native. English for correspondence and project documentation. Working command of vocal texts and musical terminology in English, Italian, German, French, and Latin.
Working conditions. An autonomous workspace with independent power and internet. The war has not interrupted my work, and it has not moved a deadline.
His editorial advice was never based solely on technical or source accuracy but was always informed by a deep musical understanding and a refined sense of style. His comments and suggestions were consistently insightful, well reasoned, and of significant value to the quality of the final publications.
Nicolai Pfeffer | Clarinetist
Substitute Professor, Zurich University of the Arts
Lecturer, University of Music Franz Liszt Weimar
Substitute Professor, Zurich University of the Arts
Lecturer, University of Music Franz Liszt Weimar
CONTACT
Available for ongoing collaboration and for individual projects.
mail@arsenyakovenko.com
+380 67 774 72 06 (WhatsApp)
LinkedIn
+380 67 774 72 06 (WhatsApp)
Kyiv, Ukraine | Working remotely
Registered sole proprietor, eligible for international invoicing.
The working day can shift to overlap with North American hours where a project needs it.
The working day can shift to overlap with North American hours where a project needs it.
Photo: Viktor Sachok (Kyiv)