What is Reddit's opinion of
MuseScore?
From 3.5 billion Reddit comments
➔ MuseScore website
By popularity on Reddit, this Service is:
100 reviews of this app found across Reddit:
No he means 4/4 but for each beat (quarter-note), you will see eighth notes written like this. That means instead of playing straight eighth notes (split equally 2 to a beat), you are still playing 2 to a beat but holding the first one longer.
in case you're curious, the same designer who's now helping with Audacity's design previously made the designs for the upcoming Musescore 4, and prior to that most of Paint 3D and parts of Powerpoint and Ubuntu Mobile.
not only is it free, it's also Free and anyone can contribute to the project. Find a bug? No need to wait 15 years for Avid to not fix it (looking at you, system-break-spanning ties), with some programming chops you can fix it yourself! Even without programming abilities you can report bugs and follow them on a public, transparent, and community-managed issue tracker.
Musescore actually has a wide variety of instruments. When you create a new score, you'll want to change the drop-down menu from "Common instruments" to "All instruments". You can also download another soundfont and replace the default one if you feel the default is not realistic enough. Soundfonts explained on Musescore website
If you really dislike Musescore, you can try Noteflight or Lilypond, which are free. I haven't used them though, so I can't really tell you how good they are.
Edit: typo
Ninsheetmusic has a good amount of sheet music, but not every track, in piano.
If you play something else, Musescore has sheet music arrangements in piano and other instruments made by fans if you search for Professor Layton.
Hope this helps :)
Possibly. Well, yes.
Simply put, the top number is how many beats are in a measure. In 4/4 there are four beats in a measure, in 3/4 there are three, and so on.
The bottom number is what KIND of beat that is. 3/4 means there are three quarter notes in a measure, 3/8 means there are three eighth notes in a measure, and so on. They say "the quarter note gets the beat" which is an odd-sounding way of saying put a 1 over the bottom note and it's THAT type of note that has the value of one beat.
99.99% of the time, we simply scale meters to conform to ~~even values~~ powers of two. There are some interesting discussions out there, but for all practical purposes, any third or sixth note (or anything that's a multiple of three) can be represented in a standard time signature. Odd ones like 4/3 and 8/6 are described as "irrational time signatures."
Wiki:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_signature#Irrational_meters
Interesting discussions:
https://musescore.org/en/node/11660
http://www.ibreathemusic.com/forums/showthread.php?13409-4-3-Time-Signature
Edit: Changed even values to powers of two (thanks Spire!)
You should consider Musescore. Not the most advanced or intuitive (but no notation software is intuitive) but it's free and development is backed up by a very dedicated dev team and contributors.
musescore is open source and linux native. There is an official AppImage available or your distro may have it in their repositories. https://musescore.org/en/download
A text based option is lilypond, which has GUI editors like frescobaldi or denemo:
https://lilypond.org/easier-editing.en.html
Ok, so, assuming the version of Musescore you're using is the latest available from their website, I took the liberty of scanning every dll file it installs and the exe with Virustotal and it comes back 100% clean on all of them.
There are a few possibilities here, but primarily I would say that you might have misconstrued his ability to immediately 'fix' the problem with the fact that first it must be determined that:
There is a problem.
They're allowed to fix the problem.
That the antivirus, in fact, is the root cause, and if not the root cause has been identified. I am going to go out on a limb and say that virus definitions are not at fault here for it being blocked.
That despite what you might believe, maybe there is something wrong with the current version of Musescore and before it is white listed it needs to be vetted by the admin team first.
In IT no promises are made unless the thing promised already exists. I don't know is a much better answer than "sure" followed by "Whoops, nevermind" a day later.
The obvious answer is - musescore. It's free, it does guitar tab, and you can copy tab to notation. And the notation looks a lot better than GuitarPro (IMO).
You will need to understand about timing - how to choose a time signature, note values (durations) and so on - but there are plenty of sites to learn that, and I also recommend looking at sheet music for songs you already know, to see how they show rhythms.
go onto the rest in between. in the palettes, there should be a category called “beam properties” or something like it. select it and choose the option that has the two notes beamed together.
Sibelius and Finale are the two "professional" programs that people use, but I'd encourage you to check out MuseScore. It's free and does all the stuff you'll likely need to do.
Hey just in case you ever need to hear how it sounds, you can download a free program called musescore (musescore.org) and you can enter the music into it note by note and it will give you an idea of what it should sound like .
The chords are F#m9-B13, followed by Em9-A13, but you're right it's implying two different keys alternately - first E major, then D major. So there's four key signature options as I see it:
1. E major with accidentals for the D major bars;
2. D major with accidentals for the E major bars;
3. Blank key sig with accidentals all over;
4. Take the average: A major, with fewer accidentals, evenly distributed.
Personally I don't know which would be easiest to read. I think my preference would be for D major, because it feels like that's where it might end up resolving, if it ever did.
As for the rhythm, it seems to be swing overall - not just in the drums - although each instrument is interpreting the swing value differently (or it's been set at random on a DAW or whatever).
If you thinking of this as 2 bars per chord (in fast 4/4 or slow 2/2?) then the drums have a quarter-note triplet pattern at one point. Otherwise the swing 8ths don't seem quite at triplet strength.
In jazz, swing is not normally notated at all - i.e. 8ths are written as normal, maybe with "swing" written above. Only anything that is clearly in regular triplets would be written as such.
There is a metric modulation sign sometimes used in rock, but that indicates (literally) a triplet shuffle rhythm, not really swing. Swing itself is in the region between straight and triplet feel - nearer straight at fast tempos, nearer triplets at slow tempos.
Sorry this isn't much help!
I found about this today, but I haven't tried it yet. It is free and multi platform, so perhaps give it a try: https://musescore.org/
For really simple stuff I still use a copy of finale notepad 2007 (last free version).
To my knowledge, the heavy weights are still finale and sibellius, but I find them overkill for my needs.
I don't know if it'll be sufficient to replace what you're using now, but for music notation, you might want to have a look at Rosegarden, Lillypond or Musescore. All of those are available in the Ubuntu repos.
Ich hab Guitar Pro auch noch in Version 6, hatte mir das zugelegt, als ich Gitarre gespielt hab. Mich hat nur gestört, dass ein paar Kleinigkeiten noch so optimal sind, wenn ich auf andere Instrumente gehe - man merkt halt, dass der Fokus auf Gitarre liegt. Eine gute Alternative für Noten allgemein ist Musescore (kostenlos, Open Source)
This post includes an estimated timeline, which puts the stable release of Musescore 4 at 15 December.
It sounds like a massive task, it could easily be pushed back. Wait and see, I guess.
There are a few links to alternative soundfonts at the bottom of the page including a few piano-specific ones. There's also detailed installation instructions. Hope this helps!
So I just did this for the first time, and while it's a couple of hoops to jump through, it was pretty easy.
A) There's a couple of links I found quickly An FAQ section with some free and safe links Plus the downloadable files list included in Musescores resources
I downloaded and installed the Salamander one used for piano sounds since that would be simple.
B&C) the second link I provided has instructions. If you download the Salamander soundfont, just extract the sf2 file, double click said file and if asked what app to open it with, find the version of Musescore to open it.
Musescore will prompt you from there to install it, BUT you also have to do a coupel of extra steps: open your synthesizer (View -> Synthesizer) and click "Add", you should see the new sf2 listed there. After adding, close that dialog and open your Mixer (you should have a piece open that will use the new soundfont), Under the "Patch" option, you can choose which sound is used for the instrument. You'll have to choose the new soundfont here.
That's it. There's a listing for orchestra sounds provided in the second link. It might take a little more time on the Mixer step, as you'll need to choose a new Patch for each instrument. I hope this helps!
I can definitely understand your point and I do agree that the opportunity may not be a good fit for everyone. It may, however, be a better fit for someone that requires such an internship as part of their studies, and we are able to support and fulfill such requirements for academic credit.
I am not sure if you are familiar with MuseScore, but it is a free open source music notation application paired with an online community. MuseScore, like many open source projects, is built for the community, by the community.
As a free community-driven open source product, even many aspects of software development, documentation, support, etc. are volunteer efforts of the community.
There are, however, some internship opportunities that are paid, but these are done exclusively in cooperation with supporting partners, for example, with Google Summer of Code - https://musescore.org/en/developers-handbook/google-summer-code
Regarding specifically our new efforts in marching percussion, our aim is to create the best solution in the market for marching percussion notation and make available absolutely free everyone. This opportunity is appropriate for those interested to participate in and support this community effort and goal.
How did anyone think this was a good idea?
I did actually. I wrote the MuseScore and the MuseScore Songbook app. I'm also one of the main developer of the free and open source music notation software https://musescore.org
I read this article https://www.nngroup.com/articles/stop-password-masking/ long time ago. I still agree with a large part of this article.
Of course, the password is not transmitted or stored as plaintext! And, if one can see your password in a glance, you probably need a stronger password ;)
Musescore isn't designed for playback, so you'd probably have to mess around with the synthesizer in ways I'm not familiar with. This should hopefully be a lot more fleshed out in musescore 4 though.
The easiest way to get a nice sounding orchestral sound would be to use a DAW and get some free plugins. DSK Overture and VSCO2 orchestra have decent strings (both are free), and Spitfire has their LABS Strings (free, but with weird panning) and BBCSO Discover (free, but you have to fill out a survey and wait 2 weeks, or pay $50). If you don't have a DAW, you can follow this tutorial to make these free libraries into a soundfont you can use in musescore: https://musescore.org/en/node/293510
According to the release timeline, version 3.3 is currently scheduled to be released on October 7 or 8.
In the meantime, you can download a release candidate.
Tu peux trouver des tonnes de partitions au format pdf ou midi sur la communauté Musescore. La majorité sont pour le piano, mais il y en a spécifiquement pour violon ou des arrangement complets qui incluent le violon (j'ai vu Elephant Gun de Beirut, par ex.).
Et si tu sais lire la musique, tu peux toujours plus ou moins transposer du piano vers n'importe quel instrument et éditer une tablature. Tu peux faire ca sous le logiciel Musescore.
*Ce commentaire n'est pas sponsorisé
If you can read sheet music, you can also try musescore, which is free and comes with a range of different instruments, including electronic ones. Some of the sound fonts aren't great, but luckily it's easy to install new ones (some of which also happen to be free).
Try MuseScore. They've been free/open source for years. I used to use it when I was stuck on Linux and I didn't think it was very good six years ago but it's improved a lot since then. Your Linux distro probably already has a package for it.
I typically use MuseScore, which is free and I've found easy to use with a fair number of features. It also has a moderately active community on the website where you can browse scores and share your own.
Download MuseScore (or any free music notating app) put the rhythms in a template and then you can have it play them back to you and it will follow the notes as it plays. Very helpful tool.
I don't use MuseScore but I thought I would fire it up and see about your points.
> Musescore doesn't have shortcut keys so entering music is much slower than Sibelius.
It looks like it has a shortcut key available for just about every function it has. Some you have to assign but plenty are already built in.
> There are many things you can't copy and paste, like pedal lines, and entire sections with all lyrics and barlines and tempo markings.
You can copy and paste pedal lines and lyrics and lots of other things. I'm not sure about barlines and tempo markings are not supported yet. The vast majority of elements can by copy and pasted, however.
> Its panoramic/continuous view (as opposed to page view) freezes in large scores.
I have no way to check that.
> You will never have decent sounding playback in a way you could with NotePeformer in one of the other programs.
Here is what the Musescore devs say:
>> Probably the most exciting part of our plans include a new audio engine as well as VST support. We plan to implement integration with Steinberg's VSTi SDK, while making sure that our system will integrate with NotePerformer. To that end, we are in constant communication with the engineers from the NotePerformer team to ensure that the integration goes smoothly.
So I would say that you are half-wrong to mostly wrong.
What, you can't do a 19 fret strecth!? 😜
There's some handy keyboard shortcuts that do what you want.
You play the left hand part an octave higher until the end of the dashes.
There is also one that makes you play it an octave lower. You can read and see the symbols here.
I'm not sure if I understand the question correctly.
Are you asking about how to create the pickup measure / upbeat? It's explained here:
https://musescore.org/en/handbook/3/measure-operations#duration
TL;DR: Right-click an empty part of the measure and select Measure Properties
While the nominal measure duration is 3/4, the actual measure duration can be set to 1/4.
That's called "cross-staff beaming" and is frequently used in piano music. Noteflight doesn't support this but MuseScore does. See here for documentation.
You can create a blank score with your instruments of choice and save them in the templates folder for later use. It should appear in the start center like the other templates.
Maybe a keyboard and some piano lessons for kids?
My son is 10 and he's only just getting used to basic features on Ableton. He grew up around me producing, but I didn't force anything on him. He plays guitar and violin at school. I think getting a child to play an instrument is a much better idea because later on those skills can be applied to producing in a DAW. It's also a good age to develop creativity.
As your kid grows you can introduce to scoring software for kids which I think might be easier for early composition and It'll become a very useful skill to read/study and write music notation. MuseScore is free :)
Another thing that might be interesting is Melodics. If you have a drum controller like an MPD, or Maschine, your kid can tap along to the beats, or melodies (requires midi keyboard). I'm not sure if 5 is young for this but my 10 year old loves it.
I'm not sure if you're a musician yourself. If you are make some music together. Don't focus on the technical aspects on it - that'll bore a child to death. Focus on the playing around on the instruments.
My 2 cents. Hope that helps.
You could maybe use MuseScore. They have a way to upload scores online with embedded playback.
https://musescore.org/en/handbook/share-scores-online
The other online (only) notation site I know is noteflight.com, but I think there's a small limit to the number of scores you can start on the free version.
> Music
I'd like to add on top of this.
Musescore is a brilliant notating software, that's 100% free and open source. If you're a more "traditional" musician (like myself), Musescore is my go-to.
Cockos REAPER is a great DAW worth looking into, as it is professional quality, but is free (evaluation version). There are a bunch of plugins that can be found online. I'm just getting into it myself, but there are many possibilities with it.
Nested tuplets is the term you'll want to google. They're written exactly as you'd expect.
I sincerely urge you not to buy Finale or Sibelius (they are ridiculously overpriced), use the free software MuseScore instead!
I have been using Sibelius for the last seven years or so, it's OK and gets the job done. MuseScore however is both free and has a much more intuitive interface, runs lighter and has better playback. I found out about it about a month ago and since then I've written arrangements ranging from marching band to piano solo without any trouble whatsoever -- I'm never going back!
If you want to spend money on notation software, Sibelius is vastly better than Finale, but I recommend using money on a DAW instead (as I see people are suggesting under) and use the free notation software available.
Oh yeah, I forgot!
I've only ever used the Musescore software rather than anything online. In fact, it has a lot to do with me that Musescore-only links (those to Musescore.com) on this sub are now banned.
Anyway, original OP, here's the software, the site you'll need:
And here's Musescore the website/social network/sharing site/etc. (whatever it's supposed to be):
That first single beat is an anacrusis, which is part of the initial score set up, or at any point afterwards as per that link.
The ‘having the flute part by itself because nothing else is playing’ is the Hide Blank Stave I initially linked to and I what I thought you were asking about
By addons, you might be talking about plugins or extensions. A lot of different plugins exist but they're mostly simple utilities. Extensions on the other hand can add new instruments and sounds, yes. MS Drumline does this mainly for marching percussion and the HQ soundfont adds in better quality sounds for some instruments.
But if you only wanna change sounds, you can just look online for soundfont files and add them into the synthesiser without needing to install anything else.
Video goes into the history of Audacity, with a large number of interviews with maintainers.
Key takeaways: flagging up some UX issues, maintainer desires and lesser-known features.
Tantacrul is the Product Manager (and formerly(?) Head of Design) for MuseScore, open source music composition software.
Here's a previous video of his UX/UI improvements for MuseScore can be found: https://www.youtube.com/c/musescore/videos
During the improv sections, the trumpet, trombone, and guitar are certainly swinging (or not swinging) however and whenever they want, because they can.
The rhythm section - the banjo, steel guitar, and drums - are not swinging. You can check this by tapping your foot to the constant beat and noticing that every banjo strum/drum hit lands at the same time as your foot - that's straight time quarter notes aka "four on the floor," with no swinging eighth notes nor triplets. At no time are they emphasizing or favoring the "back end" of the beat, a la dotted-eighth + sixteenth or quarter + eighth triplet rhythm.
Mind you, I don't really care if it's of the Swing genre or not; I'm no gatekeeper. But OP's original observation was that the backing rhythm is not swung is correct. I'd be happy to lindy to it all the same.
New marching percussion soundfont and improvements to percussion notation/playback are coming in MuseScore 2.3. Should be out before summer. More info - https://musescore.org/en/node/271033
If you felt comfortable with Logic, then that's the thing to go for you. Any other advice would probably be counter productive. You liked the workflow, you felt comfortable using a Mac, so go for it.
If you want to write for orchestra, you should also get this to scribble down notations (it's free and great and there are alot of mods/plugins for it): https://musescore.org/en
This is an extremely broad topic of discussion, and a lot of it is extremely subjective. However, this is an example of what the notation looks like when the composer wants pedal in a specific spot. This notation almost always refers to the damper pedal, or the right pedal on an acoustic piano.
In this case, the point when you initially put down the pedal is notated by the Ped. The upwards pointing breaks in the line indicate a pedal change; allow the pedal to come all the way to the top so that the sound no longer resonates, and then push it back down again. The end of the bracket indicates that you should lift the pedal.
How important the pedal is depends a lot on what kind of music you're playing: in Baroque music, many people will argue that it should not be used at all, whereas Classical and Romantic composers made much heavier use of it. Anything past that and you're hurting yourself by not using a pedal.
If you're just playing arrangements of video game music or pop songs, pedaling will certainly help, but it's almost entirely up to you where you use it, since most of those songs will be arrangements, and thus won't have the specific pedal markings.
It will also output as MusicXML, if I remember correctly. That will let you import it into a truly free program like MuseScore, which won't have any restrictions on what you can do.
Wha? GP7 never has a light mode.
However, white score on a dark background would strain my eyes, I imagine.
I would maybe do a line break mid-measure, it's a common practice in filled passages anyhow and this looks like a good situation to apply it as well... You could look into this: https://musescore.org/en/node/209381
Musescore. The app is free and awesome. But pay the token cost to join, because the library of scores is worth it, and it's a non-profit, so much of the money goes to the artists.
That's not the dialog - it indeed only specifies the font characteristics. instead. Also, it seems you might be using an extremely obsolete version, for the past several years the style dialog is Format / Style. So first update, then go to Format / Style / Chord Symbols, and there is where you'll see the options for appearance etc.
Stacked extensions are not currently supported, but work to implement this is underway "as we speak" for MuseScore 4. If you do a search of the official Supprot forum on musescore.org, you'll also find some custom chord description XML files that can be installed to give stacked extensions already in MuseScore 3.
Debian and maybe other distributions have a basic alsa configuration that you do not need to care if you use pipewire. Read pipewire wiki: https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/pipewire/pipewire/-/wikis/Config-PipeWire
Use Rosegarden with fluidsynth-dssi and zynaddsubfx-dssi. Download soundfont for fluidsynth here: https://musescore.org/en/node/94941
It looks to me that the top voice is | rest 2 3 4 | and the bottom voice is | 1-2-3 rest | (so basically there should be another rest on beat 4 in voice two.).
To write this in musescore, you’d use the voice feature and put the dotted half in voice one and the quarter note line in voice two (you could do it the other way around, no difference).
I wasn't aware that one could upload custom audio with a score to the site. Hopefully someone will know what settings are ideal.
https://musescore.org/en/handbook/3/share-scores-online
> 6. If you are using a different SoundFont than the default one and if you are able to export MP3 files (may not be the case on some Linux versions), a checkbox Upload score audio will be visible:
> If the checkbox is checked, MuseScore will render the audio of the score using the current synthesizer settings and upload the audio to MuseScore.com.
You can definitely transpose from the desktop. That might be my most commonly accessed feature. You select the notes you want to transpose, either all of them or a subset of them, and then follow the directions on this page.
https://musescore.org/en/handbook/transposition
You do make me wonder if we're talking about the same thing when you say you are logged into the desktop program. Maybe there's a way to do that, but I never actually log in to the desktop software. I just use it.
Weird. I’ve never had that happen to me. If simply restarting the program after saving doesn’t work, musescore has a pretty good forum where you can ask about troubleshooting.
I've finally settled on the language that I'll be using as my first "proper" language. I realized that I was super excited about projects like Musescore and LilyPond, so C++ was a bit of a no brainer for me. I took some Java classes as an undergrad and dabbled in Python, but C++ really keeps me grounded because I know exactly what sorts of projects I want to work on in the future!
Update to MuseScore 3.2.2 - accents are automatically above for battery now. Also, there is a new sticking feature (no more McGyvering lyrics).
New release of MDL coming next week.
Also, you can use pictograms for puffies instead of text. :-)
Nice list, I'd like to add that musescore.org is all community uploaded so you never know what you're gonna get, sometimes you'll find strange scores that are generated automatically and people should not be discouraged that they can't play them.
IMSLP is my go to, it's got tons and tons and tons of free licensed classical music from many different periods.
If I understand you correctly, you might like Musescore3, free notation software for Mac, Windows & Linux systems. You can compose for a number of instruments using standard notation and tabulature. This include ukulele, I believe.
Usually when I transcribe music I'm sitting at a piano or sometimes holding a guitar, and I use musescore which can play back what I've transcribed if I'm not sure if what I wrote in is correct (and it has the added benefit of midi connectivity so I can play in straight from the piano if I'm feeling lazy). I'm originally from a classical background and I did a lot of dictation exams, usually with just a pencil and paper and a starting note or key, so this is definitely possible and I can do it but it's much easier with an instrument and a computer.
Don't underestimate how useful being able to read and transcribe music is, and at the same time don't overestimate how easy reading music is. The reason I include it so early in my method is that while it's not strictly necessary, and you could in theory just skip anything involving writing down or reading music, there will come a point where it's far easier to progress if you have a way to read and write down musical ideas.
The earlier you start learning to read music, the more thankful you'll be in a few months that you learned. I'd consider it one of the key differences between a musician and just a guitarist.
I think they meant getting input from a keyboard, not necessarily the Parts function of musescore (though that is quite handy for arranging for an actual band). There's definitely note input from a MIDI keyboard, with a limited real-time input mode and a "step-time" entry mode. https://musescore.org/en/handbook/note-input#midi-keyboard
It all has to do with what sound each instrument makes. Trumpets usually make a medium-high, piercing sound, flutes usually have an high, airy sound, cellos usually have a medium-low, warm sound, etcetera. So usually, I’ll just think about what kind of sound I want.
Do I want something solemn and remorseful? Low French horns, low strings, and maybe a solo violin or trumpet. Do I want something triumphant? All brass, percussion, and fast high strings.
Arrangements for me are easier than compositions, just because the melody is already there. Melodies for me are the hardest part, because they’re the central part of the piece.
Original music occurs really when I hear a melody and I think of a way that I can change it up when I hear it to improve it.
If you wanna get some good composing software, check out musescore. It’s totally free and relatively simple to use.
From the 3MLE website: "The .DLS using the same sounds as MS2 has been included in the package."
Musescore uses .SF2, so I used Viena soundfont editor to convert maplebeats.dls to .sf2 (for your convenience: https://my.mixtape.moe/lsowrn.sf2), then just change the font with this: https://musescore.org/en/node/50721
(I'm going to assume you understand the basics of sheet music in this, if not, there are plenty of resources out there to help you learn :) )
Glad to see others are interested in this! The software I'd highly recommend to start with is MuseScore - it is a free, open sourced sheet music interface. There are plenty of tutorials on how to use MuseScore online, and I've been using it for about 2 years now and I still haven't hit the top of it. There are other, more professional sheet music interfaces such as Finale, Sibelius, etc., however they are expensive.
Now to actually begin arranging. If you have a piano/keyboard (other instruments work as well, but keyboards are the best since they use concert pitch and have the largest range), you can use your instrument to help match pitches. It's easiest to start with the melodies, since they're the most obvious. I generally find YouTube videos of OSTs - preferably non-extended versions. YouTube videos also have the gear in the corner of them that allow you adjust the speed of the video. If you listen on 0.5x or 0.75x speed, while it sounds much slower, this is how you can dig into the "fine" parts of the soundtrack, such as background parts, percussion, and complex rhythms.
I'm very bad at explaining things, but the best thing I can suggest is to go right into it, and practice helps a lot over time. I listen to the stuff I made two years ago and barely recognize some of it, since you're always improving. Hope this helps.
Aww, thank you! If you want to look up more amazing sheets, check out the MuseScore Database (this is the free sheet music program I use to arrange). There are hundreds of different sheets out there ready to be played.
MuseScore has an entry method that allows you to use a digital keyboard in place of your computer's keyboard. Here's a link to their docs which explain it: https://musescore.org/en/handbook/note-input#midi-keyboard
I know MuseScore is capable of producing microtonal sounds and scores, but the two are not interlinked. To create the sounds, you alter the tuning of individual notes, while the microtonal accidentals do not affect the sound. For this reason, it's likely not the best option, but it is free.
There's argument on this among music theory folks, but, except for certain composers and certain periods, I was taught on both piano and flute that a grace note with a slash through it is played on the beat so swiftly that it barely takes any time ...with exception on the duration, because they should be played within the piece's style,
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/ae/Grace_note.svg/559px-Grace_note.svg.png
while a grace note without a slash through it is played before the beat and should be played in tempo in accordance to its notation relative to the note(s) it embellishes. You'll see some written as quarter notes, some as sixteenths, some as eighths, all without the slash. These are played within the space of the beat preceding (to the left of) the note which follows them. Those with a slash are played at the onset of the beat of the note following to which they are attached, taking time from that beat (to the right).
https://musescore.org/sites/musescore.org/files/issues/1.1%20double%20grace%20notes.png
Here's a short article about them: https://music.stackexchange.com/questions/5936/different-types-of-grace-notes
There ARE exceptions and special handling, depending on the composer and on the Period. I was taught a unique handling for Bach, and Mozart is specifically handled "as written, in tempo", while more contemporary pieces tend to turn the sixteenth flagged graces into either 128th notes or 64th notes, the eighth flagged ones into 64th/32nd notes, and the quarter note ones turned into 32nd/16th notes.
I should start off by saying that songwriting is a different experience for everyone - everyone writes songs differently. I'll share my process and some other ideas.
The way I write songs is by using a program called Musescore. This makes things a bit easier and allows me to hear all the instruments in the piece together before I go ahead and record. Usually pre-Musescore I have ideas already thrown around in my head and I staple them in there and contribute other instruments. Musescore, personally I think, is also a good way to learn music theory if you're interested in that.
If you want to begin recording, and if you have an Apple device, go mess around in GarageBand. When you want to get more serious about recording, look into things like Studio One or Pro Tools or Abeleton, etc.
Songs begin with an idea of a lyric or musical riff or head and you just layer other things on and just mess around and see what sounds good. Start writing lyrics, start thinking of riffs, just whatever sounds good to you. The only way to become a good songwriter is to write, write, write, and write what you know and what sounds good to you. Write for yourself, not other people. Good luck, and welcome to the world of songwriting!
My workflow these days is to notate everything in MuseScore then export the score into GarageBand via a MIDI file.
AVID currently includes their Sibelius Score Editor in some Pro Tools subscriptions. That might be worth consideration if you're interested in a combined package for notation and editing/mastering.
1 - MusicXML has numerous professional backends, musescore being a prominent open-source one, plus Finale and Sibelius. Lilypond is an excellent format for human-readable serialization, but for machine-generation I think MusicXML is better, as you don't worry about whitespace etc. Also, my non-algo composition uses WYSIWYG editors like Sibelius, which was important when I was touching up the individual parts.
2 - The recording will be coming out on Leo Records in a few months, and there's a video of the live performance. I'm still working on how to release the score, and maybe even the source code (I've released the supporting libs but not the "artistic" code), which requires figuring out publishing etc. I'll update the site when these are available.
There are two important parts to writing melodies: rhythm and pitch. The pitch of the notes that you want to play can be done as /u/kirbykaz said. Alternatively, if you have a midi keyboard and you know how to plunk it out on the keyboard, you can record yourself doing that in real time. Rhythm comes from the length that those pitches should be held. Try and get a feel for which beats your "1-2-3-4" counting fall on (assuming your music is in common time). If the note is to be held for one count ("1-") , you can set the FL quantization settings (the lil magnet at the top left of the piano roll window) to only mark off single beats and lengthen your pitch to the next line. If it falls between counts ("1 -note-"), you can set the quant settings to something like 1/4 or 1/2 a beat and measure it out from there. Try to hear your melodies as "I need to fit this many notes into 4 counts. First I'll throw all the pitches into this 4-count measure, and then I'll deal with the lengths of them afterward."
If you can, do try to learn how to read sheet music, as it'll help you tremendously. Also, maybe try playing around with Musescore!
Musescore has a plugin that does that: https://musescore.org/en/project/notenames
It also has a sister site (musescore.com) where people post music typesetted with the program, you might find what you'd like to play. Then, you could download the score, open it with the program (which is freeware), and use the plugin.
Musescore.com also has an utility that tries to transform pdf scores scanned from paper into files for the software, but it doesn't work very well.
It sounds like you're going purely by trial and error, which is fine I guess, but putting some time and effort into the things aderra mentioned will be very helpful for your purposes. Imagine if you didn't have to have a program to tell you what chords you're using, but instead using your ear and music theoretical knowledge to identify it instantly.
>Is there maybe a program specifically for planning this kind of thing?
Every traditional notation program. You could, for example, use a leadsheet format (melody + chords) to create a basic harmonic structure for your piece first and embellish it in your DAW later.
There's MuseScore. It's free. Probably not as powerful as Finale and Sibelius but might be enough to get the job done. I use it for my notation needs. https://musescore.org/
Also, there's online-based Noteflight. A friend loves it. https://www.noteflight.com/login
I use and constantly suggest MuseScore. It's fully-featured and open source. It has quirks, but the learning curve is really not all that steep and it's a powerful little tool.
People like to play the music of others if you ask nicely. When you have your leadsheet, post it and ask. If it truly is a jazz lead sheet with melody and chord symbols, I would be happy to play it and record it for you myself. Just send me a PM if you don't get any takers on your post.
Good luck!
Soundfonts!
https://musescore.org/en/handbook/soundfont
I remember using Fluid ten years ago but having problems with memory requirements. Now that PCs measure memory in GB, it shouldn't be a problem anymore. That Sonatina soundfont looks huge and specifically geared towards orchestral stuff, so it's probably right up your alley.
Fruity includes a soundfont player but there's this free VST soundfont client that's been good to me as well: https://www.plogue.com/products/sforzando/
Place "swing" or this at the top of the score if you want a swung rhythm don't write it all out. Just use eights where you'd use that triplet figure. I recommend investing in notation software though. The look of a composer's score is indicative of their level of craft, and it's the only thing a performer has to work with.
I really liked the atmosphere though (it drags on after a bit, but depending on the music's function, it may not matter).
The guitar is a very hard instrument to write idiomatically for. Research shell voicings like /u/qwertyzxcvbnm said and look up how some common movable chord shapes look written out.
Sure, use MuseScore and a plugin like Note Names.
> **I have absolutely no interest in learning to read sheet music, so please don't suggest it.
It's hard for us not to suggest it. r/piano is a place to learn about music and about the piano. When you impose limitations on yourself (aka not wanting to learn how to read music), we're always going to encourage you to put the effort in and learn it. Many of us in r/piano have taken the 3 to 12 months it takes to learn how to read music and realize how many doors it opens. We just want to encourage others to do the same!
Cheers!
Musescore is free notation software (i.e. working from MIDI data), and you can get scanning programs which will convert PDF's. Advice here: https://musescore.org/en/node/11125.
Those other programs may not be free, and they will need editing afterwards anyway. Like OCR programs for text, they are never 100% foolproof. It's often quicker to copy the PDF into the notation program by hand yourself.
Photoscore can convert PDF notation into MIDI, which can then be transposed (and edited) in any way you like. However, as with OCR programs, it will need some degree of correction depending on the clarity of the original.
I.e., editing is always needed, it just might be a little or a lot. So you have to understand notation yourself. And if you understand notation, it may be quicker to do it manually from scratch in a program like musescore - which is free.
I'm not sure photoscore (even the lite version) is free as a standalone app (I've used it as a free app with Sibelius), but check this out: https://musescore.org/en/node/11125
musescore is free, and will convert notation to tab and vice versa.
Its fiddly to learn, of course (like any new software), and as jazzadelic says, when you convert from standard notation to tab, the notation has no idea what the best fret position would be, and will normally just choose the lowest fret where that note appears. So you pretty much always have to edit it to get playable positions, or just to get positions that feel or sound better.
the beta for MS4 is from two months ago, whereas the nightly build I downloaded was from last night. Nightly builds are far less stable, but my goal was have the latest version just to see what might be coming as a beta, or even what MS4 will be offering. I wish the piano roll was in the nightly dev build but it was not; still, I watched the piano roll video for MS4 in a youtube and looks very cool, I am excited; though its programmer said it might not appear until MS4.01 ir NS 4.1
please upload the score as an attachment to the official support forum (https://musescore.org/en/forum/6). You might even get better answers from there than this reddit forum.
There's a great report at https://musescore.org/en/node/307369. I think some of the issues listed have already been addressed (e.g. the font).
It's helpful to keep in mind that MuseScore probably does a better job at engraving than a handwritten sheet by musician who hasn't learned engraving.
Large list of chorale melodies: https://bach-cantatas.com/CM/index.htm
Large list of sequences (in German): https://mu-sig.de/Theorie/Tonsatz/Tonsatz15.htm
Free notation program: https://musescore.org/en
No, you can. You only have to add different dynamics in each hand's staff and edit them to affect only it's staff rather than the whole instrument
Thank you! Only been using Musescore so not sure how the notation process compares, but its simple navigation might differ from "traditional" programs which creates a slight learning curve. Shortcuts are very customizable in the preferences. Still shines in technical notation; I dug up a very badly orchestrated excerpt that shows some of its capability (this is from a year ago, before a major font update).
DAW etc. compatibility, playback, and software aesthetics are in the works for Musescore 4 to come in a year; initial looks seem very promising: the capabilities of major programs without the fuss of inconsistent design. See this update.
There are lots of good soundfonts available, and (I think) all soundfonts are compatible with Musescore. The handbook tells you how to install them (https://musescore.org/en/handbook/3/soundfonts-and-sfz-files). You can look for other GM (General MIDI) soundfonts to replace the default Musescore one, or just look soundfonts for individual instruments. Personally I use the default soundfont and just replace the strings and piano for a better sound.
What you're looking for is how to add another instrument: going to Edit>Instruments or just pressing "i" (more info here)
For tutorials and so, go first to the MuseScore handbook (https://musescore.org/en/handbook), it's always updated
https://musescore.org/en/handbook/3/tablature
MuseScore does it, but it requires you to input the notes in the first place. There's r/paidtabs and r/transcribe
I see. Teaching a computer program to copy a performance is not something I'm personally interested in. And in my opinion, if notation doesn't communicate well to humans, it's not worth much.
But fortunately, there are ways in MuseScore to get the playback you want and still produce a readable score, although it will put you on a steeper learning curve than you're on now.
If you're not already using the piano roll editor, you absolutely should be. Modifying note parameters is the way to get the feel you want in the playback, without adding unnecessary clutter to the score. Even if you don't care about the score, it gives you finer control than just using rests and articulation marks.
MuseScore also has a swing function that gives you much better control over rhythm than mucking about with different note values.
And there even exist plugins that give you fine control over grace notes, although probably the piano roll editor can do that well enough without.
Of course, the fastest way to get MIDI playback is simply to make a MIDI recording. I use Logic for this kind of thing, which has its own version of a piano roll editor. Starting with the human input can really make a big difference in quality, providing you can actually play.
I searched Google for "MuseScore Retardando" (why didn't I come up with this before the last reply?), and found that MuseScore has no such feature. However, their documentation says that it can simulate that effect by "adding hidden tempo markings".
> (it doesn't export to MusicXML)
Checking the MuseScore* bug tracker, it's not on the big list of problems with MusicXML export. Since it doesn't seem to be a known problem, I think it's worth creating a ticket for. Trust me, creating tickets gets stuff done! That's why rehearsal markings are square by default now.
* I assume you're using MuseScore based on what it looks to me