Quick selection guide (download free music writing programs). Music editor Inserting text notes

MuseScore is an application for editing sheet music scores with a simple and intuitive interface. The program supports input from external MIDI keyboards and is available on most popular operating systems, is completely free and translated into Russian. It allows you to add notes in a couple of mouse clicks, makes it possible to comfortably work with instrumental parts and contains a special inspector for setting up each element of the score.

MuseScore also boasts an extensive library with templates, an equally extensive database of instruments, the ability to enter notes in WYSIWYG mode, work with an unlimited number of note lines, a built-in sequencer and FluidSynth synthesizer, export of ready-made scores to most common graphic formats, as well as the ability to assign specific actions to keys and keyboard shortcuts. By supporting these hotkeys, MuseScore greatly reduces the amount of time it takes to create new projects. Included with the program you will find detailed technical documentation in Russian. It will be especially useful for those who have not previously worked with applications of this kind.

Key Features and Functions

• can work with connected MIDI keyboards;
• allows you to export working projects and finished scores;
• supports note input in WYSIWYG mode;
• can work with an unlimited number of musical lines;
• has a nice graphical shell with customizable toolbars.

A program for writing notes, like any other software, must be well written, functional and practical, and also provide users with a convenient and understandable user interface. The narrow specialization of the task and the complexity of composing musical notes are often reflected in the price tag of commercial products. However, don’t worry, there are plenty of free programs capable of meeting your needs.

The main task of this class of programs is to create compositions from notes and their subsequent presentation in printed form. Of course, manually composing music notation, using pen and paper, can be a more exciting activity and carry a subtle aroma of creativity that a program can never replace.

However, you may face more mundane tasks that are much easier to solve if you have automation tools. For example, duplicating repeating parts of compositions, inserting notes in the right places, dragging notes from one part to another, which, when compiled manually, can be solved up to composing a composition or a separate page of musical notation from scratch.

However, this class of programs is just one of those options where you should not chase automation, sacrificing freedom of action. First of all, notation programs should not interfere with your recording of the composition. The main purpose of such an application should be to support and provide additional tools for fast operations.

So if you install a program and find that your capabilities are limited in some way or you are required to change the way you write, it is better to find another program, even if it has fewer tools.

Remember, any composition writing is primarily a creative process. Just imagine you are composing a composition. In front of you lies a pen and music paper. How appropriate do you think it would be to remove “extra” notes or duplicate them multiple times because the program cannot move the volta bracket to the next line or page?

There are many free music notation programs available. Some may seem better, some worse. A matter of taste. However, when choosing, you need to take into account that each of these programs has its own individual interface, the analysis of the features and functions of which may take you at least half an hour.

Note: Basically, the parsing time is determined not so much by the complexity of the programs, but by different approaches to the organization of the menu, the location of buttons and other controls.

IN this review presents well-known and powerful cross-platform programs for writing notes.

Review of free programs for writing notes

MuseScore is an excellent sheet music editor.

Lilypond

Free music editor, allowing you to create scores of any complexity. The resulting score can be saved in one of the popular formats or even as a sound file due to the presence of a built-in synthesizer using SF2 technology.

Attention! The description below is for previous version 1.3.3, which may differ slightly from the current one.

A computer is a universal thing! It can be used for work, for entertainment, and even for creativity. We have been convinced of this more than once when considering various programs on the pages of our website.

Our article today is another “hello” to musicians :). And, this time, it’s professional, since the application that we’ll look at allows you to create musical scores of any complexity on your PC!

But not only will you be able to create and print sheet music of typographic quality, but in addition you will also get a fairly powerful synthesizer that will allow you to hear the composition you just recorded with notes and even save the recording in one of the popular sound formats! So, we will talk about cross-platform free visual editor scores - MuseScore.

Comparison with a paid analogue

MuseScore has a user-friendly interface and rich functionality that can be compared with the capabilities of famous paid music editors, such as, for example, Finale 2012:

A small disadvantage is the ability to work only with SF2 instruments (support for VST and VSTi would be nice), since it is not possible to find high-quality “soundfonts” for all instruments. And the built-in sound library, although it sounds better than simple MIDI, is still far from ideal.

However, not everything is so bad :). MuseScore has small sizes(in comparison with giants such as Sibelius or the same Finale), but at the same time it allows you to add almost all imaginable signs and notes to scores. And support for exporting and importing the MusicXML format allows you to easily open and edit sheet music created in any popular editor!

The last thing I would like to note is that the interface is as simple and user-friendly as possible. There is nothing superfluous in MuseScore, and all the control tools for the created composition are located as well as possible, which allows you to add the necessary notation elements in just two clicks!

Installation and first acquaintance with the program

Installing MuseScore is very simple. You just need to download the archive with the program and run the installer. In the installation wizard window that opens, agree to all the points and click “Next” until the program is installed. Once the installation is complete, the program's working window will load:

Here is the simple interface I promised :). The main part of the window is occupied by the staff with notes familiar to all musicians, the remaining elements of the workspace are grouped around it.

On the right is the MuseScore Connect frame, which gives us access to the program's community, which contains some sheet music material. Basically for work this section is practically useless, so you can close it by clicking the cross in the upper right corner.

Below the sheet music there is a preview panel. It displays thumbnails of our entire project, with the help of which we can quickly move to the position we need in our score.

On the left is a panel containing drop-down lists with a variety of additional musical signs and symbols. All of them are grouped by type, which allows you to quickly find the one you need.

At the top there are two toolbars (one for entering notes, and the second with the usual project control buttons and a mini playback panel) and a menu bar. That's all:). Let's look at how to work with the program in practice, creating the melody of the popular Soviet song “The Last Electric Train”.

Creating a new score in MuseScore

To get started new project we just need to click the “Create a new score” button or select the appropriate item in the “File” menu:

In the window that opens, we can enter information about the name of the composition, its authors, etc. In principle, you can skip this step and enter all the data into the finished score using the “Text” section in the “Insert” menu. After filling out all the fields, click the “Forward” button and move on to the next preparatory stage:

At this stage, we will need to decide on the set of instruments that will be used in the composition. By default, the names of all tools are given in English language, but if you wish, you can change them to Russian in the program settings (menu “Edit” - “Options” - line “List of tools”).

To begin with, I advise you to leave only the piano (or any other solo instrument) in the list, and add the remaining instruments after creating the main melody. The next step is choosing the key of the piece:

If you have the notes of the original work, then indicate the key that is in the existing score. If you want to write a melody from scratch, then it is easier to select the key “C major/A minor”, ​​and then, if necessary, transpose it to the desired key (menu “Notes” - “Transpose”).

Last preparatory stage- working with beats:

Here we need to specify the size of our composition, adjust the beat (if there is one) and set the number of measures in the score. Naturally, all these parameters can be changed in the future, but it’s easier to specify everything at once;). Once the configuration is complete, you can click the “Finish” button - our project is ready for work :).

Working with Palettes

Since we decided to create the melody of “The Last Train,” it would be nice to start by finding its notes (although you can pick it up by ear, but it’s more convenient :)). We open a PDF file with notes and try to reproduce them one-to-one in the MuseScore environment:

We will figure out how to work with notes and pauses in the next section, but now I want to show you an example of working with “Palettes”.

As you can see, we already have the signs at the key and the size of the bars, but there are no instructions regarding the dynamics of the game. In the original score there is the designation “mezzo forte”. We need to put the same icon at the very beginning of our sheet music. To do this, go to “Palettes”, look for the “Dynamics” section, open it and drag the desired icon onto the staff with the left mouse button. Ready:).

In the same simple way, you can add almost any musical symbols and symbols other than notes to MuseScore.

Entering notes into MuseScore

Notes can be entered into MuseScore in two ways: with the mouse and using a MIDI keyboard. You can also use hot keys regular keyboard, but this is not very convenient, so this option we will not consider. Based on the fact that we don’t have a synthesizer as a device, let’s try to work with the mouse:

By default, MuseScore runs in edit mode. In order to be able to add the notes we need with the mouse, we need to activate the “Note Input Mode”. This can be done with the corresponding button on the note input panel (in the form of the letter “N”) or by pressing the “N” key on the computer keyboard.

After the mode is activated, we can enter notes and pauses of the required duration by clicking the mouse in the desired place on the staff. In this case, we set the duration of the entered notes and pauses by activating the button with the image of the desired duration on the note input panel.

Also, in addition to the buttons with duration and pause, on the panel you can find buttons for applying the most commonly used accidentals, a key for changing the direction of note stems, and buttons for switching between voices (if the score provides them).

MuseScore automatically groups the notes we enter according to the rules of musical notation, but such grouping is not always convenient. Fortunately, any program action can be corrected manually. Let's give a specific example with our “Electric Train”. We have entered the notes correctly in the first four measures, but they are grouped differently than in the original score:

In order to combine notes into one group, just find the “Group Properties” tab in the “Palettes” and drag the “Group Middle” symbol to the note next to the one that should be included in the group.

In order to divide a large group into several smaller ones, we need to drag the “Start of Group” icon to the note from which the division should begin. Accordingly, if we need to exclude only one note, then we will apply the “Without group” property to it.

In the previous screenshot you can also see a few more interesting moments. In the original score, there are accent marks above the chords in the second measure. Adding an accent is not a problem: we look for it in the “Articulation and Ornamentation” section and drag it to any note of the chord.

But in our case, the accent is under the staff lines, and not above them. We can correct the situation in two ways. First, you need to try to rotate the chord stems down using the corresponding button ("Expand direction") on the note input panel. In theory, this should help in most cases. If it doesn’t help, then there’s another option: turn off the note input mode and just drag any sign to the right place!

Using the latter method, you can control the position of any elements, such as, for example, leagues, volts, crescendo/diminuendo features, etc.

Inserting text notes

We figured out how to work with notes and insert various musical notations into them. However, sometimes in practice musicians have to make various text notes in the notes. With MuseScore you don't have to do them by hand - there is a special section for this in the "Insert" menu:

In the “Text” section, all items are placed in three groups.

1. The first group contains text fields for entering the name of the composition, its authors, etc., in short, all those fields that we filled in at the very beginning of creating a new project.
2. The second group contains items that allow you to make various kinds of notes over the required notes regarding the nuances of their performance. There is also a chord signature feature.
3. The third group contains a wide variety of text inserts that allow you to enter everything from vocal text to tempo symbols in different languages ​​(there is no Russian).

To enter text, we must first select the note to which the text will be linked. Moreover, a feature of, for example, vocal text (and some others) is that after pressing a space or hyphen, the next syllable is automatically linked to the next note, which is very convenient and allows you to quickly write vocal parts or long explanations using the “Staff Text” tool.

Copying and Pasting Note Snippets into MuseScore

One thing I would like to mention separately is the copy and paste function in MuseScore. The fact is that the use of these features is somewhat complicated by the fact that the program does not have the selection frame that is familiar to many. However, this does not mean that you cannot highlight anything.

Selection in MuseScore occurs as follows:

1. Click the first note of the fragment that needs to be copied;
2. Clamp SHIFT button and click the last note. Moreover, if you also need to highlight the bass part, then you need to mark the end of the fragment precisely on the last note in the bass clef (otherwise, only notes in the violin range will be highlighted);
3. Press the key combination CTRL+C or “Edit” - “Copy” to copy the selected fragment to the clipboard.

With these simple manipulations, you can quickly copy repeating fragments of a part, as, for example, in bars 1 - 2 and 5 - 6 in the screenshot below:

Adding new instruments and working with drum parts

As you can see from the previous screenshot, our work on entering the piano part has come to an end. However, with MuseScore we can also create an arrangement for our main melody. For this we will need additional musical instruments.

We can add them by calling the “Tools” item in the “Insert” menu:

We will see a list of tools already familiar to us, which you, I hope, have already Russified. If you haven’t done this, you can do it from this window, without even resorting to the “Settings” of the program. Just click the “Download” button, select the “instruments_ru.xml” file from the list and click “Open”.

In the list of instruments, open the “Non-tonal percussion” section and select the “Drum kit in five lines” item. At your disposal will be a standard drum kit, which is used today in popular music of various genres. Why did we choose drums? Because working with them is different from working with conventional instruments that play according to notes.

In a drum “staff”, each line is responsible for a specific drum or cymbal that is part of the kit. We can add the desired one from the “Drums” palette using drag and drop, which is already familiar to us. In this case, we, as before, indicate the duration of the sound using the buttons on the note input panel. That's the whole difference :).

Having made a loop of four to eight bars, you can then copy it and fill all the remaining bars with rhythm!

Additional MuseScore windows

We have dealt with all the main features of the MuseScore music editor and all that remains is to clarify some of the nuances. These nuances include additional windows that can be activated in the “View” menu:

These windows include the Playback Panel, Mixer, and Synthesizer.

The “Playback Panel” contains in its arsenal a track playback progress slider, the already familiar “Rewind to the beginning” and “Play / Stop” buttons, as well as a “Level” slider, which allows you to adjust the overall volume of the composition and “TMP”, which is responsible for the tempo of the melody .

Among other things, in the lower left corner of the window there is a drop-down list that allows you to select the playing style of virtual “performers”. The default setting is "Straight", which corresponds to standard note playing, but shuffle and swing rhythms are also available.

The “mixer,” like its real counterpart, is designed to adjust the volume level, panorama and some effects (in our case, reverb and chorus) for each instrument separately. Moreover, the part of any instrument can be switched in real time to “performance” by any other instrument by selecting it in the “Sound” drop-down list.

At the same time, for a set of percussion instruments, we can choose the type of drum set, from standard to such exotic ones as, for example, the TR 808 drum machine!

The “synthesizer”, which is the popular free FluidSynth, gives us the opportunity to adjust the brightness of effects, and also, most interestingly, change the sound sets of virtual instruments created based on SF2 technology!

You can find a lot of pretty good sound banks on the Internet, of which I would recommend RealFont and Shan's Soundfont. To unpack them into a regular SF2 format, you will need the sfArk SoundFont Compression program.

The soundfonts mentioned above are full-format complexes musical instruments, however, there are also highly specialized ones, for example, electric guitars or sets of folk instruments - look and you will find :).

Advantages and disadvantages of the program

• user-friendly interface;
• support for all musical notations;
• support for SF2 sound banks;
• support for text data entry;
• saving the score into a finished sound file.

• no support for VST plugins;
• An optical note recognition feature would be nice.

conclusions

If you are a musician who is “friendly” with notes, then you definitely need to try the opportunities that MuseScore provides. You will receive a double benefit: firstly, a tool for creating high-quality scores, and secondly, a software synthesizer that will allow you to realize almost any of your musical fantasies!

In addition, the scores you create in MuseScore can be distributed in one of the most popular MusicXML formats, which is supported by all popular music editors, which means that the path to the world of modern composers who use a computer to write music will be open to you!

P.S. Permission is granted to freely copy and quote this article, provided that an open active link to the source is indicated and the authorship of Ruslan Tertyshny is preserved.