importing music
I am a 64 amateur clarinetist. I started working with MuseScore a couple of weeks ago and think it is terrific. But one item I am not clear about---is it possible to import an existing score, so you can edit it, and don't have to start from scratch? (For example, I would like to import a piano treble and bass from a published piece---say a Bach two part invention--- and then transpose this for a clarinet/cello duet). Can one, for example, take a PDF file, and convert it to the MuseScore language, and have MuseScore recognize it? If not PDF, a file in another format? If so, could someone answer in simple, non-technical terms how to do this? I know something about music, but am not that sophisticated with computer programs. Many thanks, Bob LaRocca, Philadelphia, PA
Comments
MuseScore can't import PDF. As you can understand, it's quite a challenge to figure out from an image where the staff lines, notes, rests etc ... are. It's even a challenge for musicians sometime.
That's being said there are a couple of software aiming at Optical Music Recognition (OMR). Majority of them are expensive proprietary ones and you often have to make a lot of fixes, depending on the quality of your scan. The only open source and free one is Audiveris but it might afraid a beginner.
If the piece you want to transcribe is in the public domain, it may be that someone else already transcribed it in another software. MuseScore can open MusicXML and Capella files. MusicXML can be produced by many software and if you find a Finale file (mus) or a sibelius file (sib) on the internet you should be able to create a MusicXML out of it with Finale or Sibelius and then open the MusicXML file in MuseScore. See [[nodetitle:Export]] for more info about formats.
Good sources for other notation software files are :
If someone knows other websites for music notation software files, please share.
If you can't find a proper music notation source, your last chance is to find a MIDI file of the music. By nature, MIDI is different than normal music notation and so importing a MIDI file in MuseScore might cause you a lot of work.
In my opinion, if you can't find a notation software file, but have a PDF and a MIDI files, you really need to think twice before deciding to go use the PDF/MIDI or enter the music yourself. Often it's really faster to enter the music by yourself.
Only a few weeks ago, I tried to assess the status of the OMR software. I tried two of them:
*) Audiveris: open-source, free, works on bitmap images (TIFF, JPG, ...)
*) PDFToMusic Pro: proprietary, ca. 200$, works on vectorial graphic PDF (I used the fully functional demo, only limit is on saving)
and a couple of scores:
*) a sonata for two viols by Boismortier
*) a double choir from Carissimi's Jonas.
The process is in each case:
1) With the OMR sotfware, create a MusicXML file
2) Import the XML in MuseScore
3) Clean up
The bottom line is that the total time required to have a finished product is of the same order of magnitude (if not even bigger) than re-typing from scratch in MuseScore, regardless of the program and of the piece.
PDFtoMusic is somewhat better in the raw recognition phase than Audiveris; however, Audiveris built-in editing functions are far superior and allow for a somewhat better resulting XML file (less clean up in MuseScore).
In all cases, there is a lot of errors (wrong note durations, overlooked rests, ...), some of them not so easy to spot (for instance, PDFtoMusic generated several 1/8th notes without flags, hard to spot in a 12-staff system), a lot of missing details (slurs, ornaments, dynamic, fancy beaming, ...) and the general feeling of not having complete control on the final result ("what else did the program forget to include or misinterpreted?").
In conclusion, OMR seems to me currently not worth the effort.
I did not try the 'big brothers' PhotoScore and SmartScore; however, their price tags (300 - 400$) do not make them suitable to the casual user, I believe.
Hoping it will be of some help,
M.