What Do *You* Use MuseScore For?

First of all, thanks a lot for this great piece of software! My first MuseScore version was 0.9, and I can see how far it improved since that. Music is a hobby for me, so I wouldn't be able to justify huge license costs for the software :)

My current MuseScore projects are:

- my own songs, "Phantastische Lieder", are new pieces for bards in historical or fantasy settings (all in German). They are for 1 or 2 voices, some with recorder interludes. Since I was asked to share that, I recently discovered Musescore.com which really makes it easy to do so:
http://musescore.com/user/27845/sets/45138

- arrangements for Historical Dance Music: I play recorder for historical dances. The tunes are all traditional, but there is always the problem of finding the right arrangement for the group of musicians present ... so I started to write some:
http://musescore.com/user/27845/sets/45761

- arrangements for a choir: I sing in a Gospel choir where we have a couple of African songs in the repertoire. Many of them are just passed on orally, but we Germans love to have sheets :)
(didn't upload that stuff so far)

I found in a librairy a sheet music that is out of print.....
and unfortunately , the flute part has been lost (after50 ears i'm not so surprised !), so
I wanted a freeware to "rewrite" it ^^

and I found it , it is so awesome, that I will use it for other things (transpose sheet music to play with transposing instruments or so on I've no idee yet !!!)

I have been a middle school/high school band director for over 20 years. My first experience with computer notation software was a program called Pro Composer by Mark of the Unicorn on an old Mac Classic that I inherited when I took a job at a new school in 1994. Pro Composer was pretty basic, but it evolved into Composer's Mosaic around 1996, which was a very easy-to-use and intuitive piece of notation software, and I loved it. I created over 200 marching and concert band compositions and arrangements on it. Unfortunately it was a Macintosh only program, and Mark of the Unicorn chose to leave it for dead, deciding instead to move into the audio mixing hardware and software business. (They could have eaten Finale's lunch if they had continued to update Mosaic and created a Window's version - what could have been.) I continued to use Composer's Mosaic until I got some of my original band compositions published in 2002. I began working with C. Alan Publications, and I would mail them a paper copy of a score and e-mail them the MIDI file, which they would clean up and publish. After the publication of the first two pieces, the powers at C. Alan, who used Finale, hinted very strongly that if I wanted them to publish any more of my compositions, I would have to submit Finale files. Thus began my 7 year hate/hate relationship with Finale.

I might not have had such a distaste for the program had I not been coming from Composer's Mosaic - which was so intuitive - to Finale, where I always felt as if I was "fighting" with it as opposed to "using" it. I never felt a sense of flow when composing or arranging, with input and formatting taking much longer than it had with Mosaic. The cost was through the roof for the initial program (even with an educator discount), and the costly yearly updates that fixed nothing that frustrated me, only adding features I didn't need or want was another sticking point. (As an aside, I went to the Georgia Music Educator's Convention in Savannah, Georgia a few years ago, and MakeMusic had a Finale booth. I chewed out the booth vendor to the point that I thought he was going to have security escort me out.)

In early 2009, after a particularly frustrating session with Finale, I hit Google and searched for an alternative. MuseScore came up, and at the time was at version 0.9.4. I tried it, but there were still too many bugs and quirks to convince me to switch. A few months later (after *another* frustrating session with Finale trying to write my show music for the Fall), I went back to MuseScore and found it at 0.9.5. I gave it another shot, found it much more stable, and never looked back. I love composing and arranging again. I didn't realize how far away I had gotten from doing it regularly with Finale until I started learning MuseScore and was able to flow in my writing.

I have converted almost all of my old Finale files through MIDI or MusicXML over to MuseScore files. I have dozens of marching band arrangements and compositions that I've done in MuseScore. I write for myself and several close band director friends who ask me to arrange things for them, many of which I have turned on to MuseScore as well. I have about 20 concert band compositions all written in MuseScore, three of which are published on pdfbandmusic.com. Even though I use MuseScore and they use Sibelius, the MusicXML format allows them to clean up and publish scores with very little effort. Last year I dove into composing and arranging for my Jazz Band, and I have about a dozen pieces that I've done for my group's instrumentation. I have a high school student who is a junior, and he wants to go to college to be a band director. I gave him a link to MuseScore last year, he downloaded it, and has become quite accomplished at arranging for small ensembles and simple full band pieces. This would have been impossible with Finale, as he couldn't have afforded to buy the full copy, and Notepad is so limited as to be barely useful.

I know MuseScore still has its quirks (many of which have or will be fixed through updates), but I would take it 10 times out of 10 over any commercial notation program. I feel productive after using it, and I am grateful for the work that so many have put in to make it such a great program.

In late 2009, I found MuseScore in a Google search too, I think.

Shortly before, I tried a couple of notation software, but from what I remember, I think they were cumbersome to use. Even to this day, MuseScore actually appears to be simpler to use - I'm generally comfortable with it.

I'm not a composer, but I do like to transcribe as a hobby.

I believe from 2.0 onwards, MuseScore will have its feet planted in the ground in being able to serve the more demanding of users :).

With the FLOSS license, I feel comfortable promoting Musescore to anyone and everyone without worrying whether they'll really use it. A commercial program purchase has to be justified by a real need, but FLOSS can be tried without hesitation just to see… MuseScore was even my gateway into really embracing FLOSS, so now I'm moving to GNU/Linux and learning about the other music tools there… You can see the software recommendations page on my website (wolftune.com) to see my current list of mostly FLOSS music links for all systems.

As a private music teacher, I've gotten most of my students using MuseScore to learn theory through composing and creative things. It's a very satisfying process. When we go through material in their lessons, I then have them use MuseScore to compose music inspired by the ideas from the music they are studying. Some really take off and start exploring their own directions in MuseScore as well!

My dream is to use MuseScore to develop a new beginning music method based on the ideas I've developed over the years, and to license the whole thing under Creative Commons and share the actual MuseScore files so students can manipulate the material.

Right now I'm using MuseScore to put together my own accordion "gigbook"--a collection of leadsheets of (mostly) typical accordion gig songs. Sort of an accordion-focused "real book". As you can imagine, page turns are a real pain for accordion players. Rewriting/transcribing these songs in leadsheet format puts nearly all of them down to just a single page. Very convenient!

I used to use Finale, ages ago. Then I happily switched to Sibelius. I've found MuseScore to be every bit as good as either of those two for my needs, and you can't beat the price!

- Jeff

I use it for copying a piece of classical music, listening to playback and then laying it out in a format that I can read better than the original. I also use it to re-arrange vocal parts into parts for several instruments (usually brass). If a snatch of a tune comes into my mind I used to write it down on paper but now just put it straight into MuseScore. I have also collected a lot of folk tunes (900+) and put them into groups of graduated difficulty using MuseScore to tie it all together and to correct the inevitable errors in time and key signatures. I have collected pieces for ABRSM grading for trumpet and for flute and have amalgamated the scales and arpeggios required for each grade to create daily exercise charts.

My PC runs ubuntu 10.04 and MuseScore 1.1 so I am used to "Free" both in the sense of not costing money and also in the sense of allowing me to develop and to share. Under Applications...Music I also have Canorus, Frsecobaldi, GNU Denemo, NoteEdit, NtEd, Rosegarden and ScoLily Score Recorder and I don't think I've used any of them this year.

I feel a little silly posting this amongst all the true musicians/composers/talents who have posted in this subject. I am a male in my mid-forties with minimal music training. I played the trumpet (badly) in my high school concert band. I never learned to play another instrument. I can barely read sheet music. I have written some music using the old "music tracker" type software ("Sound Tracker," "Octamed") back in the early 90's, but that was a very different (and much more limited) composing environment.

So why am I using Musescore? Well, it's because I have musical compositions in my head, and I want to get them out of there! I've had these "tunes" in my imagination since high school, but no real outlet for it within my grasp, ability, or ambition (or lack thereof). I discovered Musescore while searching for music composition software on the net, and it looks by far to be the best tool for my needs to "compose" music. I don't want to "piano roll" canned or looped music, I want to write the music, note for note! The addition of "Fluidsynth" to the Musescore package makes it seem possible for me to actually compose and produce credible classical-style music on my computer!

I admit my initial results sound awful, but that's because of my own limitations and not the software's. I have a LOT to learn and a LONG way to go! This may all turn out to be a ridiculous fantasy on my part, but Musescore is clearly a great tool. If it turns out that I am not that talented after all, at least I didn't spend lots of cash on a "professional" product before discovering this.

I am posting this to give the Musescore programmers some perspective on what types of people are using their software. It sounds crazy, I know, but It's not just "real" musicians who use Musescore, it's also "musical idiots" like me. :-)

I'm happy about the price too, and that matters for many reasons. But Finale NotePad is zero price also, and I don't see you using that. Of course, Finale NotePad is restrictive crippleware. So emphasizing free in freedom is important if we want stuff like MuseScore to exist. If people just go for zero price, there's lots of other options. Zero price is important, but it isn't what makes MuseScore special. What makes MuseScore is the combination of zero price, freedom, quality output, and good interface. I apologize if I came across as critical. There's nothing really wrong with your comments at all, I just think the freedom aspect needs to be emphasized as well!

I use Musescore to create MIDI files to play software synthesisers in the Reaper musical workstation software. My piano playing skills are not good enough to play the music in real time, so I use MIDI files. I typeset mainly baroque piano music and some violin + piano music.

I also use Musescore to typeset tricky music so I can playback and listen to the rhythm. I like being able to adjust the tempo easily.

Note entry using a MIDI keyboard is also a very convenient feature .

Some of the melodies of the songs we sing in church, are not that familiar and make it difficult to sing lustily. The wish was expressed that the notes should accompany the words to make it easier to sing. In our church we project the words with the help of n proxima and powerpoint presentations onto two walls next to the pulpit. MuseScore is the perfect solution to write every verse with its notes. The project to combine every verse with notes for projection started December 2010. The aim is to do all 850 songs and just more than a half has now been completed. The singing has improved dramatically and the congregation sings the more challenging melodies with confidence. Although only a small percentage of our congregation can "read" notes, everybody can now see when it is a "long" note or where one should sing a little quicker (shorter notes), Our organist is now a much happier person. Thank you, MuseScore!

I sing in a choir and I've used MuseScore to type in all our songs and use it for practice. I can adjust speed and turn up/down the volume of individual voices, which is very helpful. Just missing the repetition tool, and it'll be even better (http://musescore.org/en/node/16180).

I've made the files available for others in the choir on our website as well (http://www.triangelos.no, requires member login to view the files though), so they use it too. Great stuff :)

I am interested in converting ancient Elizabethan-period music to MuseScore files. I would like to see the software be able to provide more raw MIDI control for purposes of bank changing and it would be nice to see more interpretation of dynamics and ornaments.

One reason I'm interested in doing these things is that I am not the greatest at keyboard playing and enjoy hearing music that others have not recorded yet.

If the software becomes more capable with dynamics and MIDI control, I will also start converting music by Flor Peeters, one of my favorite organ composers.

I am using Musescore to try and make performance parts for music which does not have any and I think it is worth it. For the purpose I need mostly the note entry function. I use playback as a "typo catching" device: if the harmony sounds iffy there is probably an incorrect pitch somewhere.
So far I have done a string quartet from the 20th century for which only an autographed manuscript score is commercially available. I have those parts ready to go except for small "cosmetic" improvements that I'd like to make and don't yet know how to.
I am also working on a violin sonata (no. 6) by Georges Onslow, which is available from IMSLP in a very old edition which nobody will want to play from directly (no violin part in the piano part, no bar numbers, dynamic markings in the parts don't always agree, also far from the readability you can achieve by careful work with Musescore.
The main issue I am running into is file size: the compressed files are not that big, 120 some kb, but the program becomes notably sluggish, when I work at the last movement.
If somebody needs a copy of the Onslow such as it is right now I can send you those, the other work is under copyright.

I lead a SAAT saxophone quartet but with few exceptions saxophone quartet music is scored in the SATB format. MuseScore enables me to enter the tenor and baritone sax parts and transpose them to alto and tenor parts respectively. This usually requires little or no further tinkering, but occasionally it's not a straightforward transposition and I have to use MuseScore to adjust the arrangement in places to suit the alternative instrumentation.

Apart from the original saxophone quartet music we buy for the quartet, a great source of music for us comes from the a cappella choir world. A cappella choir scores are usually arranged in sop, alto, tenor and bass harmonies often with piano accompaniment and here again MuseScore allows me to rearrange the choir score and transpose it for our quartet picking our quartet harmonies out of the voice and piano parts. I bought the a cappella choir scores for Lennon and McCartney's 'Penny Lane', 'Michelle', 'Yesterday', 'The Long and WInding Road', 'In My Life' and 'All You Need Is Love', and used MuseScore to arrange and transpose them for our quartet and they are, I have to say, six of our audience favourites.

Just in case anyone is wondering, yes, I am very much aware of copyright. I purchase all the music in its original published form and ensure that there are no restictions on rearrangement or transposition. There are some classical pieces which I would love to set about with MuseScore for the quartet, but there are specific restrictions on transposition and rearrangement with most of them so Herr Mozart's Minuets, for instance, must remain in tact I'm sorry to say.

I have actually used mscore 0.95, own compilation, on a ScientificLinux-5.x installed in 2008 and updated with dag/wiers repository packages, however I can not compile the newer versions and do not mind because 0.95 is fairly stable and can do a lot, really do a lot. I have often thought that I should offer to revise the sample-files, there is one or a handful of errors in the a-minor Inventio by J.S.Bach.

I publish the best of my compositions, though not all, on YouTube. Here is a link to one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3EZMuwpTB0

-Donald Axel-
Denmark

Finally I have time to post :)

I have been a full time organist, teacher, composer, programmer and performer for most of my working life, apart from a 4 year gap when I tried my hand at sales.

For me the joke: "Weddings, bahmitzvahs and funerals" is pretty near what I actually do.

I began by teaching guitar in the mid 1970s. Guitar teachers were few and far between back then, indeed the guitar was nott viewed as a serious instrument by many classical musicians. That was way before music notation software was even thought of, of course, and a computer occupied several large rooms, the main processor being have to be kept in a hermetically sealed dust free environment. Data inut was by the means of punch cards produced by teams of operators typing away. Consequently all the music I wrote for teaching or other purposes was produced with pen and ink - I came across one of the special pens I used for final copies while clearing out a drawer the other day, and I still have a box of manuscripts yet to be transferred to the computer.

Since 1983 I have been Director of Music at St Michael's Church, Retford and entered the world of computer generated music in the early 1990's with a program called Rhapsody which ran on RISCOS computers. The output was basic to say the least, but the fact that I could now produce readable copies of music easily was a godsend. This was the same OS that Sibelius was first written for, only being ported to PC when Acorn Computers finally folded around 1998. Rhapsody continued development until the demise of Acorn computers, and I was one of the beta testers for the final version, which, in my opinion beat the c**p out of Sibelius at the time.

After being forced on to PC's by the closure of Acorn Computers, I turned to Finale, which at the time offered much better control over layout than SIbelius. I discovered MuseScore in May 2011 whilst contemplating upgrading from Finale 2003. After trying it out with a small project for St Michaels (producing an arrangement of the Regina Caeli) I was immediately hooked, and have used nothing else for notation purposes since, using it daily for the production of teaching worksheets and music for St Michael's Choir. I am particularly excited by the new features coming in version 2.0, which I believe is really going to put MuseScore on the map with professional musicians, and give both Finale and SIbelius a run for the money.

There is only one area I would like to see improved currently - support for plainchant and other unmeasured music. That really would give it the edge over the proprietary opposition, as neither of them are good at supporting this.

You can find some of my compositions at MuseScore.com, and I am currently engaged in transferring works for Organ to MuseScore from public domain sources, which I'm planning to open up as a library in the near future, the goal being never to have to turn a page of music again :)

Mainly choir musics, editing it for easier lyrics legibility (font size, breaks according to lyrics rather than to bars)

Some double bass parts for my own use

Instruments parts out of conductor scores

I previously used Rhapsody, and Pizzicato, a «one man» software (Mac and Windows), whose programmer kindly answer questions. His programm includes devices aimed at helping componers, about which I am not able to have an opinion.
It seems that there is presumably some Musescore users who would appreciate suchdevices.

I like the feature that lets you mute one voice. That way I can play the muted voice and learn the part, and if necessary I can gradually bring it up to performance tempo, before meeting with the other, more experienced performers to rehearse.

I use musescore to copy and edit old manuscripts. There is a lot of music that is never played, since there's no printed sheet music. I do this as a hobby and post it for free, so I don't have to worry about the commercial aspect. It would make me very happy if I can contribute to someone actually playing more music of Roman, Agrell etc. live.

As a violinist, composer and orchestrator, I'm always in contact with notation softwares to write my music and do my work. When I bought a new pc, tried to find free/open softwares with quality in output - as so I had on Finale and Sibelius, to minimize some costs. So, I found MuseScore through Wikipedia.

Since this, I use it to produce my own scores to play out there, to do my homework from university and, one of the main uses: to build my "score backup facility". I usually must read flawed scored, or even blurry manuscripts. So, write'em in MuseScore and backup for futher use.

Even to produce my computer-aided music, I need to write down the sheet, so notation software is fundamental in my life. And, my first choice today is MuseScore.

I use musescore for creating audio mock-ups of Bach-style chorales that I write for my music class in school. Musescore is simply the best notation tool available on GNU/Linux, so that's what I use. The musicXML support is essential for me to use my pieces on both my home computer and the computers at school that use Sibelius 6. I look forward to Musescore's further growth and success :)

I began classical training on the piano at age six. I began taking a large interest in composition and arranging music at about age 12, and that is also when I began playing jazz (trombone and piano). At that time, I was mainly trying to develop my compositiing skills, and must have composed about sixty piano songs, all of which were in various stages of incompletion. I had tried out many free notation softwares but all of them were, in my opinion, un professional in display and notation. Thus, I began to hand-notate the songs, which slowed my progress and enthusiasm.
I first came across MuseScore when it was version 0.9.5. I was first of all impressed by how much more professional the sheet music came out to be. I also enjoyed that the note-imput method was somewhat similar to Sibelius, which one of my teachers had shoed me how to use. The best part was that it was free. I began again to compose and arrange music, and have come a long way in my composing skills.
I arrange songs for the high school jazz band and basketball pep band. I started out taking big band songs and converting them to combo tunes (and vice versa), but now I do original big and tunes. I also take classic rock songs and arrange them for basket ball band. My arrangements have been performed by the bands quite a few times.
Personally, I compose songs in the New Age classical genre, but I also enjoy making piano arrangements of big band tunes, and original works in the jazz genre. I also do works for chamber orchestra and occasionally the church choir.
MuseScore has come a long way since V0.9.5, and I look forward to the future of MuseScore.

I use to work with musescore to copy scores for my choir. And, also I have copied some of my own works, but I like a little bit other softwares like Finale, and Sibelius, specially in audio devices. I like to test music notation softwares like LilyPond, MuseScore, in order to test its capabilities to replace Finale and Sibelius. I hope freeware can replace totally these non-free softwares. That is why I like so much the opportunity that MuseScore is giving to us.

I was searching a good notation program. I was trying with Sibelius, Encore and Finale, but neither program makes PDF files in good quality. Finally I found MuseScore. When I made my first PDF with this program and I printed it, I knew, so I choose good program. MuseScore now helps me with make high quality PDF files of my arragenment, transcriptions or refreshes from old printings. There is link to my score, Up Is Down, by all of score isn't acces, because I don't protect this sheet of copyrights.

http://musescore.org/en/node/16234

_________________________________________________________

In future I'm going to make online libary of sheet music with my friend, which works in MuseScore too.

_________________________________________________________

There is one of my finished works - Nocturne b minor by Frederic Chopin:

I've been singing in barbershop quartets since 1993 and barbershop choruses since 1997. One of my favorite activities in barbershopping is tag singing. Tags are pieces of music short enough to be taught by ear. They were originally the codas to song arrangements, which typically featured some especially satisfying harmony. Tag singing grew into its own activity, and now there are tags that never had a song attached to them!

I'm a "tagmaster", the kind of guy who is ready to teach all four parts to a few dozen tags when I'm with other singers. Some I learn just by ear, others by studying sheet music. As I sing tags taught by others, I try to collect the "spots" from them and build up my collection. I need a notation program to keep them digitally and so I can hear the transcription to make sure it sounds right. MuseScore to the rescue!

I have MuseScore and DropBox on my upstairs desktop (Windows), my laptop (Windows/Linux dual boot) and my downstairs desktop (Mac). MuseScore runs equally well on all three, and DropBox keeps the files in sync. The combination is heavenly! I'd used Finale PrintMusic before, but couldn't run it under Linux and couldn't afford to keep it current on more than one computer.

I'm trying to preserve my tag collection for future generations by posting everything to http://barbershoptags.com (see my uploads ). I use MuseScore to prepare attractive, legible scores and export them to PNG for display on cell phones. I convinced the webmaster to add MuseScore to the notation formats he'll accept when posting a tag.

I'm looking forward to the day MuseScore will make adding lyrics above the staff as easy as adding them below the staff, as that's something that's called for quite often in barbershop notation.

Been a pianist since I was a little kid and started studying classical, but after 8 years of lessons, I got away from it for a long, long time -- let's just say that if you are a starving newly-graduated "young professional," an acoustic piano is possibly the worst instrument in the world in terms of ease of moving, apartment-friendliness, and expense. I went for a very long time without, and when digitals caught up quality-wise and I had finally reached some sort of financial stability, I got one.

And discovered at the age of 44 that not only could I write music, but I could write fairly decent music. As a kid, I had gotten the message that one didn't "make things up" at the piano but just played the notes as written. "Making things up" was like "playing by ear." Bad. I wish I had played a more portable instrument, which would have given me the chance to shake that off a lot earlier than middle age, but it is what it is and I'm just glad I did it in the end. And glad that the classical world is more welcoming to that sort of thing than it once was.

After pencil and paper, I started with Lilypond in terms of just writing it down, but was encouraged by a viola teacher to try Musescore and never looked back. I'm now writing my own work and arranging others that I love but want to bring into the piano universe (Haendel arias especially, but some Vivaldi). Musescore is fantastic. I don't anticipate using anything else.

So I'm not really a "pro," but I hope to be someday. Still cranking away on my own stuff, and someday, maybe it will be on Bandcamp and iTunes ... It's already on paper, though. :-)

Earlier this year, my friend Heather and I (we're both cellists) needed to find a software to compose a song for the talent show on. We looked at two, and I don't remember their names, but we couldn't figure them out. When we found musescore, we were amazed at how incredibly easy it was to use, based off of the tutorials. We downloaded it on her mom's computer and made a 3-part piece (two cellos and a string bass) in under half an hour.

Now, I've been trying to piece out Viva La Vida for an orchestra to play, as well as composing another song that I have yet to name. I still love this program, and I've been using it for more time than I should every day. :D

I'm a completely self-taught musician, having started on classical guitar in 1965 (ancient history). I've never performed in public and never published one note of music (nor did I ever want to), but over the years I managed to teach my instrument in commercial studios. Eventually I changed my line of work and wound up as a German-English document translator. Guitar was my only instrument, but due to some physical limitations, not to mention various distractions and lack of time, I finally got discouraged and started neglecting my guitar practice. I'm retired now and have lots of time, but arthritis is keeping me away from the guitar altogether.

I acquired my first electronic keyboard in the 1990s, learned some chords on it, and began to write amateur keyboard compositions. Since my keyboarding technique was never good enough for playing the left-hand part fluently, my compositions were in lead sheet format. I played the melodies with an improvised accompaniment, which was mainly chordal, but sometimes included stride bass. When I discovered MIDI, I started writing pieces out in full piano score with the aid of Cakewalk Apprentice (on Windows 3.1). I then let my computer play my pieces for me, so I could get a better idea how they should sound. Once I finished a piece, I could sit back, relax and enjoy the concert. :)

Of course, MuseScore, which I found in a Google search a couple of years ago, is far more flexible and feature-packed than Cakewalk Apprentice was. I run it on a netbook with Windows 7, and the sound is phenomenal, especially with the "FluidR3_GM" sound font. The sound I get from a standard MIDI sequence through the Windows Media Player doesn't even come close, so I play everything in MuseScore.

Even though I write out the full piano score, I still copy it out on paper as a lead sheet to accommodate my amateur playing technique and natural clumsiness. Now in my sixties, I'm more or less unteachable, and I doubt if I'd want to take piano lessons. ;)

We moved countries and our piano has been in storage for almost a year. MuseScore has enabled my school-age kids to continue their voice lessons. We input their lesson music for them to rehearse. In a way it has been better than the piano as MuseScore is always in tune and always plays the rhythms as written. They can practice syllable by syllable or set a rehearsal or performance tempo. In the process of inputting, we've all learned quite a bit of music theory as well. We are able to create tracks with and without the voice line and they can sing along to their iPod or even take it as accompaniment for impromptu opportunities to perform at school (we still use a live human accompanist for recitals of course). We found the program by necessity, but even when we have access to our piano again we will continue to use it. The kids have shared their enthusiasm with their teachers and classmates, and we were pleased to see that the program is also available in our current language, so the choir teacher has recommended it to all his students now as well. I really appreciate the work that has gone into this and the fact that it is free to all. Thanks!

I'm a full-time music teacher and musician from the island of Puerto Rico. Musescore is the only music notation program I use at the moment (previously used Finale and then Sibelius before switching to Musescore), both for educational and personal work. Since promoting Free/Libre and Open Source Software (FLOSS) is part of my teaching philosophy, I teach how to use Musescore in a basic level to my elementary school students as part of the music class. You can take a look at my children's works at my blog (it's written in Spanish, but maybe you can use a translator service like Google Translator if you don't understand it):

MuseScore Workshop photos

MuseScore works of my students during the workshop

Also, I made two simple and basic videos for my students based on MuseScore 1.1 (that was the current version when I offered the workshop to my students). The purpose was to prepare them for the workshop on MuseScore that I offered to them. The first one explains how to install the program, the other one is a very simple tutorial on how to write a short song with MuseScore 1.1

Best of all, my students get to install a copy of the software at their home computers. That way they can keep practising what they learned at the music class. This is one of the best aspects of FLOSS, which comes handy at an educational setting. I can't do that with Sibelius or Finale!

Congratulations to the MuseScore developers team. You are truly doing a great work, and it only gets better with time.

I am a junior student and I love music.
I had been using Overture until I saw this awesome free software.
I often use it for arranging piano sheets, or writing some music.
I hope MuseScore can be better.
And I want MuseScore to play more realistic sounds.

I am an inactive drummer (rated PAS level 5 a few years ago). I recently decided to write scores in the World Beat genre which is how I came across MuseScore. I have been surprisingly productive with the tool and wish to thank the engineers or developers. I love simplicity and the software's simplicity does not interfere with creativity. I am GRATEFUL.

My approach is to use the notation abilities of Musescore as well as its ability to produce MIDI files that I will use in a sequencer. I am about to enter this realm and will post to share as well as asking questions in the future. I am working with Caribbean/African at the moment and would like to hear from anyone with similar interest and, of course, Jazz.

I am a high school student, chorus geek, and I play in a post-hardcore band. I also enjoy writing songs (usually piano-based ballads). Music is my life so I spend most of my time composing or arranging, usually choral pieces or multi-instrumental pieces that reflect my emotions and what not. One of my favorite pieces (which is a work in progress) is my Reverie in G-sharp Minor: http://musescore.com/user/15912/scores/49200
One of my favorite choral pieces I've arranged/composed is "The Hanging Tree", which is adapted from a poem in the Hunger Games (it's in the third book.) Here it is: http://musescore.com/user/19303/scores/47654

I've been goofing around with musical instruments for literally as long as I can remember. I got my first guitar about the time I was big enough to manage one. A few years ago, in my early 40's, I developed a neuromuscular disorder. The first thing I lost was the ability to play guitar. I have a nice Casio keyboard I kept using for a while, but it just turned into a tracking device for the progression of my disease. So it went under the bed.

Numbskull that I am, I didn't realize until a few weeks ago that music can be digitally generated. I mean, I knew but it never occurred to me that it wasn't the sole province of house elves working for Disney Pixar or whatever. It never occurred to me that "I" could do that.

So I looked around the Web a while, downloaded this and that, and I was coming close to deciding I couldn't afford to do this right. (Have you seen the free Microsoft Magic Score? Good Lord!) Then I found this thing. It's like the guitar; easy to learn, much to master.

Thank you, you magnanimous angels of music. A thousand times.

I am the Artistic Director for the International Choir and Orchestra of Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam. I use MuseScore for writing arrangements for choir and orchestra. Especially for our Christmas concerts as I don't want to do the same old carols every year. I try to add at least a few new arrangements each time.

I also use MuseScore to engrave old scores for classical works we are doing. Sometimes just to transcribe them but often to do my own arrangements of the instrumental parts to make them work better for our particular group.

I am in an R&B band consisting young musicians. I use muse score to write out the horn parts. It is so much easier then doing it by hand. You can just transpose the music and change things up real quick if something is not as you wanted it to be. THanks Muse score for the wonderful, user-friendly software.

I'm a student in my first year of high school and I use Musescore for homework projects and for personal use. I found Musescore while Googling for a free notation software because the professional ones are a bit pricey, and I came across this, which I thought was the best option. I was actually surprised that such a good notation software came free! If I were older I'd donate something. Musescore has made my music composition life so much easier, easier to change key, notes, easier write and to send parts to friends and teachers and that's coming from a kid so that's pretty good. The simple stuff are the best stuff.

Drummer, with Roland TD12 kit... the MIDI seems to work very well with Roland and Yamaha modules that have MIDI in/out connectors. As a student drummer (2 + years) I use it to compose the measures we are practicing each week, then I take the laptop up by the drum kit and practice by reading the notes off the screen (MuseScore.) I like it because the notes are easier to read than those handwritten from my teacher (sorry boss) and I can zoom in for large viewing during practice. If something is truly difficult for me to understand the timing, composing this way helps me to 'get it.' - Musescore also can audibly play it through my notebook's speakers.
The blank scores of "3 line" and "5 line" unpitched percussion kits are very helpful! Supports alternate symbol for repeats (common in drum notation.)
The MIDI output files that result can be inputted into Roland practice software directly, such as DT-1 or HT-1

Anyway, it's great. THANK YOU! This tool for me, has helped my drum learning greatly, I was having difficulty last year with some difficult parts (darn you "Boston!" ) - and almost quit and Muse has helped me understand a lot better!

I also like, that everything is configurable... you want more space between staves? You got it - etc.
Thank you thank you.

It was pure luck that I found musescore, but I'm happy I did. My friend posted a score on another friend's facebook page, and I decided to click, listen, and I liked it. I looked up more and more songs and decided to give it a try. I've played French Horn for 7 years now, starting it 4th grade, and creating a few "test" scores turned out to not be too bad (but I'd rather not post them, since they aren't the best). Right now I'm using it almost as a way to get deeper into music and understanding how scores are written, how parts are put together, but to also have fun. Hopefully the score I'm halfway done (3 weeks on, now) will turn out better than the one for Time from the movie Inception. I will say that this program was definately great to discover. With or without a background in music / reading sheet music, musescore is made in such a way that it's almost impossible not to make a piece of music with. Thanks for making such a great program!

My Aunt is turning 100 this weekend and I wrote her a song. Since my handwriting is atrocious and I'm bad at musical transcription, I looked for a free program to do the notation.

I am not a trained musician; I play a guitar and a uke and the tympani and I sing a bit (not all at the same time!) To be honest, I don't even know what half the options in the program mean. It took me four hours to type in the notes (no midi) and add the lyrics and chords. The result, though, is far more professional than I ever could have done on my own. Since I have written several other songs, I now have a means to "publish" them in rudimentary form. I see that I could also use this program to write simple pieces for my 2 octave handbell choir. I will take the time to learn more about MusicScore to see how else I can use it.

I would like to thank the creators of this program for sharing it with all of us. I thoroughly enjoyed reading all the above stories of how people use it to create music, and to teach, to learn, to practise. May the muse continue to be with you all.

I have a traditional Irish Folk band and when there were only 3 of us, we could get away with just using chord charts and playing by ear. Now, however, we have a fiddle player that we stole from the local community orchestra and playing by ear isn't her strong suit. While I have quite a few tune books, very often the arrangements in the books aren't in the key we play the song in, or the rhythm or time signature is different, so I use MuseScore to arrange the tunes to fit our style and the keys we play in. I used to do this by hand and it took forever, but now I can knock out 6 or 7 tunes in an hour and she's much happier.

I am learning to play the Chromatic Button Accordion. There are few books in English for this instrument so I am working from a tutor book series written in French. All the scores in the tutor books are provided with metronome speeds. I enter each practice piece in MuseScore. This enables me to then play along with MuseScore which has many advantages.
I can set the tempo much slower than the target tempo and practice just the treble or bass line. Then I can bring them together. Once together I can gradually increase the tempo until I can play the music in time at the target speed. The beauty of this approach is that it is constantly giving me something to compare my playing to. By starting slowly I find that the gaps between the notes become apparent. By that I mean the initial slow tempo reveals when to change the bellows or to make preparatory changes of finger position. This makes a significant difference for achieving the higher target speeds. I am not a professional musician, just a beginner, but I feel that the ability to slow the playing time down gives me an experience similar to that of a more competent player as it allows me to play the music at a speed that my mental processing can keep up with until the muscle memory can take over.

I am also a member of a local Molly Dancing side (think Morris Dancing but with attitude :-)
I am using MuseScore to produce professional quality scores for the music for all the dances we do. This will enable new musicians to either read the music or play the music in MuseScore and learn the music by ear.

Thanks to everyone involved with MuseScore for creating and maintaining such a great application.

Johnathan

I use MuseScore for composing my choral and vocal music; also to arrange choral music and display it through a projector in my choral classroom. I love the feature where you can create PDF files with it. I have a "high-end and high -priced" notation software installed but I've found myself using more frequently the MuseScore.

Hi there. I dreamed of playing Violin since I was a kid. I actually did it (11 years old). It was a nightmare. Too difficult. Simply impossible. Gave it a new shot when I was 25 and loved it. Even though it was still hard my dream was suddenly possible and I could start playing simple/small songs. All public domain! =)

I love MuseScore because it is open-source. So people I recommend the software won't have to pay for it and because it is cross platform. I'm planning to use linux soon and the same software will be there for me when I need it.

My dream of playing some of Vivaldi's(and tons of other beautiful and inspiring) songs is still a work in progress. But being able to share songs -- in an OPEN format --, midi and the PDF file are a HUGE win for me. ;-)

Greetings to everyone using this awesome piece of software and cheers from sunny Brazil.

Victor

I'm an amateur choral director who leads the choir and the congregation at church. I have been using MuseScore for over three years now and can't imagine using anything else. It's so easy! I write and arrange choral music with some occasional piano arrangements. From time to time I also add flute or violin music to my arrangements. MuseScore provides the perfect balance of notation, composition, production and playback. It's amazing to me.

I'm also a full-time software engineer, so I know a lot about writing computer software. MuseScore is very well written software, which makes it easy to produce and run on Windows, Linux and Mac. The software engineers who have created MuseScore are also musicians representing a variety of genres and instruments so they really know their stuff.

I teach music in the high school. Now I use only MuseScore for all transcription, exercises, examples in my profession. I show to my students how practical and easy MuseScore is. I hope they will begin to use it too. I've created a little blog with video-tutorials in italian to teach how to use this fantastic program: http://corso-musescore.blogspot.ch
I hope it can be useful.
Matt

My 4-year-old grandson saw and heard me using MuseScore, and was fascinated by the cursor marching along while the notes played. We have now gotten into a routine which he starts by asking me if we can "do the note thing." So I start a new score for him, ask him what instruments he wants to use, whether he wants it in sharps or flats and how many, and whether it should be 4/4 or 3/8 time etc. (he even uses 5/4 sometimes!). He invents a name for the piece, and then I turn him loose entering notes. The result is he now has about a dozen of his own "compositions," which would drive music-theory people crazy, but it's lots of fun, and he is learning so much so fast! He always wants to add "shave and a haircut" at the end, and can recognize it by the accidental when it's there. We downloaded some tunes, too, but there aren't too many for kids encoded in MuseScore yet, but we found some MIDI files that work.

I am not the most proficient Piano player, but I lie to write music. All my songs used to use simple octaves for the base clef, and sometimes some simple chords, but now, with Muse Score, I can create a fully formed idea using the bass clef, then print it out and play it. Your software is easy to use, and I love writing music, and this makes for a great combination.

First, a thousand 'thank-yous' for such a great programme.

I play percussion (anything that needs hitting, including keys) in 4 bands / orchestras. Sometimes, for a given tune, I am given music for up to 6 different instruments, mostly as individual sheets. Trying to juggle all of these sheets while dashing between, for instance, kettle drums (tympani), vibraphone, snare drum, marimba, chimes, glockenspiel, etc., etc. gets somewhat confusing.

So, I use MuseScore to consolidate everything on one score. That way I can have one common sheet of music on each music stand. Makes sense to me !!

The most satisfying thing I have done with MuseScore is to recommend it to a friend who is trying to write a jazz opera. His problem is that, though he is extremely musical, his only instruments are his guitar and his voice; and he has little musical training. I have been completely amazed at what this new tool has done for him. Because MuseScore allows him to hear what he writes he has been able to go from very rudimentary melodies that he needs help to transcribe, to complex and quite good arrangements for voices and several instruments, and he has done this in a matter of just a few months. Frankly, I don't think he has slept since the first couple of lessons I gave him. MuseScore has opened a new world for him as a composer. I am feeling rather humbled and not a little envious.

Well, I use it mostly for generating MIDIs. And sometimes for generating the sheet music.

I use Musescore for arranging music for my own performances - both for the band I work with and for my own performance - solo voice and piano accordeon.
I took a course on composing Term 3 of 2014 - that's when I really go into the Application, needing to write for my final assignment and during the Course I moved from using manuscript paper to writing directly into Musescore.
Being retired from work, I couldn't afford to buy applications such as Sibelius - with the features in Musescore 2.0 this Application does all I need!!

I am singing 10+ years in a men's choir (//www.mannenkooreuterpe.nl ). Since a few years I an responsible for the sheet music (handing out, archiving, and getting it back from the members. We do have over 500 numbers in the archive. the choir consists of around 100 men.

The choir exists 50 years (this year). In the begin years the music was hand written, and over the years copied over and over again. As result on some music one can't distinguesh anymoer between open and solid notes...

So, since I am since a few month retired I have now time (but no money) to re-write it. For this I use MuseScore. After my first exercise I moved to MuseScore v2.

I have no midi keyboard (don't know if that works on iMac), and I don't play piano (I used to have a few years piano lessons in my youth, so I am able to read and sing from sheet music).
At this moment I enter the music using my computer keyboard.

I have no experience in other music programs like Sibelius, Mozart or Lilipond, but MuseScore is really good stuff.

In short, I use it for fun. Music "composition" is really a hobby for me. I compose for the piano, but some of the things I have composed are beyond my ability to play. I did a latest piece (I've done about 9 so far but I am nervous about uploading them onto this site) which I can just about learn I think.

I have always liked "jolly" sounding music, so I write music that sounds happy or jolly, rather than serious, though sometimes it can be a bit unusual and people might not get the idea of it. But it's really all as a bit of fun. I definitely appreciate that there is this good quality music notation software that I can use to make my strange ideas heard.

I'm using MuseScore to transcribe songs from old (1920's!) or illegible church hymnals to make them easier for me and my organist to read. Except as I'm learning to use the program, I'm liking it so much that I might try composing some responsorial psalms or such. What a great tool!

I'm a "retired band geek", so I use my half-remembered music-reading abilities to compose things (one year reading treble clef and six on bass). Of course, I didn't take music theory or ear-training, so it's more of, "I hope MuseScore isn't allowing me to break the (musical) rules!"

I have two scores posted here, two partially-finished, five originals planned and six transposed (a couple of hymns, two Broadway tunes and some others--leaving the copyright intact, of course). I've even turned the wav output files into music videos and posted them on YouTube. (I'm too lazy to press space every time a new measure comes up, so there won't be any video scores.)

...and I lost my train of thought. Great.

I sing in a male voice choir (TTBB) and most of our music is very old style 30s&40s laid out in an old-fashioned way.
Tenor staff, followed by bass staff, followed by tenor Tonic Solfa, followed by lyrics, followed by Bass Tonic solfa. Which makes following notes/lyrics difficult.
I use musescore first to set out the music (without Tonic solfa- though that would be useful) in a far clearer way, most songs being on 2 A4 pages so there are no page turns when we perform.
I also "correct" examples of poor notation in the current layouts.

I also produce practice mp3 & audio CDs from MuseScore so members who don't read music can still practice away from our choir practice sessions, These files simply have one voice emphasised with the other 3 parts and accompaniment playing but at a lesser volume and with a different sound. Seems to work well.

I also do large copies for the less well sighted (we're mostly all senior citizens), this with virtually no effort as I simply created a second style which enlarges everything. The only down-side to this is that the choir master can no longer say "top of page two" and instead uses bar numbers.

Brilliant software, glad I found it and the voluntary support is brilliant.
Thanks o everyone involved.

I use MuseScore primarily to: a) recreate a missing orchestral score from the parts; b) recreate missing parts from the score; c) transpose clefs for less experienced players; d) simplify parts to make difficult passages accessible for those senior citizens who have followed their doctor's advice to take up playing an instrument in their golden years; e) create playback of sonatas and concertos for myself in which the solo part can be selectively muted; and f) help a friend with his compositions.

One really nice feature of the fifth item is that a passage can be slowed down in order to gain mastery.

Hi Marc. I've been writing songs all of my life and decided to get everything fully documented.

BTW, is it OK to discuss general musicianship topics here at MS? Things like Theory, Composition and Performance? Which subforum is best for that?

Hello,
I’m not a composer or anything like that, i’m just an hobbyist musician playing jazz (mainly bass, and a little bit of guitar).
I use MuseScore to write down bass parts from recording and also.. (ok it’s strange I know) to learn rhythm, because the drum writing part is very clear, simple, easy to use.
So I mainly use MuseScore as a learning tool, and it is great for that.

I am wondering if anyone here is using MS to write songs? I do not mean instrumental music alone. I mean the text (lyrics) and music.

I play 1st Trumpet in a town band. When I get new music I copy it with MuseScore to make it easier to read by enlarging it and spreading it out, especially music that was formatted for a lyre; and to have a clean sheet that isn't covered with the prior owner's scribbling. I also add cues from the other instruments.

When the trumpets aren't playing in unison I write the score for all of us, and play it so I can hear what everyone is supposed to be doing.

It is very helpful to hear MuseScore play my part perfectly with the metronome accompanying it.

I'm composing a song for my neice and wanted to write down the parts to see what works best to fit all the parts together for what I had in mind... just wish I knew how to get the casio tones loaded to have different instruments for this program to have the instruments I want to use, because I started to compose this song just playing the parts on keyboard and putting it all together on audacity but it's becoming a complicated mess with all the different ideas I have fo reach part to try for several different parts in the song.
I do like music a lot. besides, writing and playing music, I created a new system to teach people how to note read music using shapes and colors on piano. it has five difficulty levels of sheet music I created myself..it's on YouTube if you youtube " learn how to note read with shapes and colors on piano 99 bottles of beer on the wall" . then I did a similar system for violin using shapes for each string with a spectrum of colors for the note finger number position on violin . it amuses me.

I'm mostly a violinist in orchestras, and have recently realised that there are two things preventing me from progressing on the piano. First, I never practised scales and arpeggios as a kid, so they don't fit under my fingers as easily as they should. MuseScore is no help with that, so I am calling on all my reserves of grit and determination to get through that one! But also, I realise from watching a friend who is a very good pianist, she reads chords and harmonies, where I read melody lines. She looks at a chord and knows what is there, where I have to pick out every note individually. So, I determined that I would study harmony to try to be more Bronwen! But it is so much easier to do exercises when you don't have to laboriously write out every note, get to the piano, find a mistake, so MuseScore is helping me massively with this. I can also change harmonies and have several different versions at once to compare, which is invaluable! As part of my studies I am writing some accompaniments for my young son's trumpet pieces, but for me it is really a very useful study tool!

I’m a retired scientist (Molecular Biology)/computer programmer (loved c hated c++)/jazz pianist (mostly self-taught with Mark Levine’s book after classical training as a child). My main interests are in jazz harmony & reharmonizations, which I posted. My current project is to “Unravel Ravel”. I am transcribing several of his piano pieces, following Bach’s advice, who said: “Everything I know I learned from transcribing works of other composers”. Ravel’s use of harmony is highly unusual, and as far as I can tell nobody had quite figured it out. Yet he coyly said: “My music is very simple. It’s like Mozart.” So, there must be a system.
Just today I realized that via export to xml I can analyze his ‘style’ in Excel, where I can test for all kinds of patterns, do all kind of stats, and approach his music as if I came from Mars. It’s like a reverse engineering project. Wish me luck!

I’m a retired scientist (Molecular Biology)/computer programmer (loved c hated c++)/jazz pianist (mostly self-taught with Mark Levine’s book after classical training as a child). My main interests are in jazz harmony & reharmonizations, which I posted. My current project is to “Unravel Ravel”. I am transcribing several of his piano pieces, following Bach’s advice, who said: “Everything I know I learned from transcribing works of other composers”. Ravel’s use of harmony is highly unusual, and as far as I can tell nobody had quite figured it out. Yet he coyly said: “My music is very simple. It’s like Mozart.” So, there must be a system.
Just today I realized that via export to xml I can analyze his ‘style’ in Excel, where I can test for all kinds of patterns, do all kind of stats, and approach his music as if I came from Mars. It’s like a reverse engineering project. Wish me luck!

I am a composer. I was born in Peru in 1970, and back then music wasn't seen as a "realistic" job for most people over there. So I went for many other creative areas and ended up making my living from graphic design, 3D (blender fan here), advertising (mostly as art director and copywriter), film director and motion designer. I worked for big agencies and got some awards on these areas, while music was a hobby involving mostly andean-african peruvian traditions and instruments than notation.
I moved to Bahia, Brazil, around 1998, and here I was eventually able to dedicate some time to music again. I started my offical studies in composition in 2011 (at 41 years old) at the Federal University of Bahia's School of Music (EMUS/UFBA), along with (re) learning piano, viola and clarinet. So that's about when I started to use notation software more "seriously".
I started with MuseScore 1.0 which was great on the first years. Then along the composition course I started having some engraving needs that weren't there. Most of my teachers and colleagues insisted that I used Finale (and few of them, Sibelius) but it was hard for me to adapt to those particular pieces of software and their ideas of good UI and code practices. I ended up using tools outside the "big boys" list up to my graduation.
I also have a humble history with programming, starting with basic and assembly as a kid, and nowadays learning a little javascript, c or c++ as I needed. I've contributed with plugins for 3D apps and other commercial software.
I remember one of the things that didn't work for me was Feathered Beams, and I contributed a bit to fixing that in MuseScore around 2012, but I had little spare time and limited skills to contribute more.
Now that I have my degree (and my time back), and on this "pandemic" times, I returned to MuseScore, and I must say I'm amazed about how far it has arrived in every aspect with the effort of contributors. I am willing to make it my tool of choice once more and contribute when I find possible.
My work in MuseScore involves mostly instrumental/chamber/orchestral work that is best done when including several "contemporary notation" practices, like: cutaway scores, proportional time, proportional pitch, improvisative non-tonal sections, repeat boxes, feathered beams, staff changes, graphics, text instructions, big time signatures, custom noteheads, and customization of some details where possible, as in using straight beams or custom musical fonts that add a personal engraving "touch" that is so much welcome in this particular niche of the contemporary arts.

I'm writing original worship music for my church. I play guitar, bass and ukulele but it's more intuitive for my to write with a keyboard. The MIDI input is great

I use it mainly for backing up scores from other programs; also to make videos of them to share with friends and family. The sound of Musescore is a little more realistic. I use to use an Autocomposer program and Cakewalk back when I started dabbling in composition. Now I mainly use Musink Lite for composing (for it's ease of use) and Musescore for backing them up plus editing in more advanced features that Musink doesn't support ie. trill playback; arpeggios; and such.

I am a teenage composer who likes a lot of kinds of music. Until a year and a half ago, I didn’t see myself as a composer, but loved creating music. I wrote my first piece when I was four.
In September 2022, my aunt suggested musescore to me when I asked if there was any free software I could use to notate music with. Immediately, I wrote two pieces for her string quartet to play (See “microwaved popcorn” and “missing pieces” on my musescore.com profile). Musescore was currently in its 3.6 phase back then. I am amazed at how much it has changed since then. For a while, I had no idea I could put musescore 4 on the computer I used. Then I found out that it didn’t need muse hub to run 😂.
That’s how I didn’t get to use Muse Sounds for many months. Due to this, I think of it differently. Not as the default sounds for MuseScore 4, but as an extra soundfont (soundfont, right?) for publishing and checking orchestration. Currently unable to get vst3 to work, though.
I think it is absolutely INCREDIBLE that there is free notation software with some of the best sounds around, and a whole community of people with it who also like music like you.

Hi Marc
Great respect with regard to Trumpet, performance composing etc and your teaching.
However Musescore is predatory, they promote uploading my music and then sell it in the form of daily monthly or yearly charges. They are a load of bloodsuckers..
Steve Brooks