Better Jazz Notation Support
MuseScore currently does not have a great deal of jazz notation. It would be great if there could be things implemented to more easily insert things like bends, falls, doits, and slashes for solo sections, as well as a more jazz-like font for notes, key/time signatures and the like. If it were also possible to use the more standard Jazz Font (like the ones here http://www.jazzfont.com/jazzchar.htm and http://www.jazzfont.com/textchar.htm ) that would be very useful. Thanks.
Comments
much of this is already implemented in the upcomming 2.0
In reply to much of this is already by Jojo-Schmitz
Ah, I didn't know that. I didn't see it when I looked at the roadmap.
In reply to Ah, I didn't know that. I by GeniusInFrance
bends, falls, doits are in 2.0, slash notation is possible in 1.x already, via Marc's plugin and Jazz fonts are in there too (to some extent), see http://musescore.org/en/handbook/chord-name
You are welcome to use the Jazz font for text if you own a copy - but it is a proprietary / commercial font and as such could never be part of MuseScore. It's a bit awkward to use Jazz for chord symbols because these are handled in a special way by MuseScore and do not render as ordinary text, although if you do a search, you may find a chord description file someone once put together to allow this. . The changes we are making for to chord symbol rendering for 2.0 (see http://musescore.org/en/node/21202) should actually make that easier, but still, someone would probably need to provide a new customized chord description file to get it to work.
But for the notation elements themselves (notes, clefs, time signatures, etc), MuseScore does not provide a way to substitute different fonts at all. For 2.0, it will provide a choice of two fonts, but neither go for a "handwritten" look. It would certainly be possible for someone to develop an open source handwritten music font, and then to modify MuseScore to allow use of it - MuseScore being open source, anyone who is sufficiently motivated & skilled can do so. Personally, I don't know that it's worth it. When I first switched from FInale to MuseScore, I missed the "handwritten" music font, but now when I compare my charts produced with MsueScore to my olders ones in Finale, the Finale ones look like affectations to me. I find I prefer the more "typeset" appearance. For chord symbols, though, it's not just an affectation - it's about a font that combines heavy strokes, good readability, but also a small horizontal footprint when rendered large. So I continue to prefer to "handwritten" fonts to "typeset" fonts for chords. And then for consistency, for other text as well. But of course, that doesn't mean there wouldn't be room for a handwritten music font as well.
I assume, BTW, you are aware of MuseJazz, the "handwritten" text font that comes with MuseScore. This could stand to be improved of course - or perhaps another alternative developed. There another area of opportunity for a sufficiently motivated / skilled person.