The reason I decided to use MuseScore

• Dec 17, 2009 - 22:18

I was slowly buying upgrades and various brands of notation software to render some of my older things from manuscript. Every notation that was reasonably priced was severely limited when it came to copying out some of my orchestral scores. I accidentally found MuseScore listed on a blog and at the price I couldn't pass it up. MuseScore has turned out to be far better than I expected.

I've attached my 'Work no 19, no. 11 - Nighthawks At Dusk" from 1982. This is the first time it's been copied out since the 1982 manuscript currently sitting in the UCLA special collections dept. I'm seriously pleased. There are a couple of little things I haven't been able to locate in MuseScore, like a non divisi symbol for the strings, and the Anvil sounds like a crash cymbal once it's inserted into this score. But all in all it gives a nice idea of what the piece sounds like; I'm not really looking for a virtual orchestra right now. I need to get these things timed, printable, and a good audio example, which the program seems to accomplish.

I like the idea of colored note heads when the instruments get "out of range", even though an excellent player or some instrument tweaking can always make the needed adjustments to get the sound.

Whoever built this software -Thanks so much!!

Attachment Size
Nighthawk_2.mscz 15.09 KB

Comments

• Dec 18, 2009 - 00:07

Regarding non-divisi, the latest prerelease has a vertical bracket in the Arpeggios palette that can be used for indicating double stops. (Please note that scores edited in current prereleases are not backwards compatible with 0.9.5).

In version 0.9.5 I suppose you could write out "non divisi" using staff text.

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• Dec 23, 2009 - 00:16

There would appear to be a lot of orphaned triplet and quintuplet symbols on the oboe, clarinet and horn parts. Does this only appear on my version, or are these down to 'leftovers' after editing the score?

By the way - quite interesting music - along the lines of Edgard Varese, IMHO. Any chance of hearing some more?

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• Dec 23, 2009 - 16:10

Rhythmically the score looks very close as it does in manuscript, cleaner of course. If your version shows an isolation of the instruments, and some triplets with an eight note rest followed by the two remaining eighths, and some quintuplets with three of the five sixteenths with a rest to fill, it would be correct. To get MuseScore to do some of these things, I had to do some creative manipulation of the elements, hide a few things, etc., but I'm pleased with the way it rendered.

Thank you for your interest in the score. I can post something else later, but I mostly wanted to show how MuseScore handles a large orchestra with a moderate complexity of writing.

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• Dec 23, 2009 - 20:20

I'm not certain what you mean, but I think that my version is different to yours. Bar 1, for example, shows a quintuplet line in the contrabassoons over a semibreve rest, followed by a triplet sign in the bassoons over a semibreve rest. The harp part does not show a triplet in the treble line and the upper violin part seems to be missing its quintuplet sign. Looks like these have moved.

I have attached a pdf for you to see what I mean (page 4 is a very good example).

Attachment Size
Nighthawk.pdf 490.9 KB

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• Dec 24, 2009 - 01:32

I see that the pdf isn't like my MuseScore rendition. Those brackets have somehow moved in the pdf you've attached. In the MuseScore version I have (version 0.9.5) on my Windows XP, the quintuplet is over the 1st Violins beat 1, and the triplet bracket is over the harp beat 4 - both in measure 1.

I set the score page layout up with the custom option 8.50in wide X 29.50in height. The reason I'm mentioning this is that when I change the size of the paper (for example use size A1), the brackets disappear from the violins and harp, and shift up the score much like your pdf.

I'm new to MuseScore myself so I can't say if this is a bug or just some technique. I would think that the page would default to what size the writer set it and the problem wouldn't appear. I'll take another look at the score and do some editorial touch up before I do any printing. I see some re-spacing needed for a few notes that look like like they're too close to their accidentals; I tried several distances trying to get what works best.

By the way, flute 1 - measure 1 is correct in that beat two is 5 sixteenths against 4 sixteenths notes, but flute 2 has a ghost note "G" that popped up unexpectedly ( notice there are two "G" notes). I thought I had corrected it in the final version. It disappears when the "green 2" layer box button, located in the tool bar is pressed, but reappears when the score is reloaded.

Thanks for pointing this out. I plan on taking a look at the score you uploaded and see if any of quirks appear, from my side.

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• Dec 24, 2009 - 15:27

I will take a proper look at this later, but there are 2 obvious issues here that spring to mind.

1 - I am using Linux, whereas you are using windows XP. This may well be something to do with the positioning error. It might be useful to know what view other windows users are getting - yours or mine.

2 - The pdf that I created was by using the 'save as' option in musescore. I didn't really look to see if there were options on sizing, as the truncated version that I uploaded showed the problem that I saw using the musescore file.

Will do a bit more investigating (still very very very much a novice at this) and let you know if I discover anything useful.

In the meantime, have a good Christmas Eve.

Steve

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• Dec 25, 2009 - 12:52

Just to clarify:

Page size information is stored in the MuseScore file. A score will appear on the same page size on every version of MuseScore.

I see the same problem of "orphaned" tuplet bracket using MuseScore 0.9.5 on Windows XP. Jsarag_oz_a, did you try reopening the file to check whether it is the same as left it? There is a known bug in 0.9.5 related to positioning of tuplet brackets. The brackets may not stay in the same place after you save the file (see #2315: Position of tuplet bracket not saved )

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• Dec 27, 2009 - 17:26

David:
I've tried reopening the file that was originally uploaded here and also the last the most recently edited one on my Dell. I don't encounter the problem of "orphaned" tuplet brackets that both of you get. I'm uploading my most recent edit so you can see if there is a difference in the positioning of tuplets but I haven't done anything to attempt to change the tuplets in the new file. I suppose if the problem continues I can delete the note groups in question and rewrite them to see if the problem still shows up.
Thanks,
Justin

Attachment Size
Nighthawk_2.mscz 15.09 KB

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• Dec 27, 2009 - 21:51

Justin,

Just taking a quick look, there appears to be no change, i.e. you still have the 'orphans' there as per your original upload.
Sorry to bring bad tidings (it is Christmas after all!!)

Perhaps you could try saving as a pdf and seeing what this looks like?

Cheers,
Steve

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• Dec 29, 2009 - 02:02

Steve:
That's a shame. It looks fine on mine and ultimately that's what I need it for, i.e. to copy my own music. But if it's not possible to share across users, that makes it difficult. I'm not a programmer so I have no idea if it's the size of the orchestra, some combination of elements, or just a glitch that recopying will fix, but thanks for pointing it out. Later I'll do one more re-post after I recopy the bracketed elements and see if it fixes.
Jusitn

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