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This and a feature to “insert” note lengths instead of “overwriting” them, is imo a fundamental piece of missing feature. I have the same experience with postin

This and a feature to “insert” note lengths instead of “overwriting” them, is imo a fundamental piece of missing feature. I have the same experience with posting a request for help in this direction. They’re very pedantic when it comes to how a person uses the software. (The use case I need this for us when I want to transcribe music by ear. I first use my MIDI device to type all the notes, and subsequently modify the lengths. Currently I have to cut, modify length, paste, repeat. For every, single, note, rest… Extremely annoying) If anyone knows software that can help me with this, or another way to transcribe music wrt my use case, let me know!

reikonomusha 3y ago
As far as open-source software is concerned, you can use Lilypond [1]. Fully text-based transcription. You can edit, insert, splice, overwrite, etc. to your heart's content in your favorite text editor and get a high-quality engraving as output. [1] https://lilypond.org/ https://lilypond.org/
- PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
  As much as lilypond is awesome, it really is NOT the same sort of tool as musescore. Lilypond's purpose is to create "beautiful engraved (printed) scores". Musescore is as much a compositional tool as anything else, although the (now-former) project lead does value the printed output too, and believes that Musescore is now better than lilypond in several ways.
  - kazinator 3y ago
    LilyPond is much, much better suited toward writing music that doesn't exist yet and is changing as you invent it. Because, as reikonomusha put it in the previous comment, "you can edit, insert, splice, overwrite, etc. to your heart's content in your favorite text editor", which makes the overwhelming difference. You don't see the notation as you're entering it, but you have a way to iterate on that. However, it greatly helps if you're a developer or computer scientist, since you're working with a compiled markup language. LilyPond isn't the answer for regular mortals. LilyPond has sane playback. If the piece you've written is 3 bars long so far, and you play the MIDI file that pops out of the compile, you hear 3 bars and then it terminates. MuseScore requires you to specify the number of bars before you compose and then gives you sheet full of that many empty bars. When you click play, it plays through all the notes you have composed so far ... and then doesn't stop! It goes through the empty bars. It's like the Forrest Gump of music programs. Run, MuseScore, run! If you put a double bar in its path, it doesn't get fooled: that's not the actual end of the file, so it blows right through it.
wizofaus 3y ago
In principle that might even be possible with a plugin, but the commands to double/halve durations can also help. Usually I end up just copying and pasting though. I agree it'd be nice to be able to easily arbitrarily shorten or lengthen notes while having following notes automatically shift to accommodate, though it's not the #1 feature I think's missing (I say that as a sometime contributor to the project).
- ShadowBanThis01 3y ago
  What's your #1 missing feature?
  - wizofaus 3y ago
    If I had to pick one it'd probably be proper support for score instructions that appear over multiple staves. I was involved in trying to design the feature and was supposed to help implement it but a change of circumstances at the time meant I didn't have time to dedicate to it, so a very-much-simplified version was developed separately. I gather basically it requires editing the template files to customise. I do remember there was significant debate over what such a feature should be called, and that the proposed name didn't really make sense to me (I think it was "system text" or something similar).
- kazinator 3y ago
  If you're not a music notation genius trying to compose a complex, syncopated rhythms where you need the right rest values in between notes, MuseScore makes it very difficult. You can't just guess at the time values and then delete or insert bits of time in any way that is obvious or discoverable. Here is a question: suppose you decide that you need an anacrusis (or "pickup measure") but didn't specify one at document creation time. Where can you do that? It's not discoverable at all. There is a submenu under Add for measures, in which you can insert measures at the beginning or end, but full measures only with all the beats.
  - wizofaus 3y ago
    Huh? That's simple - just change "actual" (vs "nominal") time signature in the measure properties. What is a problem for me though is that the measure properties dialog opens up behind the main window...
derriz 3y ago
This is such a common use-case or way of working (write down the melody/harmony first, then fix up the timing) and such a natural way to transcribe music, that it gets requested all the time. The weird thing is that the software can do this but they've made it so difficult and fiddly via the UI that it's impractical as part of any work-flow but there is nothing fundamental/technical preventing MuseScore from supporting this way of working. The forums are generally hostile when (new) users innocently ask how to use the software this way - perhaps out of fatigue. It seems it's been decided that the "one true way" to transcribe music is know how each note relates to the bar structure of music first before adding anything to your score. As a result it feels like trying to use a word processor stuck in overwrite mode.

reikonomusha 3y ago

As far as open-source software is concerned, you can use Lilypond [1]. Fully text-based transcription. You can edit, insert, splice, overwrite, etc. to your heart's content in your favorite text editor and get a high-quality engraving as output. [1] https://lilypond.org/ https://lilypond.org/

PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
As much as lilypond is awesome, it really is NOT the same sort of tool as musescore. Lilypond's purpose is to create "beautiful engraved (printed) scores". Musescore is as much a compositional tool as anything else, although the (now-former) project lead does value the printed output too, and believes that Musescore is now better than lilypond in several ways.
- kazinator 3y ago
  LilyPond is much, much better suited toward writing music that doesn't exist yet and is changing as you invent it. Because, as reikonomusha put it in the previous comment, "you can edit, insert, splice, overwrite, etc. to your heart's content in your favorite text editor", which makes the overwhelming difference. You don't see the notation as you're entering it, but you have a way to iterate on that. However, it greatly helps if you're a developer or computer scientist, since you're working with a compiled markup language. LilyPond isn't the answer for regular mortals. LilyPond has sane playback. If the piece you've written is 3 bars long so far, and you play the MIDI file that pops out of the compile, you hear 3 bars and then it terminates. MuseScore requires you to specify the number of bars before you compose and then gives you sheet full of that many empty bars. When you click play, it plays through all the notes you have composed so far ... and then doesn't stop! It goes through the empty bars. It's like the Forrest Gump of music programs. Run, MuseScore, run! If you put a double bar in its path, it doesn't get fooled: that's not the actual end of the file, so it blows right through it.

wizofaus 3y ago

In principle that might even be possible with a plugin, but the commands to double/halve durations can also help. Usually I end up just copying and pasting though. I agree it'd be nice to be able to easily arbitrarily shorten or lengthen notes while having following notes automatically shift to accommodate, though it's not the #1 feature I think's missing (I say that as a sometime contributor to the project).

ShadowBanThis01 3y ago
What's your #1 missing feature?
- wizofaus 3y ago
  If I had to pick one it'd probably be proper support for score instructions that appear over multiple staves. I was involved in trying to design the feature and was supposed to help implement it but a change of circumstances at the time meant I didn't have time to dedicate to it, so a very-much-simplified version was developed separately. I gather basically it requires editing the template files to customise. I do remember there was significant debate over what such a feature should be called, and that the proposed name didn't really make sense to me (I think it was "system text" or something similar).
kazinator 3y ago
If you're not a music notation genius trying to compose a complex, syncopated rhythms where you need the right rest values in between notes, MuseScore makes it very difficult. You can't just guess at the time values and then delete or insert bits of time in any way that is obvious or discoverable. Here is a question: suppose you decide that you need an anacrusis (or "pickup measure") but didn't specify one at document creation time. Where can you do that? It's not discoverable at all. There is a submenu under Add for measures, in which you can insert measures at the beginning or end, but full measures only with all the beats.
- wizofaus 3y ago
  Huh? That's simple - just change "actual" (vs "nominal") time signature in the measure properties. What is a problem for me though is that the measure properties dialog opens up behind the main window...

derriz 3y ago

This is such a common use-case or way of working (write down the melody/harmony first, then fix up the timing) and such a natural way to transcribe music, that it gets requested all the time. The weird thing is that the software can do this but they've made it so difficult and fiddly via the UI that it's impractical as part of any work-flow but there is nothing fundamental/technical preventing MuseScore from supporting this way of working. The forums are generally hostile when (new) users innocently ask how to use the software this way - perhaps out of fatigue. It seems it's been decided that the "one true way" to transcribe music is know how each note relates to the bar structure of music first before adding anything to your score. As a result it feels like trying to use a word processor stuck in overwrite mode.