Music Software Recommendation

[sparhawk]

Can one of our musicians recommend a good music software? What I would like it to have is that you can pick notes with icons and put it on the sheet. Currently I have found a music software, but the problem is it requires that you know all the terms. Since I'm not a musician I don't know all the terms of the musical notations, and even if I knoew them, I wouldn't know how they are named in english. So I wondered if there is something that shows the symbols via icons where you can simply pick and place how you need it.

 

If it is free it wouldn't hurt either.

[oDDity]

I think Sibelius is the best software around for this.

[pakmannen]

Well, most (alright, "advanced") sequenzers can do this: Cubase, Cakewalk etc. I'm sure there are some free sequenzers as well which can then output your notations to midi/vst whatever.

 

(edited)

[OrbWeaver]

Are you talking about "piano roll" notation where the music is displayed on a grid, with time going horizontally and pitch going vertically?

 

This should be available in most MIDI sequencers as pakmannen said. The only free one I know is Rosegarden4 for Linux, but there may be others.

[sparhawk]

I'm talking about normal note notation. The reason is because I have some books with childrens songs, that I don't know. The musical notes are in there, so I would like to put it into the computer so that I can hear the songs with my kids.

 

You know, sheets like that:

[drumple]

Harmony-Central keeps track of a wide variety of sound processing software, some of it free and for many

different platforms. as for recommending one specific one, it depends on what kind your looking for,

midi, mod, wav.. ect..

 

http://www.harmony-central.com/Software

 

looks like a waltz, 3/4 time. try the software oddity recommended.

[sparhawk]

This was just a sample for the notation. It doesn't mean that I want a software which works only with 3/4th tempo.

[pakmannen]

I got what you were saying, so my recommendations are still valid. Probably too expensive though unless you want to "obtain" them via internet.

[drumple]

well, i wasnt shure if you wanted it to read notation, piano roll.. ect.. that software will read it regardless

of the time.

[OrbWeaver]

There should be some free software which does notation like that, although it won't be as good as the professional offerings.

 

It also depends on what sort of quality of playback you want - some software is designed primarily or exclusively for the production of printed sheet music so offers only very basic playback facilities. Sequencers on the other hand do very sophisticated playback and recording but might not be so strong in the notation department.

 

I believe that Sibelius is widely considered the best for this sort of thing, but being a professional tool it is likely to be very expensive.

[SneaksieDave]

As mentioned in a different thread, Anvil Studio is free. But if you're going with linux, rosegarden is probably better.

 

http://www.anvilstudio.com/

[Magnesius]

I can always recommend the good old "Deluxe Music Construction Set" for the Amiga (emulator).

 

 

It does its job, and you might find someone who still has the disc in a dusty corner. While the whole program is limited to the Amiga midi features, it does not come up with so many instruments - but hey! I played with it a bit when I was 10 (when not playing Rick Dangerous, though).

Edited February 25, 2006 by Magnesius

[sparhawk]

Something like this sounds perfect. I had an Amiga, but I never bothered with the emulator for it.

[Domarius]

I used to have software that did exactly this - it was a MIDI music composing program with a real musical notation interface. I actually bought it. I hope I backed it up somewhere because I have no idea what happened to the box. Was kinda buggy though, and was really made for Win 3.1 so may not even run.

 

However, I think I may have found some alternatives, though I have not used any of them;

 

This one looks most like the one I had

http://www.noteworthysoftware.com/composer/screenshot.htm

 

Hey this one is free, check it out

http://www5f.biglobe.ne.jp/~mcs/emc.html

[sparhawk]

I'l check ou tthis Noteworthy. Looks exactly like what I wanted.