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Music Software for Mac OS X? 98

Posted by pudge from the mmmmm-usic dept.
tengwar writes "I'm an organist, and I sometimes have to prepare sheet music. I'd also like to do a bit of composition. I'm looking for music software for the Mac centered around standard notation. Playback would be nice, but it's not as important as a user interface that doesn't get in the way of plonking down notes on a stave fast enough for me to remember what I was trying to do. If possible I'd like something that will allow me to add the words for voice parts for hymns. Any advice?"
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Music Software for Mac OS X? More

Music Software for Mac OS X?

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  • Finale! (Score:5, Informative)

    by foooo ( 634898 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @11:44AM (#6666737) Journal
    Finale by Coda Software.

    www.finalemusic.com

    I live and die by it. Albeit on a PC but I they offer a Mac version.

    ~foooo

    • All listed products in thread (as of my post) (Score:5, Informative)

      by BoomerSooner ( 308737 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @12:20PM (#6667119) Homepage Journal
      Sibelius [sibelius.com]

      Harmony Assistant [myriad-online.com]

      Lime Music Notation [cerlsoundgroup.org]

      This is for the lazy, if you want to read on by all means do so (I may have missed a few). This was a great question because I was looking for the same answer!!! Thanks Ask Slashdot!

    • Re:Finale! (Score:3, Interesting)

      by mkldev ( 219128 )
      I don't believe the OS X version is shipping for another month....

    • Re:Finale! (Score:3, Interesting)

      by TrippTDF ( 513419 )
      I'm not a music person, but I've got a lot of friends that are, and they all swear by Finale. The mac version, too. It seems pretty descent for what you are talking about, too. If I remember correctly, it runs pretty well on older systems (it's all MIDI, I think) so you don't need anything too great. In fact, my college's Finale stations were all Beige G3s, and no one complained.

    • Igor engraver.... (Score:3, Informative)

      by Cpt_Corelli ( 307594 )
      Finale has a pretty steep learning curve compared to other notation software. I have used quite a few of them and found that Igor engraver is one of the best (and easiest to learn).

      See more at this link [noteheads.com]
      • I'm not wild about Igor Engraver. In my experience, it's extremely unstable, rather counter-intuitive ("L" for a slur, short-keys for articulations and rhythmic values mixed together, multiple unnecesary windows open during note entry, etc.), and the output doesn't look half as nice as Sibelius or even Finale.

        I was also amused/appalled that in more than one place, you can click a button/command, and get a dialogue saying that "this feature has not yet been implemented." Mind telling me what the interfac

    • Finale really does suck. OK, it may have 1001 features, but its interface is totally backwards and far too slow:

      Why have limited editing in page view?
      Why do I have to "enter" a bar (measure) before editing?
      Why do I have to manually "update layout" to make the bars reflow?
      Why does it have leave pixel artifacts everywhere until I manually force a redraw?
      How many dialogs deep is it possible to take the user (clue: more than 3)?

      Sibelius (www.sibelius.com) lets you concentrate on the music, taking care of the

    • Re:Finale! (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I live and die by it. Albeit on a PC but I [think] they offer a Mac version.

      Correction: It's a Mac program which also offers a PC version.

      It stands proudly with Photoshop, Dreamweaver, and Microsoft Word as programs which came out on the Mac first!

      Now, the bad news: No OS X version yet. Also, it's bloated and archaic.

      Once upon a time, Finale was the sizznit of music notation software. Now, I can't even recommend it over some of the better apps out there.

    • Re:Finale! (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Zanthany ( 166662 )

      Finale is great. Sibelius is great. Their price point, however, leaves much to be desired. Finale does have watered-down versions of their software. Allegro has most of the features of Finale, but is still pricey at ~$200. Finale also offers NotePad as a free download from their website [finalemusic.com], but as I have personally found out, it is very crippled, not intuitive, and generally uncustomizable.

      I would recommend over all these other apps Finale's PrintMusic. PrintMusic offers many of the features of Finale a

  • Will lilypond work? (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    http://www.lilypond.org
    • I've installed Lilypond through Fink, and every time I try to get a printable output from it, the notes have no heads, and it looks...really ugly (even apart from that). That makes it pretty useless...unless someone knows why this is happening, and/or how to fix it...?

      Dan Aris
    • lilypond with denemo (http://denemo.sourceforge.net) makes a pretty good Free music notation system. Both programs are installable through Fink (http://fink.sourceforge.net).
  • http://www.finalemusic.com/finale/system-requireme nts.asp it works for mac.... you may find "evaluation" version on gnutella

  • Finale by Coda (Score:3, Informative)

    by str8edge ( 34283 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @11:47AM (#6666773)
    Check out Finale by Coda [finalemusic.com]. I used the software for scoring music quite some time ago, and it was sufficient for my music theory classes. They have Mac OS versions available. The only downside - it is a commercial product.

  • Finale (Score:5, Informative)

    by FattMattP ( 86246 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @11:47AM (#6666778) Homepage
    Finale [finalemusic.com] is pretty much the standard on the Mac for notation.

    • Re:Finale (Score:5, Informative)

      by gmaestro ( 316742 ) <jason@guidry.gmail@com> on Monday August 11, 2003 @12:08PM (#6667015)
      Finale is not yet supported under OSX. It will be soon.

      Finale is a very nice package of software which I cannot live without, but it doesn;t sound like this guy needs that much, and I think I can save him $400. Allegro [finalemusic.com] is just as good, made by the same folks, without some of the advanced functionality (unlimited staves, customized staves, etc.). It also is not supported under OSX, ya' gotta use classic mode.

      • Finale is not yet supported under OSX. It will be soon.

        They've been saying this ever since OS X first came out. Yes, I know, it really will be released soon this time, but I'm sick and tired of Coda's crappy programming.

        Finale is the most un-Mac-like program ever, in every possible way you could imagine.

        It's also incredibly powerful. No other notation tool gives you nearly as much control over every aspect of the score, formatting, weird time signatures and key signatures, floating measures, alternate
        • It gives you powerful control over every aspect of the score. On the other hand, if it got the bloody placement of articulations and other markings right to begin with, you wouldn't need such minute control. There's nothing quite like having a dynamic marking, a slur marking, and a note articulation all simultaneously occupy the same space....

          If only Igor Engraver would move to Mac OS X.... Sigh.


      • MacCentral reports [macworld.com] that Finale for OS X will be available in October of this year.

        I'm not a musician, so I have no idea of the quality of this software; but the timeframe was in question, so now you know.
      • I believe Finale also offers discounts to schools and churches.

  • sibelius (Score:5, Informative)

    by zarqman ( 64555 ) <tm@zarCOLAqman.com minus caffeine> on Monday August 11, 2003 @11:48AM (#6666790) Homepage Journal
    sibelius
    sibelius.com [sibelius.com]

    finale is the other choice, but sibelius is much easier to use and learn - and in my experience is just as powerful. available for mac and windows.

    i was a music composition major and ended up using sibelius for nearly everything i wrote - instrumental works, choral, whatever. it does have limited playback features too.

    • Re:sibelius (Score:5, Informative)

      by BigDaddy ( 28409 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @11:54AM (#6666877)
      I'll second the support of Sibelius. I've spent the last three days working heavily on an arrangement, and I must say it is much better than Finale. Some features of note:
      • Better input using the standard keyboard (not MIDI) than Finale. Finale's input is slow unless you have MIDI. Sibelius has a much more useful system to get around this handicap.
      • More intuitive responses to changes in the score. Finale is not nearly as intelligent.
      • MacOS X native. To the best of my knowledge, Finale is still an OS9 app. Points to Sibelius for making the switch.
      There are some bugs, but overall Sibelius is a much better piece of software. Sadly, the price will prevent me from owning my own copy, but as long as I continue to work with my collaborator, I will have access to his. Sweet deal...

      • Re:sibelius (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward
        I teach a graduate level notation course in which students use both Finale and Sibelius, and I own a music publishing company. Both Finale and Sibelius are good. Both need constant tweaking.

        If you're looking for something quick, choose Sibelius, as the learning curve is easier.

        If you're looking for publication-quality, or if you might go that direction in the future, then choose Finale. It has the ability to tweak more parameters, particulary in-depth manipulation of slurs, that make it the only viable pr
      • Sibelius is simple and powerful. After reading through the tutorial, I put together a 4 page piano score in 2 hour with ties, accents, peddling, the works... There web support is outstanding as well. If you post to their support group, you will get a response in a day from their tech people, and probably sooner from another Sib user. I have not used Finale, but I'm sure you couldn't go wrong with it if you put in the time.
    • Unfortunately, I can't support this opinion... I tried Sibelius 2.0 for the PC awhile ago and found it completely lacking. I could record from my digital piano, but when I played it back, it automatically played the treble clef on MIDI channel 1 and the bass clef on MIDI channel 2. This, despite that I played the grand staff completely on channel 1 in real-time to record! (And there were no MIDI control settings to be found anywhere.)

      Now, it's possible that the mac version doesn't have this (or many of

  • Not to be so specific (Score:3, Insightful)

    by mhesseltine ( 541806 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @11:50AM (#6666822) Homepage Journal

    I've seen recommendations for Finale, which is available for Windows and Mac platforms. Is there any open-source software that also does the same thing, for the Linux/BSD crowd?

    • Not that I'm aware of. Finale is the de facto standard for notation, period. Anybody who's going to be doing music notation in a professional setting is going to be using that, so I think the likelihood of finding a program written for another OS is pretty low.

      Engraving programs are INCREDIBLY complicated, so it seems to me that it's very unlikely you'd find it in the open source community because of the incredibly high complexity and low number of people who use software like that.

      • Re:Not to be so specific (Score:1, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Actually, there's the ABC suite of programs which read ABC notation (ASCII text) and translate it into ornate script, MIDI, etc. There's also Lilypond and MusiTeX.

        Perhaps you meant "the incredibly high complexity of making a graphical notation editor that gets it right from playing the keyboard", not the high complexity of turning well specified, structured music into stave notation.

    • While I think the notation editor really only creates rough draught scores rather than professional, you could check out Rosegarden-4 [all-day-breakfast.com] for GNU/Linux.

      It also exports to Lilypond [lilypond.org] format, which does do professional score typesetting.

      Other options can be found here [condorow.net], though some of the apps are bit obscure.

    • http://linux-sound.org/notation.html

    • Re:Not to be so specific (Score:3, Informative)

      by GoRK ( 10018 )
      Yes. Rosegarden [all-day-breakfast.com] does this. I have not used it very much at all in a long time, but it does work fine, and if they have improved it since I last used it, then it may be a very slick application indeed.

      ~GoRK

  • Harmony Assistant (Score:5, Informative)

    by Moebius Loop ( 135536 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @11:54AM (#6666867) Homepage
    You should definitely check out Harmony Assistant. It's made by Myriad Software (http://www.myriad-online.com/enindex.htm). It's a little rough around the edges, but it does everything.

    I switched to it from Sibelius/Finale when they took too long to come out with a mac os x version (and charged too much when they did). Harmony Assistant is only $65, and they provide a reasonably crippled demo.

    They also make a plugin (that comes as a free trial with the software) called Virtual Singer that uses Text-to-Speech to give you an approximation of how a vocal piece will sound (kinda scary, but good for hearing what you're doing before you put it in front of a chorus)...

    There's also support for a million different kinds of tablature, all the usual staves and so forth. Like I said, it's a little rough around the edges, but a $65 price tag (compared to $600 for sibelius or finale) makes it all worth it.

    • Re:Harmony Assistant (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I second that. I've been a Melody Assistant user since version 3. Melody is the low-end version of Harmony, and it's only $15.
      • I'll third that. Melody Assistant is very nice. I've been using it for years for all kinds of things.
        • Fourth! One of the great things about Melody Assistant is the registration system. $15, free upgrades for life. Even when they changed the code format, they sent all registered users a new code in the new format, and each update brings substantial improvements to the program. It also has an intuitive lyric-entering interface, and it even has (for an extra price) a Virtual Singer that will sing the lyrics back to you in many languages. Playback is simple and will work with either MIDI or with an included sou
    • Harmony Assistant is a fabulous piece of software. It is a staff-centric composition tool, definitely geared toward musicians who read, write and prefer Standard Notation over tapedeck/pianoroll/drumbox metaphors. The vocabulary of notational devices is immense. Clefs, staves, tablature, tuplets, the works. Print quality is fabulous. From a simple guitar-chord + lyrics arrangement to multi-stave orchestral works, it produces great results.

      The number of features is very impressive and it is quite customizab

  • I'd check out Myriad's [myriad-online.com] Melody Assistant [myriad-online.com] or it's more powerful and more expensive sibling Harmony Assistant. [myriad-online.com] Melody is $15 shareware and quite powerful.

    I can't compare the speed of notation with other programs as I haven't used them much. Its been great for the work I've done, however.

  • Lime (Score:3, Informative)

    by bill_mcgonigle ( 4333 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @12:03PM (#6666969) Homepage Journal
    Lime [cerlsoundgroup.org] has quite a following.

    So does Google [google.com].

    • Re:Lime (Score:2, Informative)

      by stephentyrone ( 664894 )
      Lime is (approximately speaking) god's gift to the composer. It lacks some of the nifty input features of Finale, and it has less sophisticated playback. But, when it comes to laying out scores, and even composing, there's nothing that I'd rather use. It's wonderfully customizable (many 20th century notation conventions are much easier than in finale, you can use finale's alternate fonts, you can make it do damn near anything you want), and *it's free*.

      Let me repeat that: ***it's free***

      Finale sells fo

  • Hey (Score:5, Informative)

    by daeley ( 126313 ) * on Monday August 11, 2003 @12:11PM (#6667042) Homepage
    Funny you should ask, as this showed up in Fink Stable today:

    lilypond 1.6.10-2 (GNU Music Typesetter) [sourceforge.net]

    LilyPond prints beautiful sheet music. It produces music notation from a description file. It excels at typesetting classical music, but you can also print pop-songs. LilyPond input is plain text. So, you can use your favorite text editor to enter it, you can put it in mail or embed it in an article like this: \key c \minor r8 c16 b c8 g as c16 b c8 d | g,4 Or you can use it to print music from other programs, using one of the numerous input filters. LilyPond output looks beautiful. The font and the layout algorithms were inspired by engraved music, so you can expect that same clear and elegant look from your LilyPond output. And if anything is not to your liking, you can tweak almost everything. [Fink Packages (Stable) [sourceforge.net]]

    • Re:Hey (Score:2, Informative)

      by gperciva ( 240690 )
      Lilypond version 1.8.0 came out very recently; 1.6.10 is a year old or more. We use the kernel numbering scheme (1.7.x were development versions; 1.6 and 1.8 are stable versions).

      Cheers,
      - Graham

  • Intuem (Score:4, Informative)

    by torpor ( 458 ) <`ibisum' `at' `gmail.com'> on Monday August 11, 2003 @12:15PM (#6667069) Homepage Journal
    It is OSX Native, and works very well:

    http://www.intuem.com/ [intuem.com]

    • Re:Intuem (Score:3, Informative)

      by Dominic_Mazzoni ( 125164 ) *
      It is OSX Native, and works very well:

      http://www.intuem.com/

      Intuem is great for sequencing, but the original question was about sheet music software. Intuem does have a "staff" display, but this is not powerful enough for someone who wants to print out sheet music suitable for publication, or even suitable for distributing to someone else to sightread.
      • I beg to differ. I've given Intuem staff printouts to musicians to read plenty of times, and they've never had problems with it...

        Anyway, Intuem does work for printing sheet music.
        • I beg to differ. I've given Intuem staff printouts to musicians to read plenty of times, and they've never had problems with it...

          Anyway, Intuem does work for printing sheet music.

          What if you need first and second endings? What if you need articulations on top of notes, or crescendos? What if you need grace notes?

          These are not "power user" features, these are pretty basic formatting for sheet music, and Intuem is missing most (if not all) of them.

          I'm not trying to dis Intuem. I think it's a pretty c
          • Fair enough, but my point is: Intuem is an OSX music app, it works very well, it is very cheap and easy to use, and it does do musical notation.

            Maybe its not as sophisticated as Finale or a properly configured TeX setup, but Intuem is still a valid contendor in the list of "usable OSX music-printing apps", and therefore should be included. Who knows, maybe the next major release will add grace notes and articulations ... it *could* happen with the existing code...
  • Some versions of Cubase do scoring. It's probably not worth the expense unless you plan to do MIDI and/or audio recording too (at which it excels), but I'm reasonably happy with its scoring capabilities. It's a bit fiddly at times, but it's quite powerful, and because it's linked with the MIDI side of things you can play parts in with a MIDI keyboard in step time or real time, or enter them in the piano-roll editor (which can be faster for some types of music), and then see the results in traditional nota

  • Two great sites to check out. (Score:5, Informative)

    by xanderwilson ( 662093 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @12:24PM (#6667151) Homepage
    Check out

    http://www.osxaudio.com and
    http://www.macmusic.org

    two sites/communities for everything you could possibly want to know about Mac OS X audio software.

    Alex.

  • Ummm logic (Score:3, Informative)

    by boobert ( 7652 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @12:25PM (#6667169) Homepage
    I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Logic Audio. I don't know if they have a demo though. Apple owns them now. You might want to check out soundtrack it is supposed to be based on logic and might do the scoring also. It can be difficult to learn logic initially but it is a very powerful program. Make sure you get Logic Audio not Gold or platinum. For now Audio will do what you want and it doesn't cost $600. I think straight audio should be less than $200.
    • Soundtrack is NOT based on Logic. Logic will do the notation for you Soundtrack will not. Soundtrack is like AcidPro on the PC Logic is a full DAW with Notation
  • I know this is a little off topic, but I've been eager to ask the community for a while, so here goes:

    Can anyone recommend a good, cheap music tracking or creation package for the Mac for someone who is interested in getting into making music on their Mac.

    I guess I'm not really after anything pro, just something I can record guitar tracks on, throw in a couple of drum loops and make a noise with. An OS X version would be the best. Any ideas?
    • If you're running OS9, go to www.digidesign.com and get yourself a copy of Pro Tools Free. Pro Tools is really intuitive and a lot of the pros (Beck, Bjork, Aerosmith, etc.) use it. Thing is, they mostly want you to buy their hardware to use their software, and I don't know if you can get it for OSX w/o dropping $400 for an mBox.

      Cubase seems to be the second most popular, among pros and home users alike. SX is really robust, and there are cheaper versions with less features.

      Reason is the coolest thing
      • I'm pretty sure that the person asking the question was interested in software to work with musical scores, not audio recordings. So while Pro Tools, Reason, etc., are all pretty cool, they're not relevant.

        My father is a composer, and a bit of a computer-phobe (hey, he's 74!) and despite that, over the years he's really come to depend on Finale. To understand how important a tool like this is to a composer, I can't get him to use email or a web browser, but Finale turned him into a regular computer user. I
        • Um, check out the title: "Tracking/non-notation."

          Interesting bit about your dad, nevertheless. Just goes to show you that lots of times, it's not that computers are hard to learn, or that old people are stupid, it's just that they don't care. Reminds me of that Homer quote: "Just because I don't care doesn't mean I don't understand."
      • Pro-Tools free is a good package, but in my experience, not a great one.

        The main frustration I've experienced is latency. Conversion to audio takes just a fraction of a second -- which is a fraction of a second too much.

        The result is that I can't multitrack in sync to a live track. I record an initial midi track for guidance, and run the metronome out to my drum machine. Then I have to record each audio track to the midi -- not to another audio.

        Admittedly, this could be the result of my cheap USB aud

    • There's a good open-source program called Audacity [versiontracker.com] that I've been using. It's OSX native, does multitrack recording, and is very simple and straightforward. It might be too simplistic if you're looking for pro-level software, but if you're someone like me who's just messing around with making music on your Mac, it's great.

  • MusiXTeX (Score:5, Interesting)

    by kenthorvath ( 225950 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @01:55PM (#6668006)
    If you like LaTeX, you'll love this. From the website:

    What is MusiXTeX?

    MusiXTeX is a set of TeX macros and fonts to typeset polyphonic or orchestral music. It is still in progress and updated.

    Usually TeX source files are typeset as texts with some control sequences. But MusiXTeX source files are filled with macros to type musical marks, and they look so complicated that many people hesitate at a glance. MusiXTeX is not so easy, that's true. But once you master it, you can produce scores no less quality than the ones on market.

    Anyway, the website is here [jpn.org] and it would seem that there is a large archive of classics and standard peices to download as well. I even think that there is a nice WYSIWYG editor someplace for it, but I'm too lazy to search.

  • MusicXML? (Score:2, Informative)

    by danaris ( 525051 )
    MusicXML [musicxml.org] looks like a great notation system, for those of us who like markup languages. However, though it ought not to be too difficult to write some sort of editor and/or printable output generator for it, I haven't yet seen one that's not part of one of the really expensive music suites (like Finale). Does anyone know of an open-source or cheap shareware (or cheap commercial, though preferably with some sort of demo) piece of software that does this?

    Dan Aris
  • this looks like a neat product [music.ubc.ca] from the University of British Columbia. Been meaning to try it but haven't yet. Screen shots look nice. [music.ubc.ca]
  • I'm a composer that's used Finale for almost 10 years. I love it and it's infinitely useable. It does have a bit of a learning curve though and for writing organ music it may be more powerful than you need. Sibelius would be a good alternative if you are looking for a quick piece of software to pick up and just use. It does have notational limitations that Finale does not have. Finale [codamusic.com] Sibelius [sibelius.com]

  • Try Lime (Score:2, Informative)

    by KJE ( 640748 )
    lime [cerlsoundgroup.org]

  • Lilypond (Score:3, Informative)

    by gperciva ( 240690 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @05:47PM (#6670416)
    You want Lilypond, a Free sheet music program. We just released version 1.8. You write an input file as a text file, then run Lilypond on the input file (similar to programming). Once you learn the format, it's faster than graphical mousing to enter the notes.

    http://lilypond.org

    Also available from fink. http://fink.sourceforge.net

    Lilypond runs on GNU/Linux, Windows, MacOS, and other *nixs. It produces sheet music that looks better than Finale, but it is Free software.

    Cheers,
    - Graham

  • Summary (Score:5, Informative)

    by Dominic_Mazzoni ( 125164 ) * on Monday August 11, 2003 @06:54PM (#6670994) Homepage
    Here's my summary:

    Full featured WYSIWYG notation software:

    Finale [finalemusic.com] - this is like the Microsoft Office of music notation - seems easy to use at first, really annoying once you try to do more complicated things, but has thousands of features. No other program has as many features as Finale, even though Finale implements many of them quite poorly. Totally unintuitive and not very Mac-like. Unfortunately, Finale files are the standard file format in the industry, so if you're going to be trading sheet music with other composers, you'll need to have Finale. See also their low-end versions, Finale Allegro and PrintMusic - there's nothing at all wrong with these if you don't need the features they leave out - mainly the ability to work with large scores and do part extraction.

    Sibelius [sibelius.com] - intuitive, Mac-like. Easier to use than Finale, though some things take some getting used to. Not quite as powerful. Buggy - not more so than Finale, but in different ways. In theory it can open Finale files - not sure how well it really works.

    Low-end WYSIWYG notation software:

    Harmony Assistant [myriad-online.com]

    Lime Music Notation [cerlsoundgroup.org]

    Unix (may work on Mac OS X with Apple's X11):

    Rosegarden [all-day-breakfast.com]

    Text-based (no GUI, but renders nice output):

    MusicTeX [jpn.org]

    Lilypond [sourceforge.net]

    Sequencers (may do a little bit of notation):

    Intuem [intuem.com]

    Cubase et. al from Steinberg [steinberg.net]

    Logic Audio [emagic.de]

    Please feel free to add and re-post. If someone wants to compile prices for all of these, that would be great.

    • I'm curious as to your standard for "full featured" - aside from a couple of input/playback tricks, I've never seen finale or sibelius do that Lime can't. On the other hand, I know of many things that are trivial in Lime but take an absurd amount of work to recreate in finale. (I'm less familiar with Sibelius).

      For just plain-old putting notes and text on a page, I'll use Lime over anything else. In fact, for almost anything, I'll use Lime over anything else. And for someone who doesn't have a copy of F
    • A quick note....

      The "Logic Audio" series is now just called "Logic". It is available in 3 different versions: Logic Platinum, Logic Gold, and Logic Audio (they used to be called Logic Audio Platinum, Logic Audio Gold, and Logic Audio Silver).

      You categorize it as a sequencer which may do a little bit of notation - but in fact Logic's score editor is an extremely powerful notation package unto itself. It's leaps beyond any other sequencer package in this area.

      As stated in a previous post, it really is a
    • I would add NoteAbility Pro [music.ubc.ca] to your list, as well. It's apparently an evolution out of the NeXTStep world, so its native Cocoa-ness is very striking. I haven't used it, but I've been aware of it for a while now. Demo-ware, $225 for a license. Looks interesting, to say the least...

  • Sibelius vs Finale (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Mullmusik ( 680636 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @07:08PM (#6671121)
    I've used a number of notation programs and I feel I should chime in on the Sibelius vs Finale argument.

    Firstly I've dealt with publishers and for the most part they use neither Finale nor Sibelius, but specialized and sometimes inhouse alternatives. IME they are particularly critical of Finale's copy, and feel that it's not up to snuff for publishable work. Sibelius does fare slightly better in their eyes. In side by side tests Sibelius produces nicer copy, at least IMO.

    Secondly Sibelius IS easier to learn and use than Finale.

    Most importantly, it is a myth in my experience that Sibelius is a less powerful program than Finale. YES, you can set MIDI channels. YES, you can manipulate slurs in extreme ways. Read the manual people. Easy to learn doesn't mean everything is obvious. I've had many discussions with hardcore Finale users, and in every case the features which they felt were unique to Finale are implemented as well or better in Sibelius. (Could be some I'm not familiar with though; any candidates?)

    In conclusion I'd say go with Sibelius, sounds like it's more than adequate for your needs, and you'll be happier in the long run.

  • My two cents as a professional user (Score:5, Informative)

    by scottblascocomposer ( 697248 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @09:18PM (#6671870) Homepage
    I'm a composer, and have to say that Sibelius (www.sibelius.com) is my top choice overall. I used Finale (www.finalemusic.com) for years, and only switched because I had to learn Sibelius in order to teach it and absolutely fell in love with it. It's powerful, graceful, not too difficult to use (although, like Finale, more advanced features are a bit more complicated), and VERY importantly, Mac OS X native (I don't use non-native software. Those who haven't been able to update their software within the past 2.5 years don't deserve my business).

    What's more, Sibelius is fast becoming a co-industry-standard format along with Finale, so publishers, competitions, other composers, etc. etc., will more than likely be able to access any files you need to send them. It also converts Finale files rather well (when saved as .EPS files), with minimal cleanup to do.

    It's all about the best tool for the job, and as far as the professional music community is concerned, it's either Finale or Sibelius. Both are good, Finale is not OS X native (though they promise to be in version 2004), and Sibelius is excellent, so I chose Sibelius.

    A word of warning, however: Sibelius is have some kind of MIDI playback problem with Quicktime MIDI in 10.2.4+ which has not been remedied. Using an external MIDI device clears it up completely, but if you're relying on Quicktime built-in MIDI, stay at 10.2.3 or below (including 10.1.x)...

    *plink,plink*

  • Sibelius might fit the bill for you. (Score:3, Informative)

    by RaEJaE ( 62784 ) on Monday August 11, 2003 @09:19PM (#6671874)
    I'm a composer/arranger, and I would be at a loss without Sibelius. I used to use Finale, but I switched over because I was sick of having to reboot to OS 9 to write my music. I haven't looked back since.

    It costs $599 full price, but for educational and/or religious organization users the educational price is good, and if you shop around a bit, you can get it even cheaper (I found my copy for $170).

    Hope this helps!

    -raejae

    (btw... anybody know if I can change my username to get rid of the nasty caps? Stupid young me...)

  • Final 2004 (Score:2, Informative)

    by TherealDreck ( 552116 )
    For all those that are interested. Finale 2004 will be released on October 20th. This will be released as OSX native, and possibly work out some of the bugs inherant with OSX and MIDI.
  • I remember seeing a piece of work that allowed hymns to be created and sheet music printed for church. It was done in Director so it's cross platform (win/mac)

    I'm getting touch with the author now.

    Email me at zavpublic at mac.com and I'll pass the information on.
  • http://www.ngale.com

    There is a free version of it, nearly full up in capability, called Nightlight.

    Not yet for OS X, but works under OS X Classic and straight Mac OS's.

    Good typesetting capability, compatible with the NoteScan application, which can scan sheet music into a file which can be imported by the full up version of Nightingale. (I have notescan, it works pretty well).

    The free version, Nightlight is quite good, by the way, with only a few limitations: the size of a score, and won't import the N

  • Logic Audio, you FOOLS! (Score:4, Informative)

    by skia ( 100784 ) * <skia@skia.nUMLAUTet minus punct> on Wednesday August 13, 2003 @09:36AM (#6685539) Homepage
    Not only is Logic [apple.com] now OWNED by Apple (so you can bet it will get the kind of resources Final Cut Pro has been enjoying over the years) but Logic Audio evolved from Notator, hands down the best notation software available (for the Atari).

    While Logic itself can have a bit of a steep learning curve, there are now brilliant books [peachpit.com] and active, friendly mailing lists [yahoo.com] available to help you out. And the notation part of the program has always been pretty intuitive. Plus, as an organ player, you might appreciate that Logic has what I feel is the best B3 plug in ever made [emagic.de] (Logic comes with a 30 day demo of this, and all its virtual instruments [emagic.de] for you to mess around with). And if, down the road, you decide you want to take your notating to the next level and produce/mix/record/arrange/whatever, Logic will be able to take you there.

    There are three different versions of Logic,

    • Logic Audio
    • Logic Gold, and
    • Logic Platinum

    They differ mostly in how many audio tracks you can arrange with, what DSP effects ship with each one, and other minor stuff like being able to draw automation curves. Feature comparison charts [emagic.de] are available. For what you describe, you would need nothing more than Logic Audio, but the upgrade path to Gold and Platinum is clear and affordable should you decide you need more later on.

  • Harmony Assistant

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