[comp.sys.amiga.audio] Seeking music program which prints scores.

abrown@hpcvca.CV.HP.COM (Allen Brown) (03/27/91)

I need music software which can display music in standard music
notation.

I have sheet music that I am trying to learn to sing.  I am not good
enough at reading music to get it right.  So I want my Amiga to play
it for me.  But I need it to produce the score sheet so that I can
check it against the original to be sure I entered it correctly.

I am strictly amateur.  I perform in community theater productions of
musicals once or twice per year.  So I am not willing to invest large
sums of money.  I contacted the local (within 50 miles) Amiga software
outlets (both of them).  Four titles came up.

Dr. T:	Probably can do the job.  Would cost me around $500.00
	including the required(?) MIDI device.

MusicX:	I played with it in the store.  It does not seem to be capable
	of displaying music scores.

Bars&Pipes:  The salesman doesn't think it can display music scores.

DMCS:	I haven't seen this yet.  The salesman thinks it will work.
	But it has been backordered for weeks.

I am willing to fork out up to $150.  Amiga's built in audio is good
enough for my needs.  But rehearsals have already started.  I need it
now.  Please help.  Will DMCS do the job?  Will some other package do
it?  PD would be find.  For instance I know that TeX has one or more
packages capable of typesetting sheet music.  Is there a program which
will take one of these TeX sources and play the music?  I already have
TeX.
--
  Allen Brown  abrown@cv.hp.com or abrown%hpcvca@hplabs.hp.com
	    or hplabs!hpcvca!abrown or "Hey you!"
  Not representing my employer.
  "Don't dream it... Be it." Rocky Horror Picture Show

carson@darwin.ntu.edu.au (03/29/91)

In article <38260003@hpcvca.CV.HP.COM>, abrown@hpcvca.CV.HP.COM (Allen Brown) writes:
> I need music software which can display music in standard music
> notation.
> 
> Dr.> MusicX:	I played with it in the store.  It does not seem to be capable
> 	of displaying music scores.
> 
> Bars&Pipes:  The salesman doesn't think it can display music scores.
> 
> DMCS:	I haven't seen this yet.  The salesman thinks it will work.
> 	But it has been backordered for weeks.
> 
> I am willing to fork out up to $150.  Amiga's built in audio is good
> enough for my needs.  But rehearsals have already started.  I need it
> now.  Please help.  Will DMCS do the job?  Will some other package do
> it?  PD would be find.  For instance I know that TeX has one or more
> packages capable of typesetting sheet music.  Is there a program which
> will take one of these TeX sources and play the music?  I already have
> TeX.
> --
>   Allen Brown  abrown@cv.hp.com or abrown%hpcvca@hplabs.hp.com
> 	    or hplabs!hpcvca!abrown or "Hey you!"
>   Not representing my employer.
>   "Don't dream it... Be it." Rocky Horror Picture Show
-- 
Allan,

I have used DMCS a lot for this sort of thing, or should I say my wife does.
She is a music teacher and although DMCS is not best music program it offers
to put music in notaional form and actully flashes the notes and turns the 
pages as it plays them through.  We have a MIDI connected to an electronic
piano which does a really good job of the music playing but playing through
the Amiga is very aceptable.  The price of DMCS is the best part it has
been selling for $99.00 australian when I bought it it was $198.

It will do everything that you want it to do.

I hope this helps.


________________________________________________________________________
  __ |\  John Carson                   \   Ph:       (089)466207
 -  -  \  Northern Territory University \  Fax:      (089)466454
/       \ PO Box 40146,CASUARINA,NT,0811 \ Inter: Carson@darwin.ntu.edu.au
\_.--.__/ Australia.  
       v            "The best is yet to come when everyone has an AMIGA"	
________________________________________________________________________

dege@cs.umn.edu (Dege Jeffrey Charles) (03/30/91)

   The best musical scores I've seen printed were produced by TeX using
the MusicTeX macros.  There is a program called SMUS2TeX I found here that
will convert SMUS files to MusicTeX input, in a limited sort of way.  There
are discussions concerning building a more capable tool going on in
radical.eye/music on Bix.  I'm only a lurker there, but it is a place
to check for more information.
 .

lewism@lewism.UUCP (Mike Lewis) (03/30/91)

>In article <38260003@hpcvca.CV.HP.COM> abrown@hpcvca.CV.HP.COM (Allen Brown) writes:
>I need music software which can display music in standard music
>notation.
>
>I have sheet music that I am trying to learn to sing.  I am not good
>enough at reading music to get it right.  So I want my Amiga to play
>it for me.  But I need it to produce the score sheet so that I can
>check it against the original to be sure I entered it correctly.
>
>
>Dr. T:	Probably can do the job.  Would cost me around $500.00
>	including the required(?) MIDI device.
>
>MusicX:	I played with it in the store.  It does not seem to be capable
>	of displaying music scores.
>
>Bars&Pipes:  The salesman doesn't think it can display music scores.
>
>DMCS:	I haven't seen this yet.  The salesman thinks it will work.
>	But it has been backordered for weeks.
>

I have some of the programs you mention. Music-X 1.1 will not print scores
(but an addon module which will,  has been promised for some time).

Dr T KCS will not print scores, but there is Dr T program (Copyist?) 
which will. I have not seen it.

DMCS uses traditional musical notation and will print scores (it takes
a long time!)

Music-X and Dr T are really midi sequencers. I think DMCS will do what
you want. It is old, not supported by Electronic Arts any more, and is
very dodgy under OS2 on an A3000. Better than nothing perhaps..


+-------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Mike Lewis.    cbmuk!cbmuka!lewism!lewism                         |
| 40 Heyes Lane, Alderley Edge, Cheshire SK9 7JY, (UK) 0625 582762  |
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baeder@shamu.cadence.com (D. Scott Baeder; x6299) (04/02/91)

In article <lewism.5974@lewism.UUCP>, lewism@lewism.UUCP (Mike Lewis) writes:
|> 
|> >In article <38260003@hpcvca.CV.HP.COM> abrown@hpcvca.CV.HP.COM (Allen Brown) writes:
|> >I need music software which can display music in standard music
|> >notation.
|> >

|> >Bars&Pipes:  The salesman doesn't think it can display music scores.

IN their latest ads they talk about the "professional" version that
looks like it has this capability...waiting for the demo disk to check
it out...

Sonix also can do this (although limited staffing options)...I concur
that DMCS is your best bet...

scott

smithcd@che00.ncsu.EDU (Christopher Dale Smith) (04/02/91)

I just stumbled onto this news service today.   I have a response to the
original question, but I think I am officialy responding to myself.
Anyway,  Dr. T's Copyist DTP is probably the best score printing system on the 
market.  There is a DEMO of this program on GEnie.  It sells for around $200.

						Chris 

abrown@hpcvca.CV.HP.COM (Allen Brown) (04/06/91)

> DMCS uses traditional musical notation and will print scores (it
> takes a long time!)
>	| Mike Lewis.    cbmuk!cbmuka!lewism!lewism

I bought it for $80.  It is doing what I need.  I am able to enter the
music score and have it play the music so that I can learn how to sing
the song.  It takes me about three hours to enter one song.  (The
first song took much longer than that.)

I am running on a 25MHz 68030 going to a HP Deskjet+, so it prints
plenty fast.  But it only prints one line of music per page so it
wastes a lot of paper.  Because of that I don't print anything
anymore.

It is not a robust piece of software.  I would rate it as "pretty good
for Public Domain".  Unfortunately it is not Public Domain.  About one
third of the times when I quit from DMCS it leaves my system totally
frozen.  No response to mouse or keyboard (except it does respond to
the Vulcan nerve pinch).  And on those times when DMCS does return
control back to AmigaDo*, if I then run DMCS again it crashes the
Amiga every time.  So it seems that the only safe thing to do after
running DMCS is to reboot the computer.  Tacky!

There seems to be no way to start DMCS from the CLI.

I wonder if they shipped me rev 1.0 software.  I know no way to ask it
for the rev.  And it doesn't seem to be anywhere in the documentation.
Unprofessional.  Of course these are just my opinions.
--
  Allen Brown  abrown@cv.hp.com or abrown%hpcvca@hplabs.hp.com
	    or hplabs!hpcvca!abrown or "Hey you!"
  Not representing my employer.
  It's not that I'm afraid to die.  I just don't want to be there when
  it happens. ---Woody Allen