Transferring Your Score to Other Music Programs Via MusicXML

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Transferring Your Score to Other Music Programs Via MusicXML

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MusicXML is a file format designed for exchanging music notation between different music software applications.  MusicXML, developed by Recordare and now maintained by MakeMusic, is used under a royalty-free license in many popular music software programs.

 

Some common scenarios under which you might find it useful to transfer a score from Composer to another music notation program, such as Finaletm and Sibeliustm include:

B8You wish to send your music to a publisher which requires that submitted scores be prepared in a particular music notation file format, particularly that of Finaletm or Sibeliustm.
B8You find that Composer is an ideal tool for capturing your musical thoughts, and for producing parts used in live musician rehearsals, but you wish to use another music notation program, even though more difficult to use than Composer, to put a final polish the completed score.

 

Notation Composer supports the exporting of a score as a MusicXML file.  This means that you can transfer a score that you have created in Composer to another music program, such as Finaletm and Sibeliustm, that supports importing (reading) MusicXML files.

 

For example, here are the first few measures of C:\Users\Public\Documents\Notation_5\Songs\RhapsodyInBlue.not, as displayed on the screen by Composer:

 

MusicXMLRhapsody

The above score, saved by Composer as a MusicXML file, looks like this when opened by Finaletm 2006:

 

MusicXMLFinaleRhapsody

 

The transfer of the score is not perfect, but with  Finaletm the transfer of the score usually good.  The score might not look as good in some other music notation programs.  The quality of the transfer of the score is dependent both on (1) how well Composer exports MusicXML and (2) how well the other music notation program imports MusicXML. Composer does a good job exporting MusicXML, and Finaletm 2006 does a good job importing MusicXML, as illustrated above.  If another music notation program does not do a good job displaying the imported MusicXML score, then this suggests that the "blame" is on the other music notation program for not correctly or thoroughly importing the MusicXML file.  However, if the problem is specific to a certain type of music symbol, then the blame might very well be on Composer.  If you find that your other music notation program correctly imports a music symbol exported by some third music notation program, but not if it is exported by <%PROD%>, then please let us know, by contacting us at support@notation.com or by posting a message in our forum, following the link at the bottom of this Help topic.

 

Note, this version of Composer does not support exchange of MusicXML files in the opposite direction.  That is, this version of Composer does not support importing MusicXML. Support for importing MusicXML is planned for a future version of Composer.

 

prcarrow To export a score in the format of a MusicXML file:

1.In the Part menu, select the Conductor's Part or the individual instrument part that you wish to transfer to another music notation program.
2.In the File menu, choose the Export as MusicXML File command.
3.Optionally change the name of the file, or change the directory into which it will be saved.
4.Click the Save button in the Export as MusicXML File dialog box.

 

The instructions for opening the MusicXML file in your other music notation program depends on which program you are using.  You can expect to find the option in the File menu of that other program.  First, look for an Import command, and if you do, choose MusicXML as the type of file you wish to import.   If you do not find an Import command, then try the Open command, and look for an option to specify MusicXML as the type of file you wish to open.