Learn LilyPond: Free Music Notation

LilyPond: Free Open-Source Music Notation

In August 2024, Finale officially closed its doors, leaving countless musicians and composers stranded without their go-to music notation software. This serves as a powerful reminder of the risks of relying on proprietary software that can disappear overnight. If you’re serious about your music, now is the perfect time to explore an open-source alternative that offers stability, freedom, and top-tier results—enter LilyPond.

• Are you a student who can’t afford the hefty price tags of commercial software?
• Are you a professional needing to distribute high-quality scores on a tight budget?
• Do you prefer to use free (libre) software that guarantees long-term access to your work?

If so, LilyPond is the perfect choice for you. With Finale gone, now more than ever, it’s crucial to safeguard your work against vendor lock-in by choosing tools that will stand the test of time.

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To help you make the leap to LilyPond, I’m creating a series of tutorial videos designed to take you from a complete beginner to a power user. The first playlist is packed with 28 videos and over 2.5 hours of content, breaking down everything from the basics of note entry to advanced formatting and layout techniques. You’ll learn how to create stunning individual instrument parts, tweak every detail on the page, and add the perfect finishing touches to your scores.

If you’re ready to start learning, subscribe to my channel and check out the latest videos, including a comprehensive guide to MIDI input, playback, and export. Whether you’re a complete novice or an experienced user looking to refine your skills, these tutorials will help you unlock the full potential of LilyPond.

What is LilyPond?

LilyPond is a free, open-source, and cross-platform program that’s a bit different from the traditional music notation software you might be used to. Instead of dragging and dropping notes from a toolbar, you create your scores by typing simple plain text, which is then compiled by LilyPond into beautifully engraved sheet music.

In some ways, LilyPond is more like a programming language than a graphical score editor. But don’t let that scare you off! The learning curve is much easier than it sounds, and the syntax is straightforward and intuitive. In fact, LilyPond can do things that Finale and Sibelius simply can’t. It’s also a significant improvement over the old SCORE program that many publishers used years ago (and a few still do).

LilyPond brings the aesthetics of traditionally hand-engraved music straight to your computer, and it’s perfect for inserting score excerpts or full pages into LaTeX documents, scientific papers, musicology research, and even HTML for web pages.

Why LilyPond?

When it comes to music typesetting, LilyPond’s output is simply superior to anything else out there. Even the long-time industry standard, SCORE, can’t match the elegance and precision of LilyPond’s results.

My tutorial series starts from the very beginning:

1. You’ll learn the structure of a LilyPond input file and basic note entry.
2. We’ll explore more advanced concepts, like creating individual instrument parts.
3. Then, we’ll dive into formatting, layout, and tweaking anything on the page.
4. Finally, you’ll discover how to add the finishing touches so your scores look perfect.

The first playlist alone has 28 videos and offers over 2.5 hours of learning material. You can watch the tutorials here: http://bit.ly/LearnLilyPond. To browse a full list of all my LilyPond videos by topic, click here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tclwyZr08bE

 

Coming up next, I’ll be covering score formatting, tweaking objects, aligning dynamics, creating instrument parts, and even delving into graphic notation. Don’t forget to subscribe so you don’t miss any new tutorials. New intermediate and advanced videos are on the way every week!

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