Ukulele tab and notation software

bsfloyd

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Hello gang!! I'm am currently transposing some of my Celtic music for guitar over to ukulele. I am wanting to know what notation / tab software you all are using. It would be great if I could enter in the notation and the software recommends a tab for it, that the user could edit as seen fit. Freeware is always nice, but I doubt this feature would fall into the free category. Whatcha all using? Thanks!
 
Is there a platform you are looking for?

I do most of my work these days on Notion (Mac/Win and iPad). All the big notation programs can do it (Finale, Sibelius, Dorico) as well as the free MuseScore. I think the “traditional” approach is Guitar Pro...also just saw TuxGuitar as freeware as well.
 
Thanks Choirguy - yes, Windows. Thanks for the suggestions. I know about GuitarPro 6, and think it's a great tool. I was hoping to find some freeware and you listed some I will look into - thanks!
 
Thank you for this, Campbell! Very nice arrangement!!
 
My money is on Musescore moving forward. Lots more flexibility for creating variations and sheets more useful for teaching classes than "just tab." Kind of a learning curve, for sure. But that's freeware.

Up to now I've used GP6. Fast, easy, but it's not always easy to format it nicely.
 
My money is on Musescore moving forward. Lots more flexibility for creating variations and sheets more useful for teaching classes than "just tab." Kind of a learning curve, for sure. But that's freeware.

+1 for Musescore.

It can do all the things mentioned above (standard notation, standard notation plus tab or tab only, midi files & PDFs) without the hefty price tag. The learning curve isn't so bad (I think it's more difficult to unlearn habits from other music programs) but if you need help with ms there is a series of YouTube videos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZ4kRzkHroU&list=PLTYuWi2LmaPGb4SKXHm9JULQ-0CH8KpUk and a printed guide: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1508621683/
 
Thanks for the replies, everyone! I am going to give Musescore a try - nothing to loose here :) I appreciate the assistance!!
 
You might also take a look at Tabledit, although now that I look at MuseScore that might be a much better choice.
 
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Imwas going to suggest Tux Guitar but I've started using MuseScore recently and I'm well impressed with it. I've not tried creating tab with it as I work from standard notation and rarely use tab. Maybe I should have a look as I sometimes create little fragments of tab for riffs or copy tab fragments to get standard notation something I've used Tux Guitar for in the past.
 
Guitar Pro is the best I've used and it's quite user friendly. You can write songs using standard notation, standard notation plus tab or tab only. It also creates midi files & PDFs.

I also love playing Celtic tunes on the guitar & ukulele, here's "Si Bheag Si Mhor" that I tabbed using GP6, there's a link to the tab in the video description at YT.



Wow, that was beautiful! I sure wish I could play as well as you.
 
Would MuseScore still be the top recommendation? I want to find a program to tab out ukulele music, (free or little cost, since who knows if I'll persist in this goal), and it sounds like this would be a top choice.

Any easy to learn options?
 
MuseScore is fairly easy to use, and free.

And can't speak for other pieces of tab/notation software, but it still works just fine.
 
I still really like Notion for this work, and it may be the most accessible software package (Mac/Win/iOS), but it isn't free. It's hard to beat free...
 
I have been using GP since version 4, I have done every upgrade and am now on GP7.
It is very versatile and for what it does it is not really very expensive.
I like to make my own chord melody arrangements and having tab and notation is a real plus. I can also create custom chord grids in my arrangements.
I also make slash charts for some of my students.
 
I've used Finale for many years and have gotten so I can play it like a piano! And, yeah, it does ukulele and guitar tabs like a champ, including altered tunings and custom courses (e.g., 7-or 8- string guitar). It works great with sample libraries if you need to export some backing parts. Like any pro level notation app, the learning curve is a bitch so expect to spend some serious practicing and learning before production.

I briefly used MuseScore but it was too buggy at the time, but the price is right and I'm sure it has improved during the last few years.
 
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There's lilypond. It's open source, available on linux, windows and MacOS.
It produces beautiful scores and tablatures. It can produce midi and pdf output.
It has a steep learning curve. But it provides docs, lots of examples...
http://lilypond.org/
 
Which is the easiest to learn, regardless of price? I'm on a Mac.
 
Which is the easiest to learn, regardless of price? I'm on a Mac.

Pencil and paper? :)

I very briefly tried MuseScore last night, after watching a couple quick videos. It does seem like it's not going to be too difficult to use, and best of all, it's free.
I didn't do anything more than bring up a blank ukulele tab sheet and try entering in a little bit of random notation, (single notes, as well as using all the strings, etc.), and changing notes that had already been entered. But I was able to learn how to do that very quickly, so I'm guessing that for my limited use, it won't be too hard to pick up anything else I might need to be able to do. Except for the arranging of a song in the first place, LOL. But I want to work on that this summer, so I don't always have to hope I can find someone else's tab that I like.
 
I've used Finale for the most part since I work with standard notation for piano and voice, primarily. There's a free version of Finale (called Finale Notepad) with all the basic functionality, though if I remember correctly, it can't do key or time signature changes mid-song. I've used MuseScore (briefly) as well, but that was several years ago and as gochugogi said, I found it buggy and lacking in certain features I needed, which prohibited me from using it further. I'm sure it's significantly better now.

That said, take my opinion with a grain of salt, since I primarily use Finale for standard notation. I've been trying it for tab but found it a bit less intuitive than standard notation entry (at least using keyboard shortcuts). We'll see how it goes as I learn it (or Musescore) better.
 
Pencil and paper? :)

I very briefly tried MuseScore last night, after watching a couple quick videos. It does seem like it's not going to be too difficult to use, and best of all, it's free.
I didn't do anything more than bring up a blank ukulele tab sheet and try entering in a little bit of random notation, (single notes, as well as using all the strings, etc.), and changing notes that had already been entered. But I was able to learn how to do that very quickly, so I'm guessing that for my limited use, it won't be too hard to pick up anything else I might need to be able to do. Except for the arranging of a song in the first place, LOL. But I want to work on that this summer, so I don't always have to hope I can find someone else's tab that I like.

Up until now, pencil & blank tab sheets have been fine for me. However, I volunteered to teach a chord melody at my monthly uke group this month, and had to format the chord melody tabs as well as the chords for the "just strummers" in the group. My group leader is out of town, so I sent my arrangement to her to help format it. She's somewhere with limited internet & working off an iPad, so it took a lot of back & forth work for both of us to get everything formatted correctly. Thankfully, she had lots of spare time to work on it, and she was grateful to me for volunteering to lead the group & teach. We send music out electronically to the group ahead of time, so we had a time deadline to get it posted. This experience has made me see that I need to find a "real" program to use in the future.
 
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