Musescore is a free notation program that offers a cost-effective alternative

to professional programs such as Sibelius and Finale.

This video is the first in a series that will walk you through the basics of using Musescore to notate your compositions and arrangements.

You can download MuseScore from the website on the screen now

Let's get started with the first tutorial: setting up your score

When you first launch Musescore you'll see the Create New Score window.

If it doesn't appear you can open it by going to File - New.

Enter the title of your composition...

and other details and then choose here whether you want to base your score on an existing template,

or whether you'd like to create one from scratch.

We'll create a score from scratch today so choose that option and click Continue

In the next window, you can choose which instruments are going to appear in your score.

You can click on the arrows to the left of each instrumental family to display the instruments for that group

Today I’m going to create a 3 part round, so I’ll choose Voice from the Vocals family.

You can click the Add button to add that instrument to your score, or you can simply double-click on the name.

On the right-hand side, you can see the list of staves I’ve created so far.

Don’t worry too much about creating exactly what you need at this point

you can always come back to this window later on and add or subtract instruments.

You can even change the order of staves in your score

by selecting one of the instrument names in the list here

and use the up and down buttons to alter its position.

When you’re done click Continue and in the next window, select your key signature.

Finish off your score set-up by selecting your Time signature...

Pickup measure if you have one……and the total number of measures in your score

remembering that these items can all be adjusted later on.

Once you're done, you’ll see your empty score, ready for you to enter notes.

This is the first tutorial video in a series titled Musescore in 10 Easy Steps.

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