publishing sheet music?

Question by Steve: publishing sheet music?
im curious, is there any place i can mail in my works to get the sheet music published? im not asking that my works be put in music shops or books or anything, i would just want a formal, printed sheet music form of my compositions for myself

Best answer:

Answer by The Boy
In the past it was necessary to send manuscript out to an engraver to get this done. Luckily, modern composition software is capable of printing very attractive scores. Finale is a popular program among musicians and composers (first link). Sibelius is a competitive product that some people prefer (second link). Both programs tend to format scores in a certain way by default, but they also allow more knowledgeable users to revise almost any parameter.

If you are extremely concerned with the way your score looks then you may be interested in Lilypond (last link). Lilypond was designed to emulate the look of traditional engraving and is well liked by more tech savvy composers because of the high degree of visual control it affords and the aesthetically pleasing result.

Unfortunately, all of the programs above have a learning curve. At the very least it is helpful to have a midi controller to speed up note entry, and certain functions (unorthodox beaming, cluster notation, extended techniques) can be difficult to use at first. That being the case, this is how single composers generate “engraved” scores now. A finished piece can be divided into parts and printed for performance, or published online as a PDF or .mus (in the cae of Finale). All of this can be done without waiting weeks of months for an engraver to finish working, and the cost of correcting errors is much lower.

If the scores you want to print are for a relatively small number of instruments I would personally recommend that you try Finale Notepad. It’s free, relatively easy to use, and capable of doing almost anything you’re likely to need it for. Should your ambition increase and you want to generate scores for other musicians, knowing how to use a common piece of notation software will be a major asset.

Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!