Transcribing to a score.

[happyhacker]

I am looking for an App which transcribes mp3 or other formats to a score. I have a Mac. I don't want a subscription but want the App on my machine. Any recommendations appreciated.

[anacrusis]

Sadly, there is no program that can do this perfectly and is guaranteed to give you a sensible score you can play from, unless the original music is very simple and robotically played. You might get most pitches correct, but rhythm is really hard to transcribe when no musician plays everything perfectly in time, all the time (it wouldn't sound expressive). You would still have to do a lot of manual adjustments to the score, making sure hand distribution is sensible, and so on.

[perfect_pitch]

It's nice to know there are still some things humans can do that computer AI can't.     

[quantum]

You will spend more time fiddling with the software workflow than you would by doing the transcription yourself.  IMO, there is a place for software in the transcription workflow, but the goal is not to let the software do the work for you, rather to use software as an aid to the transcription process. 

Learn about changing the playback speed of the file, learn about using the spectrogram to visualize frequencies, learn notation software so you can create a neat and presentable score of your transcription. 

Probably most importantly, work on developing your ear's ability to hear patterns in music.  Recognize patterns such as scales, chords, chord progressions, common pianistic patterns.  For example, it is far less work to identify a pattern as a major scale, or a I-IV-V-I progression, or an alberti bass pattern, than it is to individually pick out each note. 

[happyhacker]

Good advice sure. I was looking at a video on YouTube, a video piano cover. Being a beginner and only novice at using MuseScore4 it will be a hard job. Would copyright apply to doing this just for my own study?

[anacrusis]

Good advice sure. I was looking at a video on YouTube, a video piano cover. Being a beginner and only novice at using MuseScore4 it will be a hard job. Would copyright apply to doing this just for my own study?

From my understanding, you are not breaking copyright law if you transcribe it for private study only. It's when you start sharing it with others, or selling it, that you run into issues.