Non-finale music notation softwares

[flygon9]

I've gotten a lot of my sheet music from this site, and since I enjoy transcribing in my free time, so I figured that I could give back with a couple sheets. However, thus beings the problems. My main expertise in notation programs is in musescore, and I'm getting better at Sibelius. But, everything on this site is Finale-based. I'm trying Notepad, however it's very primitive compared to what I'm used to. So I figure the best solution to just write songs in a different program and import them into Notepad via music XML. However, this hasn't worked. Does anyone else have any suggestions as to what I can do to work around using Notepad?

[Olimar12345]

What many of the notepad users do here is they do as much as they can on notepad, then post their "in progress" arrangements in this topic, asking other users with more advanced versions of finale to make the edits for them.

[Maelstrom]

Does anyone else have any suggestions as to what I can do to work around using Notepad?

Yes. Buy Finale.

[flygon9]

Aw dang. I already spent a ton of time on a duet version of the contest theme from ORAS. I guess i should start re-inputting that into notepad, huh? And as a side note, I was asking for finale for Christmas, but my parents contacted my band teacher and he recommended Sibelius, as it was more user-friendly. So that's what I ended up getting. (Not that I'm complaining of course, it works wonders.)

[Olimar12345]

I hear that Sibelius is more user-friendly, and the people running the company are actually not chimpanzees. I guess it sucks that finale is the industry standard :/

[mikey]

My music professor also recommended Sibelius.  It seems to be very good.  Unfortunately Finale is just what everyone uses.  As far as notepad 2012 goes that's just your basics.  It's okay for the level I'm at because I can just have people do the changes while my sheet is getting fixed

[JDMEK5]

Didn't Finale have some discount for people coming off Sibelius? Or did that promotion end already?

[Olimar12345]

They probably still do. It's similar to their ongoing student discount, iirc.

[FierceDeity]

I guess it sucks that finale is the industry standard :/

Which industry are we talking here
Because like, everyone else in my major (music comp; except for one other person) and all of my professors (that I know of) use/recommend sibelius
So I'm legitimately curious as to where it's mainly used, if not in academia

[KefkaticFanatic]

The industry of NSM, obviously.

[flygon9]

Well regardless of whether or not they still have that discount, I doubt that it lowers the price enough that my 15 year old self can afford it.

[Olimar12345]

Which industry are we talking here
Because like, everyone else in my major (music comp; except for one other person) and all of my professors (that I know of) use/recommend sibelius
So I'm legitimately curious as to where it's mainly used, if not in academia

Everyone here at the schools I've been to says that it's the industry standard for music publishers in the US.

[KefkaticFanatic]

Regardless, it's the standard we've adopted with our abnormally large number of sheets, and  I don't think we're going to switch to something different anytime soon.  We would rather have everything conform to one style than force users to download 4 different clients.

[JDMEK5]

Well regardless of whether or not they still have that discount, I doubt that it lowers the price enough that my 15 year old self can afford it.

I did it at that age. Just work and save up and you'll have $350 before you know it. (Or less depending on the discount. I haven't checked it in a while)

[Olimar12345]

You can always get the student discount as long as you can prove you're a student.