PDF to MusicXML for MuseScore, Dorico, Sibelius and Finale

How it works

1. Upload the PDF. Sign in with Google and choose a PDF of up to 10 pages: an export from a notation program, a score from an online library or your own scan.
2. Compare. The recognised score is laid out next to your PDF and plays back, so you can hear mistakes as well as see them.
3. Open it in your program. Download the MusicXML file and open it in MuseScore, Dorico, Sibelius or Finale.

What's in the MusicXML

• Notes, rests, ties, clefs, key and time signatures, including changes partway through.
• Chord symbols printed above the staff, written as real chord symbols rather than loose text.
• Printed tempo marks, with the metronome number when the score gives one.
• One part per instrument, named, and at written pitch with the right transposition for instruments such as the B♭ clarinet or the horn in F, so your program's concert-pitch view works.

You also get MIDI for the whole score and one MIDI file per part, if you want to hear it in a DAW.

Opening it in your notation program

MusicXML is the standard exchange format between notation programs. In MuseScore, use File → Open. In Dorico, use File → Import → MusicXML. Sibelius and Finale open the file directly and ask a few import questions. The notes and bars come across; page layout, spacing and fonts are left to your program, which lays the music out its own way.

What works best, honestly

Clean, printed music converts best: PDFs exported from notation programs and sharp scans of printed scores. Piano, solo and choir music are all fine. With several instruments, tunebard guesses each part's instrument and you can correct the guess before you download. Handwritten manuscripts aren't read, guitar tablature and drum staves aren't supported, and dense writing with many voices on one staff may need a few fixes. You see all of it before downloading.

Questions