With the best music scanning software, you can change the key of the music, scan and modify the notes in order to reproduce or print them with a different key signature. Once you've scanned the sheet music, you can quickly transfer it to different recording software or DAW.
Top 5 Music Scanning Software
- SmartScore - The most effective musical OCR/editor
- PhotoScore Ultimate - To scan full orchestral works
- SharpEye - Easy to use
- Capella-scan - Capable of tolerating slightly slanted lines
- PlayScore - The the latest techniques in Optical Music Recognition
Sheet music can be also converted to MIDI, allowing you to work with a whole collection of printed music on your computer. The first thing to do is to scan the music into electronic format, then convert it to MIDI, after that you will have access to the options for editing, playing, and working with the arrangement, using any DAW software or one that works for note recording.
1. SmartScore - Our Choice
- Finale Score-writing software included
- Ability to export the result into Finale via MusicXML
- Comes in a range of editions
- Recognises scores without any restriction on the number of parts
- None
Verdict: SmartScore is an effective music scanning software for any performer, arranger, church minister and music educator. The program offers you the ability to play, recognize and control opera, chorale, scores, orchestral arrangements, PDF scores, and transcriptions. SmartScore allows you to extract any part you want as a separate file and record it to audio.
2. PhotoScore Ultimate
- Can work with Sibelius
- Recognises nearly all notes and musical markings
- Scanning full orchestral works
- Dated interface
Verdict: With this music scanning program you'll be able to rip any kind of sheet music and you'll be able to do it right from your computer. You can rip basic sheet music or you can rip more complex music that has all kinds of markings on it. No matter what you want to do with it you can make sure that it will come out exactly the way that you want it to and you can get it done in just minutes from now. This is a great tool for anyone who wants to take care of their music collection and to know where the music is at any given moment.
3. SharpEye
- Scans music from the sheet
- Delivers high-quality scores and instrumental parts
- Can create music arrangements by scanning
- Uses OMR (optical music recognition) technique
- Updates are infrequent
Verdict: SharpEye music scanning software is a powerful and unique new midi instrument/effects processor that has the ability to detect and isolate all the defects in a music recording and then fix them, eliminating the "off" sounds. This leaves you with pristine, high quality recordings that are exactly as they were captured on the original sound equipment. SharpEye is very much like the popular recording and mixing softwares such as GarageBand, ProTools, Logic, Cubase and Sonar. The only difference being that SharpEye's database of sounds contains over one billion files.
4. Capella-scan
- The Сapella-scan layout is excellent
- The performance is good as per now
- Support is excellent and useful
- Can be difficult at first
Verdict: This is one of the most innovative and helpful software tools available today. If you love your records and want to preserve them for future generations, this is an excellent option for you. You can choose the number of albums that you want scanned, create the folders you want, and even have the songs categorized by artist name, album title, etc. All of these features make music scanning easy and hassle free, so you can get the music you want and the protection you need. I also recommed using audio editing software to work with vocal, add sound effects, crop music tracks.
5. PlayScore
- Also available for both iOS and Android
- Versatile and very powerful
- It’s friendly to use
- Free version is limited
Verdict: By being able to scan the digital files of audio files for a vast array of musical genres, you can be certain that you're hearing exactly what you want from your music - whether it's classical R&B, hip hop, or pop. Plus, with this software you can create custom playlists for each piece of music, so you can have a song that fits perfectly into your current mood or future mood. No matter how many times you use the software, you'll quickly recognize the songs that you truly love. If you are a music producer, I also recommend choosing the best mouse for music production.
