If you can't figure something out from this page or something seems broken, please be sure to look at our Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) to see if it's mentioned there. You can also access Technical Support to look in our knowledge base or make a support request.

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Keyboard Shortcuts

Noteflight has keyboard shortcuts for many common editing actions. Please see our keyboard shortcut quick reference (English) (Deutsch).

Learn how to add your own keyboard shortcuts for editor actions that do not currently have default shortcuts.

Searching Help

To find any editing tool or option, click the Help button in the top panel in your score, and type a keyword to search. As you type, relevant options appear. Hover your mouse over an option to show its location in the tool palettes. Click to take the selected action.

Use the links below to find that topic in the User Guide.

In this example, the user types "qua" and each tool containing those letters appears. The user then hovers over 'Quarter Note' to show its location in the 'duration' palette, and presses return/enter to create the Quarter Note.

Quick Start

When we say "quick", we really mean it. Putting music into Noteflight isn't complicated, and it's easy to get started. Besides reading this guide, you can also view our tutorial videos.

Click the "Create" button at the top of the page to create a score.

Then choose the initial instrument(s) for the score and press OK.

Decide where you want a new note to go.

Click any measure where you want to enter some notes. A blinking cursor will appear there.

Enter a note with the mouse

As you move the mouse next to the blinking cursor, a gray note head will appear to show the place where a new note will be created:

Click the mouse to turn this into a brand new note in the score:

Or type a note letter name, A - G, on your computer keyboard to enter that pitch. Now the cursor has moved to the next note, so you can continue entering more notes.

Change a note you just made

After entering a note, you can make changes by clicking or tapping a button on one of the editor's many palettes:

The buttons will change the note accordingly:

Rests

To create a rest, delete a note in the same location. If there is no note in a given location, Noteflight automatically fills it in with a rest of the same duration.

Select objects and measures before changing them.

Before changing any objects in the score, you always begin by selecting them. Then use the palette buttons to make your changes, in any order you want.

You can select a note, rest, bar line or any notation by clicking or tapping it directly:

You can also select a measure specific to a part by clicking or tapping the measure's staff lines:

You can also select a section of the score across all parts by clicking or tapping in the measure number bar above the score:

Add measures

Click the gray bar above any measure, then click or tap either of the + icons to insert a new measure in that place:

Delete measures

Click the gray bar above any measure, then click or tap the - icon to delete that measure:

Add parts

Open the Instruments panel using the Instruments button: Then choose your instrument and drag the new part into the correct position within the score.

Score Details

Publish or share your score with other Noteflight users and on the web by using Score Details:

Adding and Editing Notes

Tutorial Video

You can add a note in four different ways: by using the mouse, the computer keyboard, the onscreen piano or a MIDI controller (only available in Premium and Learn). Using the mouse is easier when getting started, but most people find that using the computer keyboard or MIDI is far quicker once they learn their way around.

Using the Mouse

To add a note with the mouse, select the place where you want the note to appear and move the mouse cursor over the area just to the right of the blinking insertion point (the thin vertical line). As you move the mouse up and down, a gray note head appears under the mouse pointer to show where a note will be placed if you click:

Clicking the mouse button then adds the note head to any note or rest at that position:

If any single note or rest is already selected when the note was added, the newly added note takes on the time duration of that selected object.

To control the duration of a new note using the mouse, hold the mouse button down while entering it and drag to either side. Dragging to the left makes the note shorter; dragging to the right makes it longer.

Using the Computer Keyboard

To add a note with the keyboard, select the place where you want the note to appear and use the keys A through G. The note will be added to the location following the blinking insertion point (a new note will be created if there is no note there already), and the insertion point will move ahead to the next note. Type several note names in sequence to enter the successive notes of a melody.

To add more notes vertically on the same stem to create a chord or double stop: add the first note, then hold down the Shift key Shift while you type the letter names of the additional notes.

To add a rest with the keyboard, use the N key. The currently selected note will be turned into a rest, and the insertion point will move ahead to the next note (making the score longer, if needed).

Newly entered notes are always added at the pitch nearest the last note entered, with no accidentals. They are also added using the same duration as the preceding note. So you will often need to adjust a note after it is typed. Use the following important keys to adjust your new note:

- + = add a flat, sharp or natural
[ or ( makes a note shorter
] or ) makes a note longer
, and . make ties and dots
↑ and ↓ adjust a note's pitch by scale steps in the current key signature.
Shift+↑ and Shift+↓ adjust a note's pitch by chromatic half-steps.
Ctrl+↑ and Ctrl+↓ adjust a note's pitch by octaves.
Delete removes the note and moves the cursor backwards.
← and → move the insertion point one note to the left or right.
R repeats the last-entered note with the same duration.

Using the Visual Piano Keyboard

You can display a visual keyboard on the screen with the Keyboard button: . On touch devices, the Keyboard is always displayed.

The keyboard will show which notes are selected, and clicking or touching the keyboard will change these notes and enter new ones.

To create chords or double stops on touch devices, you can play up to four notes at once, or touch the first note and hold your finger down, then touch the other notes you need, in order to add them onto the same stem.

If you are not on a touch device, you can only click one note at a time. However, you may hold down the Shift key while clicking to add notes to a chord.

Using a MIDI Controller

(This feature is only available in Noteflight Premium and Learn.)

Noteflight supports MIDI controller entry of notes, one note or chord at a time. This is known as step entry. If you want to transcribe live performance on your MIDI controller into notation, please see the section Transcribing a MIDI Performance as Notation.

In the HTML5 version of Noteflight, MIDI currently works only with Google Chrome on Windows, Mac OS and Linux (iOS is not supported). In order to use it, follow these steps first:

Close any Noteflight score windows that are already open.
Connect your MIDI controller to your computer.

When MIDI is active, you can enter notes into any Noteflight score using the MIDI controller, any time that you would use the mouse or computer keyboard to put in notes. Click the measure or note where you want the notes to appear, and start using your controller.

If no location is selected in the Noteflight score, Noteflight will simply play the notes it receives from the MIDI controller. This is useful for trying out ideas before entering them.

One convenient way to enter music into Noteflight with MIDI is to place one hand on the computer keyboard and use the other hand to play notes on the MIDI controller. You can then enter notes with MIDI, and alter the rhythm using Noteflight's keyboard shortcuts (see Using the Computer Keyboard). Of particular importance is the keystroke Z for changing the spelling of a note (e.g. from C# to Db).

Noteflight also supplies some convenient MIDI shortcuts that give you the ability to control rhythm using the MIDI controller only:

MIDI action	Noteflight action
Pitch bend down	Make notes shorter
Pitch bend up	Make notes longer
Mod wheel	Move cursor to right (to create a rest)
Soft pedal	Make notes shorter
Sostenuto (middle) pedal	Make notes longer
Sustain pedal	Tie notes

Create a Rest

To insert a rest (silence), delete a note and Noteflight will replace it with a rest of the same duration. There is no way to directly create a rest.

See Duration Palette for more information about working with rests.

Moving Notes with the Mouse

At any point, you can drag one or more selected notes vertically with the mouse to change its pitch. Dragging moves all selected notes one staff line or space at a time (diatonic transposition).

You can also drag one or more selected notes from side to side with the mouse to change where they fall rhythmically within the bar. While you are dragging, the cursor will change to a small note and an orange bar or gray outline will travel with the mouse to show where the selected notes will be placed when the mouse button is released:

Note: This feature is not available on touch devices.

Selecting Music

Selecting music is one of the most important operations in Noteflight, because you must select the things that you want to edit before changing them. Understanding how selection works is fundamental to using the capabilities of the Score Editor.

Whenever you have a selection, you can apply a wide variety of actions that affect the selection on some way. Commands that operate on individual notes or objects (for example,

Pitch:

Sharp

) will affect every object that is within the selection, whether that is just one thing or a large collection of objects. Commands that operate on ranges of measures (for example,

Measure:

Change Time Signature

) will affect all measures that include the selection. And commands that affect the structure of the score (like Cut, Copy and Paste) will operate in different ways depending on how you first select music.

There are three different ways to select parts of a Noteflight score so that you can apply actions to them. These are explained in the following sections.

Object selections

Object selections contain one or more individual notations like notes, rests, bar lines or chord symbols. After making this kind of selection, the next editing action will be applied to each object that is selected, if it's an action that applies to objects.

Very often there is only one selected object, the new note or other symbol that you just created by clicking or typing. In this case, you will not need to select it before editing it, since it is already selected.

You can select objects by simply clicking them with the mouse:

When the mouse is over an object that can be selected in this way, it "glows" a little bit and the mouse cursor changes to a pointing hand.

To select several different objects at the same time, use the Ctrl key while clicking to toggle individual objects' selected state on or off:

Double-clicking a chord selects the entire chord.

After you have selected more than one object, any editing action will apply to all the selected objects. For example, using the

Articulation:

Accent

action on the above selection will yield this result:

If the next editing action applies to measures, then it will be applied to all measures that contain selected objects.

Note: the ← and → keys provide a quick way to select the object to the left or right of the current selection.

Score selections

Score Selection captures all elements of the music including time signatures and key signatures. Deleting a score selection removes that part of the score entirely, without leaving a gap, while pasting a score selection splices a new section of score in between two existing measures. Pasting a score selection includes the key and time signatures that were selected. A score selection always begins and ends at a bar line.

Make score selections by clicking or tapping the grey, numbered "measure markers" that appear above each measure (hover or tap to see it):

Clicking in a measure marker and then dragging horizontally selects a range of the score, rather than a single measure.

Double-clicking or tapping any measure marker selects the entire score.

You may also hold down the Shift key when clicking a measure marker to extend a score selection further. On touch devices, tap and hold the measure marker with one finger, then tap with another finger.

Staff selections

Staff selection captures only the musical content within measures, rather than the entire measure or measure range, as with score selection (see above). Copying and pasting a staff selection will NOT include the time and key signatures; instead, the notes, dynamics, and text will carry over and be placed into the time and key signature context of the section of the score where the music is pasted. Staff selection begins on any note or rest within a bar, and ends on any other later in the same staff, and can include additional staves above or below. Copying and pasting a staff selection is the best way to copy music from one staff (or set of staves) to another.

Make staff selections by clicking or tapping in the staff, within the five staff lines but not on any notes or other objects:

Clicking in the staff and then dragging horizontally selects a range of measures on that staff, rather than a single measure.

Double-clicking inside any staff also selects that entire staff, from the beginning of the score to the end.

Hold the Shift key while clicking measures or objects to extend the time range or staff range of an existing selection:

(On touch devices, tap and hold the object you are extending to with one finger, then tap with another finger.)

The Shift+← and Shift+→ keys provide a quick way to extend the current selection into a staff selection that is one object longer or one object shorter.

To select an entire staff throughout the whole score, you can also click the grey "staff marker" that appears to the left of the starting point of each staff:

Dragging Selections with the Mouse

At any point, you can drag a score or staff selection with the mouse to another place in the score. This operation can move the selected music forwards and backwards in time (if you drag from side to side) and can also move music from one staff to another (if you drag up and down).

The first step in dragging a selection is, of course, to select something! Once you've done that, place the mouse over the highlighted region, hold down the mouse button and start dragging. What happens next depends on what kind of selection you made.

If you selected a single object, then an orange bar will travel with the mouse to show where the dropped object will go:

If you made a staff selection or a multiple object selection, then a rectangular outline will travel with the mouse to show where the dropped music will go. Dragging horizontally will move the music to a new place in the score, but keep the part(s) the same:

If you select music within a single staff, you can move selected music from one staff to another by dragging vertically:

If you make a score selection, you can drag an entire section of the score horizontally to rearrange entire measures or groups of measures. While dragging, an orange bar in the measure-number area above the score shows where the dropped material will go:

Clearing the selection

Sometimes you don't want anything selected at all. You can always clear the selection by clicking or tapping outside of any staff, or pressing the Esc key.

Filtering the selection

Sometimes you want to apply a specific operation to only a subset of the objects in some range of the score: perhaps only the notes, or only chord symbols. See the

Edit:

Filter Selection

action for more details on how to do this.

Actions and Palettes

At the heart of Noteflight is its Score Editor. Whether you are viewing your own score or a score that allows you to change it, you have the power to create and edit music in many ways.

The Score Editor gives you a set of actions that you can apply to the score. Most of these actions change the score in some way, usually by altering selected elements within the score. One example of an action is

Pitch:

Flat

which means, place a flat on all selected notes. Other actions do something with the score but don't change the music, for example

Score:

which prints out the score.

Palette Buttons

The simplest way to carry out an action is to click or tap a button on one of the palettes. A palette is a row of buttons, and each button corresponds to an action. Most of the palettes appear in an area above the score. Here is the Duration palette, for example:

duration

Most palettes come in two versions: basic and advanced. The small orange arrow at the right of each palette lets you switch between the two versions. The palette shown above is the basic Duration palette; clicking the orange arrow will show the advanced one:

duration

Clicking the orange arrow again will return to the basic version, and clicking the name of the palette will make the palette disappear entirely.

Many palettes have buttons that highlight in response to selecting objects. For example, the above duration palette will highlight the button corresponding to the currently selected note's value. It will also highlight the tie button if the note has a tie on it.

Browsing and Pinning Palettes

You can also browse all the actions in the editor by clicking the menu button at the top left of the screen This will cause a menu of all available palettes to be shown. Each palette opens up to reveal a view of all the actions inside it, which is useful for discovering where a particular action is and then using it:

Clicking a palette's name will cause it to display in the toolbar, "pinning" it so that you are able to use its actions repeatedly without having to keep going back and popping up the menu again and again. Palettes that are pinned in this way are shown with a checkmark.

Clicking the name again will "un-pin" the palette, causing it to disappear from the toolbar at the top and removing its checkmark.

Score Palette

This palette contains actions that work with the entire score.

Score:
Parts

Shows the Instruments panel, which lets you control the instruments in the score:

The instrument features of Noteflight are described more fully in the section Working with Parts and Instruments.

Score:
Formatting

Shows the Formatting panel, which allows you to control a variety of settings that govern the appearance of the score. Please read the section Formatting for complete information on these settings.

Score:
Show in Concert Pitch

Controls whether parts for transposing instruments (for example, clarinet or trumpet) are shown in their transposed key or in concert pitch. See Parts for Transposing Instruments for more information.

Printing a score

Score:

Page Setup

Score:

PrintCtrl+P

Documents can be printed with

Score:

, which prints the full score with all parts. This displays a print dialog whose contents depend on what operating system you are using, and what printer you are using.

Users may also use

(only available in Premium and Learn) to print each part of the score separately, in its transposed key.

Score:

Page Setup

lets you choose the paper size and orientation used for your score. Note that this does not force the printer to use the same settings — you will still have to choose the settings that match the document when you print.

Page Setup

The Page Setup section of Formatting lets you adjust the Paper Size, Page Orientation (Portrait or Landscape), and Margin sizes.

If you want to download a PDF of a score, you may use

Score:

Export

and choose PDF as the export format. This is only available for your own scores, or for shared scores that allow others to export.

Score:
SaveCtrl+S

Saves the current score. If there are no changes that need to be saved, this command is disabled.

Scores are saved automatically when you stop working for a while, or after a predetermined time limit. If you try to leave a page with unsaved work, Noteflight asks you to confirm first, in order to avoid losing your changes.

Score:
Save a Copy

Saves your own copy of the score, if you are the author or if the author has allowed you to do so. The new copy will have the same name as the old one, preceded by "Copy of...". It will belong to the same folders as the original score.

Noteflight keeps a record of document copies for purposes of tracking intellectual property rights. When you save a copy, the copy has internal tracking data that identifies the original document.

Score:
Export

Exports this score in one of a number of formats, if you are the author or if the author has allowed you to export it. Choosing this action displays the Export Score panel:

Please see the section Exporting Files from Noteflight for more information.

Score:
Versions

Allows you to inspect previously saved versions of your score, play them, copy material out of them, and restore them to the current version. This action first saves the current state of your score and then displays the Versions Panel:

Each row in the Versions list is a previous version of the currently open score, and shows the date and time at which that version was saved and the name of the user who saved it. Selecting a row temporarily displays the corresponding version in the Score Editor. When the editor shows a previous version, you cannot make changes to it: what's done is done! However, you can select, view, print and copy music out of the old version into the clipboard.

If you select the most recent version again, you are once again returned to an editable view of your current score, and your selected objects and undo history are the same as they were before you inspected an old version.

Choose Restore while a previous version is selected to save that version as the new, most current version of the score. You will not lose any information by doing so, because you can always revert once again to the version that was current before this change.

Choose Close to return to working with the latest version without making any changes.

Score:
Sync Audio

Allows you to synchronize external audio or video media playback with a Noteflight score. See the section Synchronizing External Audio/Video Media for more information.

Score:
Statistics

Click to show the total score time duration in the lower left corner of the score. Click again to hide it.

Edit Palette

This palette contains basic editing and selection actions.

Undo and Redo

Edit:

UndoCtrl+Z

Edit:

RedoCtrl+Y

All changes that you make to the score can be undone and redone, including changes to the set of selected objects or measures. (Undo/redo of selection changes is handy in complex edits since it can take some work to select exactly the things you want). The

and

actions perform these important functions. Up to 20 prior changes are maintained in the edit history.

Cut, Copy and Paste

Edit:

CutCtrl+X

Edit:

CopyCtrl+C

Edit:

PasteCtrl+V

These three actions allow selected music to be copied or removed from one location and placed or inserted into another.

To use these actions, first select some of your score. Then use

to place the selected objects into an invisible "clipboard" for storage. (

Edit:

Cut

deletes the selected material after placing it in the clipboard.)

Then, select a new place in the document and use

Edit:

Paste

. This inserts the clipboard contents into the score, usually at a different location from where

were previously used. The way the clipboard is inserted depends on the way that its material was originally selected.

If the clipboard was created from a Score Selection, then the pasted bars are inserted into the score just prior to the first bar in the selection. Existing bars are moved over to make room for the pasted measures, so the score becomes longer, and nothing is erased.

If the clipboard was created from an Object or a Staff Selection, then it can be thought of almost as a "recording" of the selected music. The Paste command overlays this "recording" on top of the selected staves, beginning at the starting point of the selection. First any existing music that would be overlaid by the pasted material is removed, and the score is extended with additional measures as needed. Then the pasted music is placed into this freshly cleared area, without changing any of the existing bar lines, key signatures or time signatures. If the new material has a different relationship to the bar lines than the original, it is re-beamed and notes may be broken up and tied across bar lines to preserve their rhythmic values.

If the clipboard was created from a staff selection, it must be pasted into the same number of staves that it was cut or copied from (although they can be different staves of course!).

If a single melodic voice is placed in the clipboard and then pasted into another single voice, it will replace only that voice and leave other voices alone.

Edit:
Delete⌫

Deletes the current selection. The behavior of this action depends on the nature of the selection.

To erase specific notes, measures or passages of music from the score, create an Object Selection or Staff Selection and use

Edit:

Delete

. The selected notations will be removed and replaced with rests as needed.

To clear out the contents of a measure without removing it from the score, create a staff selection by clicking in the staff area of a measure and using Shift-click in another staff area to extend the selection if desired.

Edit:

Delete

will clear the selected measures, but the score will remain the same length that it had previously.

To remove one or more measures from the score, create a Score Selection by clicking a numbered measure marker, then Shift-click elsewhere in the score to extend the selection to more measures if needed.

Edit:

Delete

will remove the selected measures, making the entire score shorter.

Edit:
RepeatR

It's very common to repeat a section of music in the score, sometimes exactly, sometimes with modification. Repeated music can range from a single note, to a melodic theme, to entire sections of the score.

Use

Edit:

Repeat

to duplicate the current selection and immediately paste a copy of the selection after itself. (This does not affect the contents of the clipboard.)

If you select a single note, chord or rest, this will repeat the same notation in succession. You can also select measures or entire passages. Repeating an Object or Staff Selection overlays the material on the following portion of the score, erasing what was previously there. Repeating a Score Selection, however, inserts new copies of the selected measures and moves the measures immediately following the selection over to make room for these copies.

Edit:
Select AllCtrl+A

Selects all measures in the score, as a Score Selection. The same effect can be achieved by double-clicking or -tapping the gray bar above any measure in the score.

Edit:
Filter Selection

Selects a filtered set of the objects within the current selection. This is very useful for when you want to isolate a current kind of object within the selection and only apply an action to these objects alone. Clicking

Edit:

Filter Selection

brings up a panel allowing you to choose the kind of object you want to filter:

For example, suppose you would like to move all the chord symbols in a musical passage upwards a bit. Select the passage in the normal way, then use

Edit:

Filter Selection

and choose Chord Symbols. Only the chord symbols within the passage will be selected after this is done. Now, apply

Pitch:

Move Up

as needed to move the chords to their new position.

Edit:
Keyboard Shortcuts

You can add your own keyboard shortcuts for editor actions that currently do not have default shortcuts. Watch this quick video to get started, then read all the details below and download the helpful shortcut templates. Open the Keyboard Shortcuts dialog and select any editor action without a shortcut to add your own.

If your shortcut is already used, Noteflight will show a message on both your shortcut and the corresponding duplicate. (Note: Not all shortcuts are in the dialog, such as "C" for entering the note C, etc.)

You can add and edit your shortcuts at any time or choose Reset to remove all of your added shortcuts. Download the attached file to use one of our helpful templates to see what shortcuts are already used and make your own custom shortcut guide, available for both Excel and PDF:

Noteflight Keyboard Shortcut Templates.zip

Noteflight also has keyboard shortcuts for many common editing actions. Please see our keyboard shortcut quick reference (English) (Deutsch).

Duration Palette

This palette manipulates the duration of selected notes. Its buttons are highlighted to display duration properties of the currently selected note or chord.

Choosing Note or Rest Duration

Whole Note

Half Note

Quarter Note

Eighth Note

16th Note

32nd Note

64th Note

Change the first selected note or chord to use the indicated note value, unless this would cause it to go past the end of the measure. All dots and ties are removed from the note. If the note or chord is made shorter, rests will be added to keep the measure complete.

The duration palette changes appearance depending whether you have a note or a rest selected in the staff.

If a Note is selected, the Note duration options appear:

If a Rest is selected, the Rest duration options appear:

Making Notes or Rests Longer and Shorter

Duration:

Increase Note Duration]

Duration:

Decrease Note Duration[

Change the first selected note or chord to be longer or shorter than it already is. When using computer keyboard shortcuts, this is the easiest way to control the length of entered notes by using only two keys: [ and ] (or ( and ) on keyboards without brackets). If making a note longer would cause it to go past the end of the measure, nothing happens.If the note or chord is made shorter, rests will be added to keep the measure complete. All dots and ties are removed from the note.

Duration:
Rhythm Dot.

Add or remove a single rhythm dot on the first selected note or chord, making it one and one half times the length of the regular value.

Duration:
Double Dot

Add or remove two rhythm dots on the first selected note or chord, making it one and three quarters times as long as its regular value.

Duration:
Tie,

Add or remove a tie to all selected notes or chords. The note following the tie does not need to exist when you add the tie. The following note can be added later, and the tie will automatically connect to it.

The note following a tie will automatically be adjusted so that its accidental is the same as the note beginning the tie.

Duration:
Incoming Tie

Create a special tie coming into notes that are at the beginning of a repeat ending or coda. The note at the other end of the tie will usually be in a bar that occurs earlier in the score, so a regular tie can't be used here.

Duration:
L.V. Tie

L.V. means "let vibrate" or "laissez vibrer." The L.V. Tie tells the performer to let a note sound through its full duration without stopping it.

Rhythm Palette

This palette contains actions having to do with musical rhythm.

Tremolo Lines

Rhythm:

Tremolo 1

Rhythm:

Tremolo 2

Rhythm:

Tremolo 3

Add or remove the chosen type of tremolo marking on all selected notes and chords.

If a note stands alone, it will be made into a single-note tremolo with the given number of lines. If a note is part of a double-note tremolo, the double-note tremolo will be adjusted to conform to the number of lines.

Rests are not affected.

Rhythm:
Start Tremolo

Create a new double-note tremolo starting with the currently selected note. The length of the 2-note tremolo will be the same as the length of the note from which it was created. The number of lines in the new tremolo may be changed using

and

Rhythm:
Roll

Add or remove a roll marking on all selected notes and chords. Rests are not affected. This marking only works with Marching Band Bass, Snare, and Tenor drums.

Adjust Beams

Rhythm:

Start Beam}

Rhythm:

Continue Beam{

Beaming rules are applied automatically to all notes that require them. You can force beams to start and end at specific places, however, by using these two actions on selected notes.

Rhythm:
Add Slash/

The Slash symbol converts the selection to use a slash notehead and advances the note entry cursor.

Grace Notes and Appoggiaturas

Rhythm:

Grace NoteCtrl+G

Rhythm:

Appoggiatura

Grace notes are special notes that are played as ornaments before a regular "main note" that they are attached to. They look like regular notes, but are smaller and their stems generally point up. There can be any number of grace notes preceding a main note.

The most common type of grace note looks like an eighth note with a slash through it, and is played very fast just before the beat of the main note that it is attached to. If there is more than one grace note, the whole group is written as a beamed group of sixteenth notes with a slash through the beam. Grace note groups, like single grace notes, are played very fast just before the beat.

The other type of grace note is called an appoggiatura and is played at its regular length, delaying the start of the main note that it's attached to. Appoggiaturas are not common in modern music but are quite frequently seen in classical music.

To create a grace note, first create a regular note:

and then use either

. You'll see a result like this:

If you create another grace note, it will form a group with the first one:

Finally, adding a main note looks like this:

Grace notes are frequently slurred to the following notes. If you create a slur starting on a grace note, it will automatically slur the grace note (or group) to the main note. If you create a slur starting on a note that is preceded by a grace note or group, the slur will automatically include any grace notes under it.

Tuplets

Rhythm:

Duplet2

Rhythm:

Triplet3

Rhythm:

Quadruplet4

Rhythm:

Quintuplet5

Rhythm:

Sextuplet6

Rhythm:

Septuplet7

Tuplet grouping such as triplets, quintuplets, and so on can be added by entering or selecting the note that will become the first note of the tuplet and then using one of the above actions. You can also type the number of the tuplet on the keyboard (3, 4, 5, 6, 7) as a shortcut.

The first selected rest, note or chord is subdivided in order to make the tuplet, and its pitches will now belong to the first subdivision of the tuplet. For example, if you start with a quarter note and create a triplet, you will get triplet 8th notes (since three of these take up the space of the original note) and the original note will now be the first 8th note in the tuplet.

Here's what the situation looks like before creating an 8th note triplet:

And what it looks like afterwards:

You can subdivide dotted notes, too. This lets you create duplets or quadruplets. Start with:

And after creating a duplet, you'll get this:

A tuplet acts like a "mini-measure" in that it contains a certain span of musical time. Just as with a measure, Noteflight will limit the number of notes you can put inside the tuplet to the correct time span, and will also fill the tuplet out with rests as needed to maintain its proper length. So working with the notes inside, say, a quarter-note triplet is just like working with the notes in a bar with a 3/4 time signature.

To select the entire range of a tuplet, click its number bracket. You can then delete it, once its range is selected.

Note: Noteflight automatically removes a tuplet if you make its initial note or rest last the entire length of the tuplet, since it is not meaningful to use a tuplet grouping on a single note.

Pitch Palette

This palette is concerned with actions that affect the pitch of notes.

Accidentals

Pitch:

Sharp+

Pitch:

Flat-

Pitch:

Natural=

Pitch:

Double Sharp*

Pitch:

Double Flat_

These actions add or remove the chosen accidental from all selected notes.

Sometimes a note already has the given accidental but it isn't displayed because the key signature or a previous note in the measure already applies to it. In this case, the action will force the accidental to appear, or prevent it from appearing, without changing the pitch.

Pitch:
Transpose

This action displays a panel that allows you to transpose selected notes or regions of the score by any musical interval. When first displayed, the panel looks like this:

Your next step is to fill in the box with a number corresponding to the desired interval. For example, you might want to transpose by a 6th. Once you supply the number, you will be able to choose the specific interval you want.

You can also choose whether to transpose selected key signatures at the same time.

Note that chord symbols will also be transposed: this is the only action in Noteflight that will transpose chords.

Then choose Ok to perform the action:

Move Up or Down

Pitch:

Move Up↑

Pitch:

Move Down↓

This pair of actions moves all selected objects up or down by one position on the staff (one-half of the distance between staff lines).

For notes, this action changes the pitch up or down by one scale step in the prevailing key. For all other objects like chord symbols, text, slurs, lines and dynamics, this action moves the objects vertically up and down by the same amount.

Transpose Up or Down Chromatic

Pitch:

Move Up a Half StepShift+↑

Pitch:

Move Down a Half StepShift+↓

Transpose the selected notes up or down by a chromatic step adding sharps or flats as needed. Sharps are preferred when transposing up, flats when transposing down. If you don't get the accidental you want, after using this action, follow it with the

Pitch:

Enharmonic Shift

action.

Transpose Up or Down Octave

Pitch:

Move Up an OctaveCtrl+↑

Pitch:

Move Down an OctaveCtrl+↓

Transpose the selected notes up or down by one octave.

Pitch:
Enharmonic ShiftZ

Switch between the possible spellings of all selected notes, using different scale steps and accidentals, without changing the pitch of the notes. For example, a note Db would be switched to C# and vice versa. A note C would be switched between C, B# and Dbb.

This action is very useful when correcting notes entered using MIDI, which does not recognize the different ways that the same note can be represented in notation.

Pitch:
Courtesy Accidental%

Force a note's accidental to appear before it in parentheses. This is used to make the accidental clearer to a performer in complex music where determining the accidental correctly might be hard.

8va and 8vb Lines

Pitch:

Octave Up

Pitch:

Octave Down

Add lines to the selected music in the score that indicate the music should be performed one octave higher (

Pitch:

Octave Up

) or one octave lower (

Pitch:

Octave Down

Tempo Palette

Change Tempo

This control alters the tempo, and also shows the tempo at the beginning of the score or of the currently selected portion of the score:

It can work in three ways:

If nothing is selected, the tempo control affects the tempo in effect at the beginning of the piece, and places a tempo marking there:
If a range of music is selected, the tempo control affects the exact measures of the piece in that range:
If a tempo marking alone is selected, the tempo control affects only that one tempo marking.

To alter the tempo, change the metronome marking inside the tempo control, which gives the number of beats per minute. You can also change the tempo beat value, shown by the small note in front of the tempo number. Click this note to display a list of choices beneath the tempo control, which can also include an optional dot:

The tempo may only be changed if the score can be edited by you. If the score is not editable, then the tempo appears as a fixed number that cannot be altered. However, anyone can adjust the playback speed regardless of the saved tempo: see

Sound:

Speed

To change the tempo without showing a tempo marking, use

Color:

None

to hide the tempo marking (only available in Premium and Learn).

Accel. and rit Lines

Tempo:

Accelerando

Tempo:

Ritardando

Add lines to the selected music in the score that indicate the music should speed up (

) or slow down (

) as the music progresses.

While playing back a score, Noteflight does its best to interpret accelerando, ritardando, fermatas, and other notations that alter the tempo. You must use a line to make this happen: putting in text that says accel. or rit. will not change the way Noteflight performs the score. To get the most out of this feature, pay attention to the following.

Lines for rit. and accel. cause the tempo to smoothly slow down or speed up over the course of the line.
Place an explicit tempo marking after the end of a line to control the final tempo. (Paid users can use the Color feature to hide the tempo marking.)
Put the text "a tempo" after the end of a line to restore the tempo that was in effect at the start of the line.

Tempo:
Fermata^

Place a fermata on each selected note. This causes the tempo to slow down temporarily and pause at this point.

Make sure to place a fermata in each part and voice of a multi-part score, and to align them properly, or they will not be performed.

Tempo:
Caesura

Place a caesura on each selected note. This causes the tempo to pause at this point in a more emphatic way than with

Tempo:

Fermata

Tempo:
Breath Mark

Place a breath mark on each selected note. This indicates the place where a wind player should draw breath, and can also be used to indicate a brief pause for non-wind instruments.

Swing 8ths or 16ths

You may achieve a jazz swing feel during playback by specifying that a piece should be performed with the second eighth note of each quarter value delayed by a variable amount, or for swing sixteenths, the second sixteenth note of each eighth value. (You can change the degree of swing only if you have editing access to the score.)

You can swing either eighths or sixteenths, but not both at once:

The percentage of swing refers to the displacement of the second eighth or sixteenth note from exact time. At 0%, there is no deviation and the playback will sound "straight". These examples show eighth-note swing; the same process applies to sixteenth-note swing:

At 33%, the deviation is one 3rd of an 8th note, meaning that the same passage will be performed like this:

At 50%, the deviation is half an 8th note -- that is, the passage will be performed as:

Text Palette

This palette deals with the many aspects of text within Noteflight. A number of kinds of text can be added to Noteflight scores: general text, lyrics, dynamics/expression text and chord symbols.

Text:
LyricsCtrl+L

Add lyrics to the first selected note in a score. When editing lyrics, a blinking cursor appears in the place where the lyric syllable should go, and you can type the lyric there:

When you are finished typing the syllable, type one of these characters:

Space finishes this syllable and begins the first syllable of a new word on the following note.
- (hyphen) finishes this syllable, and continues the current word on a new syllable under the following note, with a dash between the syllables.
_ (underscore) finishes this word, and shows a extension line to the right of it. Use this when a syllable is sung over several tied or slurred notes; you can press _ multiple times to continue the extension line for as many notes as you like.
Enter/Return finishes this syllable and begins the lyric for a new verse on the same note.
Esc finishes this syllable and stops editing lyrics.

As you type, lyrics will be added and the cursor will advance from note to note:

Double-clicking an existing lyric syllable allows you to edit that syllable.

It's easiest to enter one verse of lyrics at a time. To enter subsequent verses of lyrics, double-click the syllable where you want to start and hit Enter. A new verse will be started on that syllable:

Here is an example showing lyrics with both hyphens and extensions:

The appearance of hyphens between syllables can be controlled by settings in ; Noteflight can automatically place multiple hyphens between syllables, since sometimes syllables will be spaced out over many intervening notes.

Lyrics are normally placed below the staff by Noteflight. However, Noteflight will automatically put lyrics above the staff, when the lyrics belong to notes in an upper voice (see Voice Palette). This is useful for staves that contain more than one melody, for example:

You can control the placement of lyrics above or below the staff yourself by selecting one or more lyrics and using

. If you are changing the position of multiple lyrics, the

Edit:

Filter Selection

action may be useful to you.

A special case arises when two syllables are pronounced together rapidly on a single note. This occurs frequently in some languages such as Italian, and is called an elision. It's typically represented by a space or a small tie-like symbols between the syllables. Because Noteflight uses the space character to let you move to the next lyric, you can use the plus sign (+) as a special character to put in the space for an elision.

Text:
Performance TextT

Add performance text at the location of the first selected object. Performance text in Noteflight has many different uses. Instructions like ritardandos, as well as formal elements such as D.S. al coda are entered as performance text in Noteflight. Performance text can also be used as a way of adding comments throughout the score.

To add text, first select any object at the desired position:

Then apply the

Text:

Performance Text

action, and type your text. When editing performance text, a blinking cursor appears in the place where the text goes, and you can type the text there.

Use the Esc key to finish editing the text, or click outside the editing area.

Double-clicking an existing piece of text allows you to edit that text.

Performance text can contain multiple lines. Pressing the Enter key while typing performance text will advance the cursor to the next line:

If you want to change the position of performance text, drag it in any direction with the mouse, or select it and use the arrow keys to move it around.

To use an accidental in performance text, you may include the special sequences {sharp}, {natural}, {flat}, {double sharp} or {double flat}. Also, key names like Ab (A flat), G# (G sharp) or F= (F natural) will be automatically formatted to use the corresponding accidentals, just like with chord symbols.

To use a note value in performance text, include the sequences {sixteenth}, {eighth}, {quarter}, {half} or {whole}. The word "dotted" can be included before the note value, for example {dotted quarter}.

Playing Techniques and Performance Text

Performance text is also used to communicate instructions on instrument playing techniques. In particular, Noteflight Premium supports special meanings for the terms pizzicato, spiccato and arco. When used in performance text for a stringed instrument, either in full or in their commonly abbreviated forms, these will cause the appropriate string technique to be heard on playback. This example illustrates the use of both abbreviated and fully written forms:

Musical Form Directions

Performance and System Text can also refer to elements of the musical form, and Noteflight will understand these correctly and play them back properly. Supported elements include:

Repeat (number) times
Play (number) times
(number)x
To Coda
Coda
Fine
D.S. or D.C.
D.S. or D.C. Al Fine
D.S. or D.C. Al Coda
D.C. Al Segno

To include form symbols in performance text, you may include the special sequences {coda} or {segno}.

Dynamics:
Expression TextCtrl+E

Add a new piece of expression text at the location of the first selected object. Expression text is an instruction to the performer on how the music in a particular staff or part is to be played. In Noteflight, expression text is used for both dynamics like ff and p, as well as for complete words like espressivo. If you type a recognized dynamic then it will automatically be formatted properly; however, you may also type any other text that you like. Expression text is always in an italic font.

Dynamics Text

When editing dynamics/expression text, a blinking cursor appears in the place where the text will go, and you can type the text there. If you type a recognized dynamic abbreviation such as p, mf, and so on, the correct dynamic symbol is shown as soon as you are finished entering the text and the playback of the score will make use of the correct dynamic. So, while you're entering a dynamic it may look like this:

but after you are finished, it will automatically change to look like this:

Use the Esc key to finish editing the text, or click outside the editing area.

Double-clicking any existing dynamic or expression text allows you to edit its text.

For grand-staff instruments such as piano, dynamics on the upper staff also affects the playback of the lower staff. Dynamics on the lower staff apply to that staff alone. To make a dynamic marking apply to just the upper staff, drag it from below the upper staff to above the upper staff. Note also that dynamics that apply to multiple staves will be respected during playback only when all staves are being played. When an individual staff is being played, it will only respect dynamics that are actually present on that staff.

Please see the section Best Practices for Dynamic Playback for information on how to ensure that Noteflight plays your dynamic markings correctly.

Text:
Chord SymbolK

Add a chord symbols to the first selected note, chord or rest.

Automatic formatting. Chord entry in Noteflight is incredibly easy and simple: just type the chord name in a normal way, using the typical convention of substituting a lowercase "b" for flat, and the "#" character for sharp. When you're done, Noteflight will automatically format the chord so that it looks correct.

So, while you're entering a chord it may look like this:

but after you are finished, it will automatically change to look like this:

Use the Esc key to finish editing the text or click outside the editing area.

Pop/Jazz Chord Symbols. If you can type a chord, Noteflight will usually figure out how to format it correctly. Here is a sample illustrating some of the main ways that chords can be typed, and showing how Noteflight formats them. You can include any combination of scale degrees, flats, sharps, "+", "-" and triad abbreviations. Note that to vertically "stack" scale degrees, you may separate them with spaces. Here are some examples that show some of the many possible chords you can create by simply typing them:

Classical Analysis with Roman Numerals. You can also create chord symbols using Roman numerals, in a similar way. Note that preceding such a symbol with a key name and a colon (":") will align the chord correctly, shifting the key name to the left. Accidentals may come before the Roman numeral, using the characters b (flat), # (sharp) or = (natural).

Scale Degrees.To enter a scale degree number with a caret (^) above it, use a chord symbol that includes a caret before the number as in ^7. Accidentals just like those used in Roman numerals may precede the caret, as in b^3 or =^7.

Figured Bass or Fingering Notations. Noteflight also supports figured bass and fingering notations. These are typed in the obvious way, placing the different elements of the symbol on separate lines:

Placeholders for Analysis Exercises. If you are creating an exercise or assignment in which the user is to supply an analysis of some elements in a score, you can create a "placeholder" chord symbol that shows a horizontal line indicating where the analysis should go. This is just a chord symbol that consists of one or more underscore characters (_). The result looks like this:

As soon as the user double-clicks such a placeholder line to enter their response, the line disappears to make room for the user's response to be entered. The response is formatted as a normal chord or analysis symbol, and is not underlined.

Double Accidentals.To explicitly enter a double accidental in a chord symbol, use the text "bb" or "##". Note that chord symbols when transposed may yield root tones with double accidentals, even if these were not originally used in the chord.

Repeat Endings. To create a repeat ending in a measure, add a chord symbol on the first beat of the measure that has a number followed by a period, like "1.", "2.", and so on.

Special formatting. To take full control of the formatting of chord symbol text, surround it with double curly braces {{...}} and make use of the following special character sequences. This works with a single object such as an isolated flat symbol, not as part of a longer string of text within a chord symbol object.

@: flat
#: sharp
$: natural
&: scale degree "hat"
/o : ø
[1. repeat ending line (replace "1." with any other text)
^...^: run of superscript text (replace "..." with any text)
!...!: run of small text (replace "..." with any text)

If you want to change the position of a chord symbol, drag it in any direction with the mouse, or use any of the arrow keys.

Text:
Rehearsal Letter

Add a rehearsal letter at the location of the first selected object. Rehearsal letters are the same as

Text:

System Text

, but are placed inside a rectangular border and are automatically set up in sequence starting from the letter A and following the sequence to Z. Once the alphabet is completed, the letters are duplicated (AA, BB...).

Vertical positioning and coloring of rehearsal letters is independent between full score and individual parts. See Edit Items Independently in Parts for more info.

Text:
Text Block Before System

Add text above the selected system, for example to enter a title or instruction. The exception is that a text block cannot be added above the very first system in a score; for this, use Prompt text.

Text:
Text Block After System

Add text below the selected system, for example to enter additional verses of a hymn.

Text:
System Text

Add system text at the location of the first selected object. System text is just like performance text, except that it is not associated with a particular staff, but with a place in the score. System text is always shown, no matter which staves are currently displayed.

Vertical positioning and coloring of system text is independent between full score and individual parts. See Edit Items Independently in Parts for more info.

System text is frequently used to communicate musical form directions, since these apply to every part. For a list of form directions please see Musical Form Directions.

Text:
Annotation

Add an annotation at the location of the first selected note, chord or rest.

Annotations are an important feature for musical collaboration and education, in which objects and notations in a score can be marked up with comments. Each comment bears the name of its author and the time it was created or last changed.

When an annotation is first created, a panel opens up allowing you to enter its text:

This panel can be closed. To view it again, simply click the annotation icon that appears over the annotated object.

Text:
Show Prompt

Allow a paragraph of text to be entered below the subtitle, as a prompt for assignments or activity templates explaining what the student should do. The prompt can also be used fo any other purposes, of course.

After applying the

Text:

Show Prompt

action, a place appears where the prompt can be entered:

Clicking the prompt area allows the prompt to be entered:

Text:
Text Border

Adds or removes a rectangular border or box, on all selected text objects.

Measure Palette

Measure:
Add Measure After

Add a blank measure immediately after the selected measures. If you begin by selecting a measure like this:

then applying

Measure:

Add Measure After

gives this result:

Measure:
Add Measure Before

Add a blank measure immediately before the selected measures. If you begin by selecting a measure like this:

then applying

Measure:

Add Measure Before

gives this result:

To quickly add multiple measures, select an empty measure by clicking the grey bar above it. Then type the “R” key to create a new copy of the selected measure. Continue typing “R” as many times as you need. Or select a longer series of empty measures, then type “R” to repeat that whole series. You can quickly create hundreds of measures this way.

Measure:
Delete Measures

Delete all selected measures from the score. If you begin by selecting a measure like this:

then applying

Measure:

Delete Measures

gives this result:

Re-number Measures from Any Point

Click or tap inside the staff to show the grey bar above, then double-click or tap on a measure number to enter a new number. The measure numbering will flow from there to the end of the score or to another measure where you make a similar change.

Measure:
Reset Measure Numbers

Restore measure numbering to the default for all measures.

Measure:
Change Time Signature

Change the time signature of the selected measures in the score, or of the whole score if nothing is selected.

A pane is shown which allows you to specify the new time signature to apply to the selected range:

Choosing the common time or cut time options lets you specify the "C" symbols to be used for the time signature instead of the numeric format.

There are several options for time signature changes:

Normal (the default): changes the time signature in the selected measures to the specified number and type of beat, and the visible time signature is adjusted to reflect the change.
Pickup: creates a single pickup/anacrusis bar with the specified number and type of beats, with its time signature hidden. The main or "real" time signature is not changed, and remains visible.

Hidden: the time signature in the selected measures is changed to the specified number and type of beat, but the newly-created time signature will be hidden. This is useful for Gregorian Chant and other styles.
Shown: the time signature will appear even if it would normally be hidden. Use this option to display the same signature again when there is no change of meter in between, for example in a series of theory exercises in the same meter.

When you change the time signature of a range of measures using the Normal or Hidden modes, no music is lost. The existing notes in the selected range of the score are rebarred to fit the new time signature's bar lines. As a result, you may wind up with a larger or smaller number of bars than you had before you made the change.

Pickup Bars (anacruses) and Irregular Measures

There are a number of situations in which measures do not have as many beats as the current time signature implies. The most common case is a pickup bar or anacrusis in which the music starts in the middle of a bar.

To create such a feature in Noteflight, use

Measure:

Change Time Signature

to change the time signature of the bar to the actual number of beats that you want to appear in the bar, and select the button labeled Pickup. This causes the measure to contain the desired number of beats, but leaves the notated time signature as it was before.

Let's look at these steps in a little more detail. First, select the measure that you want to turn into a pickup measure:

Next, change the time signature using Pickup mode. Here, we select a time signature of 1/4 because we want a pickup measure consisting of a single quarter note:

The result is a pickup measure with a single beat of music, but which preserves the overall 3/4 time signature of the piece:

Measure:
Change Key Signature

Change the key signature of the selected measures in the score, or of the entire score if nothing is selected. A dialog allows you to specify the new key signature in terms of sharps or flats to apply to the selected range, and to also say what scale you are using:

The labels under each choice give the name of the key for the scale that is selected, which by default is Major. Change the scale to another choice such as Minor or Lydian and the labels will change accordingly.

There is one special button labeled --, which means a key signature with no accidentals and no specified key. This key signature is considered atonal, and will have no accidentals even in a transposed score.

Change Clef

Measure:

Treble Clef

Measure:

Tenor Clef

Measure:

Alto Clef

Measure:

Bass Clef

Measure:

Tenor Voice Clef

Measure:

Octave Bass Clef

To apply a clef to a range of measures, a portion of some staff, or even a single note, make the appropriate selection and use one of these actions. If nothing is selected, then all parts in the score will be changed to the chosen clef.

Clef changes may be cut, copied, pasted and deleted. To cut, copy or delete a clef change, first select the surrounding material (a clef by itself cannot be selected). When pasting, the Score Editor makes the appropriate changes, inserting clef changes as needed to preserve the correspondence of the music and the notation.

Change Bar Line

Measure:

Single Barline

Measure:

Double Barline

Measure:

Final Barline

Measure:

Invisible Barline

Change the barline style of all selected measures.

(The dashed line specifies an invisible barline. An invisible barline can be hard to select again, but it is possible -- you'll know it when you see the barline palette reappear!)

Measure:
Hide/Show CautionariesCtrl+Enter

Sometimes when creating sequences of musical examples a system or page break separates sections of music that do not belong to the same piece. In this case it is desirable to hide the "cautionary" changes in time signature, key signature or clef that are usually shown at the end of a system. This action hides or shows such cautionary changes.

Measure:
Hide/Show Measures

(This feature is only available in Noteflight Premium and Learn.)

Hide or show a range of measures in a staff, to prevent the staff from being shown in some section of a score in Page View.

Sometimes it's desirable to hide entire staves from systems, most often for silent passages when an instrument or part doesn't play anything for some length of time. When all of a staff's measures are hidden in this way and there are other staves on a system, the hidden staff will disappear entirely. Staves that contain a mixture of hidden and non-hidden measures will display normally, although in an editing view the hidden measures will be shown as gray as a reminder that they are eligible for hiding.

Measure:
Multi-measure Rest

Create a multi-measure rest (or multirest for short) that spans a set of selected blank measures, in a single part, and shows the number of blank measures above it. When a single part is shown, any multirests in that part will "collapse" to replace all these blank measures with the multirest symbol, so that a reader can simply keep count of the bars of rest without having to read individual measures on the page. When multiple parts are shown, the multirests will "expand" to show all the bars inside.

Say that you have a violin part with a section that is silent for 4 bars. Before inserting the multirest, it might look like this (with the silent bars selected):

After you insert the multirest, the bars will collapse to look like this:

If you were to have another part alongside the violin part, the multirest would be shown in expanded form: in light gray, on top of the regular measures with their normal single-measure rests. This allows you to see the whole score, including the parts which are not silent during the multirest.

When you use the Print Individual Parts feature, or when you select a part for individual display using the Parts panel, all multirests in that part are automatically displayed in collapsed form.

Note that multi-measure rests can also be created automatically by Noteflight for parts that belong to a larger score. See for further details. With this feature, multi-measure rests do not need to be added explicitly by the author but are displayed whenever the part is examined. However, you have less control over where they appear.

Layout Palette

Layout:
System BreakEnter

Add or remove a break in the current system after the selected measures, causing the next measure to begin on a new system. The break will only be visible in

View:

Page View

Layout:
Page BreakShift Enter

Add or remove a break in the current page after the selected measures, causing the next measure to begin on a new page. The break will only be visible in

View:

Page View

Layout:
Split System

Create a break between two measures within the same line or system.

Layout:
Create System

Make a set of continuous measures into a single line or system. This tool overrides Noteflight’s automatic default layout flow of system breaks.

Select the set of measures you want to create as a system.

In the layout palette, choose Create System. The selected measures now appear as one system. In this example, there are now system breaks before measure 19 and after measure 21, and two

Layout:

Keep With Next

signs on the measures in between.

To restore the formatting to Noteflight’s default flow, select the same measures again, plus the measure before the system you created (in this example, measure 18) and choose

Layout:

Reset Layout

in the layout palette.

Layout:
Keep With Next

This tool connects any measure to the measure after it, overriding Noteflight’s automatic default layout flow of system breaks.

In this example, Noteflight has automatically placed a system break after measure 28 (Note that there is no grey arrow denoting an explicit "system break", as this break is not user-created).

Click the Keep with Next button: in this example, measure 28 is now connected to the following measure, removing the default system break. This may force the selected measure onto the next system, as in this case:

Or it may force the next measure onto the previous system, depending on the flow of measures around the two connected measures.

To remove the Keep with Next you have created, select the measures again and choose Reset layout in the layout palette. Or select the measure to which you added the Keep with Next, and create a system break.

The following tools apply control the formatting of systems and pages for the whole score, for individual parts, or for combinations of parts:

System Break
Page Break
Split System
Create System
Keep With Next

Independent Breaks for Score and Parts

When the entire score is being viewed and you use one of these tools to format your music, the changes you make are applied to the score as a whole.

When an individual part or combination of parts is being viewed, your formatting changes are saved separately from the entire score, and are applied only to the individual (or, for combinations, the topmost) part. This allows you to create different system breaks and page turns for the score and for each part. The appropriate set of formatting decisions is automatically used, depending on which parts you are viewing. (The

Score:

Parts

panel allows you to control which parts are in view.)

Note: The checkbox Use system breaks from score in Formatting allows you to override this behavior, causing all formatting decisions to be shared by the full score and by all parts and part combinations.

Move Above/Below Staff

Layout:

Move Above

Layout:

Move Below

Change the direction of all selected objects to force them to always go above the staff or always go below the staff, instead of being automatically positioned by Noteflight. The objects may include lyrics, slurs and note stems.

These actions are further discussed in the sections on

and

Layout:
Reset Layout

Reset the layout of all selected measures (or of the whole score if nothing is selected) by removing all user adjustments to:

measure width
slur shapes
page and system breaks
margins specific to systems

Repeat Palette

Repeat Dots and Endings

Repeat:

Start Repeat

Repeat:

End Repeat

Add or remove repeat dots from the beginning or end of the currently selected measures. Note that a bar line can show repeat dots on both sides at once.

The type of bar line is forced to the appropriate appearance by whatever combination of repeats applies, ignoring any specific bar line choice that you may have set earlier.

You can affect the number of times a repeated section is played by including Musical Form Directions like Play 3 Times, Repeat 2 Times or 3x as text within the repeat.

Segno and Coda

Repeat:

Segno

Repeat:

Coda

Add a segno or coda symbol at the first selected measure. These symbols affect playback, in conjunction with Performance or System Text containing Musical Form Directions such as D.C. Al Coda or D.S. Al Fine.

Vertical positioning and coloring of segnos and codas is independent between full score and individual parts. See Edit Items Independently in Parts for more info.

Repeat:
Repeat Ending

Create a repeat ending in a measure with closed bracket on the right. The number defaults to 1. but you can double-click the number to change it.

Repeat:
Repeat Ending Final

Create a final repeat ending with open bracket on the right. The number defaults to 2. but you can double-click the number to change it.

Standard notation is: 1., 1.2.3. etc.

Noteflight also supports other formatting such as:

1,2.
1,2,3.
1-3.
1.2,3
1.2 3

Any sequential numbers will work correctly in Playback. If a number such as 1 is missing, Noteflight will not play back the desired number of times.

You can also enter any other text, such as Vamp, Wait for cue, I love candy canes!. If you use text other than a numerical format like those above, the music will play back only once.

Vertical positioning and coloring of repeat endings is independent between full score and individual parts. See Edit Items Independently in Parts for more info.

Measure Repeat Sign

Repeat:

Measure Repeat

Repeat a measure in the following measure. You will hear the repeated music during playback.

Dynamics Palette

Using Expression Text for Dynamics

Use

Dynamics:

Expression Text

for a written dynamic like p or ff. Simply type the letters for any dynamic and they will be formatted appropriately.

Dynamics Wedges (Hairpins)

Dynamics:

Crescendo<

Dynamics:

Diminuendo>

Add wedges or hairpins based on the currently selected passage or passages. Begin by selecting a passage:

After adding the new wedge, it will appear like this:

Use the draggable square "handles" to adjust hairpins by hand to work around adjacent notes and symbols:

See Slurs, Hairpins, Trills and Lines for more information on the appearance and control of lines. Also see the section Best Practices for Dynamic Playback for information on how to ensure that Noteflight plays your dynamic markings correctly.

Crescendo and Diminuendo Lines

Dynamics:

Crescendo

Dynamics:

Diminuendo

Add cresc. or dim. lines to the currently selected passage or passages. These work similarly to Crescendo and Diminuendo Lines. When included in a score, they will cause Noteflight to gradually increase or decrease the loudness during the passages to which they apply.

See Slurs, Hairpins, Trills and Lines for more information on the appearance and control of lines.

Pedal and Let Vibrate

Dynamics:

Let Vibrate

Dynamics:

Pedal Down

Add l.v. (let vibrate) or Ped. (pedal) lines to the currently selected passage or passages. These work similarly to Crescendo and Diminuendo Lines. When included in a score, they will cause Noteflight to sustain all notes during the passages to which they apply.

See Slurs, Hairpins, Trills and Lines for more information on the appearance and control of lines.

Articulation Palette

Articulation:
SlurS

Add a slur to the currently selected passage or passages. These work similarly to Crescendo and Diminuendo Lines. When included in a score, they will cause Noteflight to play notes during these passages in a smooth or legato fashion.

One method is to select the note on which the slur starts, and then create the slur. This produces a two-note slur. (If the note is a grace note, then the slur will extend to the main note.) This figure shows how things look before and after the slur is created:

The two small squares are draggable handles that can be used to move the slur's endpoints around, making it longer or shorter.

Another approach is to select the range that the slur will occupy, then create the slur:

Note that there are more "handles" on this slur. A slur that is longer gives you additional ways of controlling its shape. This is important because it's much easier for a human user to position slurs in a good way than for a computer program to guess what's right. Here are some examples of different slur shapes, some of which were adjusted by hand:

Hand adjustments like this must be made after you are finished entering notes into the score, since adjustments to the notes will automatically reset the appearance of the slurs. The following figure illustrates how the different handles affect a slur's shape (although playing with a slur is probably a faster way to learn!):

If you create a slur after first selecting a grace note, that note and any following grace note are automatically included in a slur that ends on the next regular note. If you start a slur after selecting a regular note, however, it will not include any prior grace notes.

Normally Noteflight decides whether a slur goes above or below the staff based on the note positions and stem directions. You can control slur placement yourself, however, by selecting one or more slurs and using

. If you are changing the position of multiple slurs, the

Edit:

Filter Selection

action may be useful to you.

See Slurs, Hairpins, Trills and Lines for more information on the appearance and control of lines.

Note Articulations

Articulation:

Accent'

Articulation:

Staccato;

Articulation:

Tenuto:

Articulation:

Strong Accent"

Articulation:

Staccatissimo

Articulation:

Closed

Articulation:

Open

Articulation:

Down Bow

Articulation:

Up Bow

Add or remove an articulation symbol on the selected notes including accents, bowing, muting and closed/open.

Ornament Palette

Ornament:
Trill

Add a trill to the selected passages. Trills cause a note to be performed in rapid alternation with the note just above it in the current musical scale. A trill behaves a lot like any other line, but it can also take an accidental that applies to this upper note. To apply this accidental, select just the trill and use the flat, sharp, natural or other accidentals on the object palette to affect the pitch of the upper note of the trill. The trill itself will display this accidental. Here's an example of a trill between D and the Eb above it:

Ornament:
Arpeggio

Add, modify or remove an arpeggio on the currently selected chord. Arpeggios may be notated without an arrow (in which case they are played upwards) or with an arrow going up or down. Apply

Ornament:

Arpeggio

more than once to switch between these choices. Noteflight does not currently support cross-staff arpeggios in keyboard music.

Ornament:
Glissando

Add, or remove a glissando beginning on the currently selected notes and going to the following note.

Mordents

Ornament:

Mordent

Ornament:

Inverted Mordent

Add or remove a mordent or inverted mordent on selected notes or chords. Noteflight does not play mordents, but they are commonly performed as a short two-note trill above or below the main note respectively.

Ornament:

Turn

Ornament:

Inverted Turn

Add, modify or remove a turn or inverted turn on selected notes or chords. Applying once adds a regular turn, while applying the same action again converts it into a delayed turn that is performed a short time interval into the note. Clicking a third time removes the turn. Noteflight does not play these ornaments.

Note Palette

Change Note Head

Note:

Normal

Note:

Stemless

Note:

Slash

Note:

Hit

Note:

Cross

Note:

Square

Note:

Diamond

Note:

Triangle

Note:

Harmonic

Note:

Cross Circle

Note:

Note Name

Change all selected notes to use the designated type of note head.

Change Stem Direction

Note:

Stems Down

Note:

Stems Up

Change the direction of all selected note stems to force them to always go up or always go down, instead of being automatically positioned by Noteflight.

Note:
Cue

Toggle the size of notes or rests to a smaller size used for parts that indicate what some other instrument is playing, called a "cue".

Note:
Parentheses`

Add or remove parentheses around all selected notes.

Voice Palette

Noteflight supports up to two melodic voices in a staff. This allows you to have independent rhythms in the same measure. The number of voices can vary from measure to measure in the same staff. Any single measure contains either one voice or two voices, from start to finish.

Use Upper or Lower Voice

Voice:

Upper VoiceU

Voice:

Lower VoiceL

Adds a second voice to the selected measures in the chosen position if it doesn't exist already. The stems of any existing notes are adjusted into two-voice format, and a selected whole-measure rest appears in the new voice that you just added. The blinking cursor for adding new notes will also shift up or down to show you which voice you are working with

You can now start to enter notes in your new voice with the mouse or keyboard. In general, once you have two voices in a measure, newly entered notes or rests will always go into the voice you are currently working in. If you continue entering notes into the next measure using a second voice, that voice is automatically added to the new measure as well.

Changes you make to a voice are almost completely independent of the other voice, except for the visual layout of the measure, and for the effect of voice-independent symbols such as clef changes. You might as well be working with two different measures that are superimposed on top of each other.

When you need to move between voices without losing your place, you can use

and

to move between them easily. Use the keyboard shortcuts for these actions along with keyboard note entry to make this even quicker.

Rests in a multi-voice measure are displaced to reflect which voice they belong to. If you want to move them for greater clarity, recall that rests can be dragged up and down or moved with the arrow keys.

Sometimes there are silent passages within a two-voice measure in which only rests for a single voice need be notated. To achieve this effect, use

Color:

None

(available in paid versions only).

Remove Voice

Voice:

Remove Upper Voice

Voice:

Remove Lower Voice

Remove the voice containing the selected objects from a measure.

Tab Palette

One of the most important aspects of guitar and bass tabs is the ability to notate bends, releases and slides that apply to one or more notes played in succession on a single string. Noteflight makes it easy to work with these notations, by treating them just like ties.

To notate a bend, release, or slide involves several steps. You can perform them in any order you like:

Create a sequence of notes on a single string representing all the "rhythmic points" in a bend, release or slide: all the places where the bending or sliding will start, stop or change direction. You don't have to worry about pitch at this point.
Select each note that is the starting point of a bend, release or slide. Use the appropriate action to choose the way that this note connects to the next note.
Adjust the pitch of each note to the pitch that you want to bend, release or slide to at that point in the music.

Tab:
Bend~

Apply a bend between the selected note and the next one.

First, create the sequence of notes in a bend/release. Here we see a sequence of notes on a string that will make up a bend from an initial note to a higher pitch, then release back again. Select the notes that are bent (which does not include the final note):

Now use

Tab:

Bend

to apply the bend:

To do a progressive bend, just include more notes in the sequence:

Tab:
Quarter Bend

Raise the selected note by a quarter-tone, affecting its representation as a bend. This tool works when you already have a bend on the selected note.

Tab:
Pre-bend|

Pre-bends can be applied to the first note in a sequence. Start with the "starting" note:

After using

Tab:

Pre-bend

, you'll have a place to enter the note that is the "destination" of the pre-bend:

Enter that note, and the entire pre-bend appears:

Tab:
Slide\

Use

Tab:

Slide

to create a slide between successive notes:

Technique Markings

Tab:

Hammer On

Tab:

Pull Off

Tab:

Tap

Add or remove these technique markings on all selected notes.

Technique Lines

Tab:

Palm Mute

Tab:

Let Ring

Add palm mute or let ring lines to the selected passage or passages.

Upstroke and Downstroke

Tab:

Down Stroke

Tab:

Up Stroke

Indicate that a given note or chord is to be picked or strummed in a Down or Up direction.

Line Palette

Add Line

Lines:

Solid Line

Lines:

Dashed Line

Lines:

Bracket Down

Lines:

Bracket Up

Lines:

Wavy Line

Create a line of the chosen type over the selected passages of music.

Most lines do not have a playback effect, but

Lines:

Wavy Line

produces a vibrato effect.

See Slurs, Hairpins, Trills and Lines for more information on the appearance and control of lines.

Color Palette

(This feature is only available in Noteflight Premium and Learn.)

Apply a color to the notes or other objects you have selected.

Color:

Black

Color:

Grey

Color:

Green

Color:

Red

Color:

Orange

Color:

Blue

Color:

Mustard

Color:

Pink

Color:

Aqua

Classroom Colors

Color:

Classroom C

Color:

Classroom D

Color:

Classroom E

Color:

Classroom F

Color:

Classroom G

Color:

Classroom A

Color:

Classroom B

Color:

Classroom C’

Color:
None

Hide the selected notes or symbols. You can restore hidden objects to visibility by changing their color to black or any other color.

Hiding is particularly useful when working with passages in two voices where one or the other voice is not shown during part of a measure. See Use Upper or Lower Voice for more information.

You can still find and work with hidden objects by selecting their measure: this will show hidden objects in a light gray color.

(To hide an entire staff in some part of the score, use

Measure:

Hide/Show Measures

Sound Palette

(This feature is only available in Noteflight Premium and Learn.)

Sound:
Mixer

Noteflight allows you to make adjustments to the how the instruments in a score are played back as audio. You can adjust the volume of each instrument individually, change its stereo position, and temporarily mute or solo parts to control which instruments are included in playback. You can also change the master volume and reverb settings.

The Mixer panel is displayed when you choose

Sound:

Mixer

. It allows you to change the playback settings for each part in your score and for the score as a whole.

There are three tabs in the Mixer: Parts, Tracks and Master.

Mixer: Parts

This tab controls the playback of each part in the score:

In this picture, all parts are shown in their normal, default settings. Changes to any setting will be saved as part of a score, and will be heard by anyone who plays the score back, whether they are a Premium user or not. Note that there is an additional "part": the Metronome. This is normally silent, but it can be unmuted to produce a metronome click along with the score playback.

Controlling Part playback. Click or tap the square checkbox for a part to toggle the playback of that part in the audio mix on or off. Click/tap the round radio button for a part in order to hear only that part alone in the audio mix. Play All will turn on all parts (leaving the Metronome setting the same).

The volume slider changes how loud a part is played. Moving the slider to the right makes it louder, moving it to the left makes it softer.

The pan slider changes where a part is located in the stereo mix. Moving the slider left or right will move the instrument left or right in the mix.

Mixer: Tracks

Please see the section Working With Tracks for information on this panel of the Mixer.

Mixer: Master

This tab controls the playback the score as a whole:

The Gain slider controls the volume of all the instruments together. The Reverb Style control lets you choose a reverb treatement for your score. If set to something other than None, an additional slider appears letting you control the degree of reverb:

Note: Reverb can slow down the playback performance of your score on older, slower computers and on some mobile devices.

Sound:
Metronome

This command toggles playback of the Noteflight metronome on or off.

View Palette

Choose View

View:

Page View

View:

Strip View

View:

Flow View

View:

Perform View

Three different display modes are available via menu commands, each of which displays the score in a different way, for a different purpose. Note that these actions are also available at the top of the screen for convenience.

View:

Page View

displays the score in exactly the same way it would be printed: as a fully justified page layout whose systems flow from page to page. It appears like this:

Editing in this mode is the best way to remain aware of the printed look of your score, and to see at all times how measures flow from system to system and page to page. As you edit, however, music may jump from system to system as Noteflight determines where system and page breaks occur.

View:

Strip View

displays the score as a continuous horizontal strip:

This mode looks very different from the printed version of the score, but it is very simple to navigate and is somewhat faster to respond to changes. If you are working on a specific part, you need only scroll from side to side to keep that part in view as you move throughout the score.

As you scroll to the right, the part name and current measure number, clef, and key signature stay in view on the left.

View:

Flow View

displays the score in a way that maximizes the use of the screen area:

This mode also looks different from the printed version of the score.

View:

Perform View

displays the score in a way that is optimized for reading music one page at a time, fitting the page vertically on the screen and showing page turn icons at the left and right. In this view, the

View:

Zoom

feature is temporarily disabled, since the score is always fit onto the screen.

View:
Zoom

A score can be displayed at a range of magnifications, to see multiple pages at a glance or to zoom in on tiny details. To control the view magnification, use this action to display a slider:

Note that this action is also available at the top of the screen for convenience.

It's important to understand that changing the magnification does not change the printed size of the music: it only magnifies it on the screen.

View:
Keyboard

Show or hide the onscreen piano keyboard. See Using the Visual Piano Keyboard for more information.

View:
Score Details

Show or hide Score Details for sharing and social functions.

View:
Full Screen

Maximize the view of the score by hiding all the palettes and controls at the top. You can see them temporarily at any time in this mode by moving the mouse to the top or left of the screen.

Choose this action a second time to show the palettes and controls continuously, as before.

View:
Large Icons

Make all icons in the palettes larger for better visibility.

View:
Page Turner

Use a foot pedal or similar device to turn pages in your score. The score must be in

View:

Page View

, and the page turning device must be configured to function as the arrow keys on your keyboard. Some devices allow the user to configure the pedals as other keys: page up/page down, space/enter, etc.

Choose this action a second time to restore the normal palette icon size.

Working with Parts and Instruments

Add and remove vocal and instrumental parts, and edit individual part settings such as vertical position and transposition key, using

Score:

Parts

, which displays this panel:

This panel shows all the parts that exist in the score, along with their instrument name. In this panel you can do the following:

Click Add Instrument to add a new instrument at the end of the list.
Drag instruments up and down in the list to change their order within the score.
Edit the characteristics of any instrument with
Delete any instrument from the score with
(Premium only) Use the checkboxes and radio buttons in the Show column to control which instruments are visible. The Show All button will display all instruments in the score.
For tab parts only, use the button to change an instrument's tuning. It's best to do this before entering any notes for the instrument.

Basic and Premium Instruments

There are two collections of instruments available: Basic and Premium. The Basic collection contains a smaller number of sounds, while the Premium collection contains a much larger collection of professionally recorded sounds covering a wide range of instrument families. Users of the Basic sounds may only create and edit scores with the Basic collection, while users with a Premium subscription can create and edit scores with the expanded Premium collection.

A score is always played back using the instruments it was created with. For example, if you create a score using Premium and share it with other users, they will hear the music with the Premium instruments, even if those users are not Premium subscribers.

However, if you share a Premium score for editing purposes, users with non-Premium accounts who edit the score can only use the Basic instrument set to make changes. Likewise, when a non-Premium user saves a copy of a Premium score, the score is converted to use Basic instruments.

In score listing pages, Premium scores are distinguished by the Noteflight Premium icon:

Adding and Changing Parts

When adding a new instrument or changing an existing one, you will see the following panel allowing you to control a part's instrument, transposition and appearance:

(Note that in the free version of Noteflight, choices are limited to the Basic tab of instruments.)

You may search for and select any instrument and choose Play Samples to hear what it sounds like. Choosing OK inserts the selected instrument as a new part at the bottom of the list (if you are creating a new part) or replaces the instrument in the current part (if you're changing an existing part).

Some instruments such as the piano will add two staves to the score, both of which belong to the same instrument. This is known as a grand staff, denoted with braces.

The same panel displays various choices:

Name gives the full name of this part, as shown in the label to the left of the first system in the score.
Abbreviation gives the abbreviated name of this part, as shown in labels to the left of systems after the first one.
Key selects the key in which the instrument actually sounds (if the instrument's key is Bb, then a C on the instrument produces a Bb in concert pitch). These transpositions are conventionally below concert pitch, not above it.
Instrument octave supplies a number of octaves by which the instrument's actual sound differs from concert pitch, in addition to the transposition defined by the instrument key.
Score octave supplies a number of octaves that the score itself will be shifted relative to the instrument's actual sound. Unlike the instrument octave, the score octave is always applied regardless of the current setting of
Score:
Show in Concert Pitch
.
Break bar lines after part causes bar lines across the whole system to include a break after this part. This is commonly used in vocal parts, or on the bottom part of a "choir" of parts for a related group of instruments.
Place directions above staff positions dynamics and related items above the staff rather than their usual default position below the staff. This option is the default for vocal parts to avoid overlapping with lyrics, and can be selected for any other part.

Part Names

Part names are supported in both long and short form. The long form is only used on the first system in the score. You can edit any part name directly in the score by clicking in it and typing. The display of part names is optional and can be enabled and disabled using within Formatting.

The name of a part has nothing to do with its sound. You can name a part completely differently from its sound; likewise, changing a part name won't make it sound different.

Viewing Parts

The checkboxes next to each part determine whether that part is displayed in the score, or in a printed copy. Clicking the circular radio button next to a part will cause that part only to be displayed, hiding all the others. The Show All button resets the display to show all parts in the score again.

Parts are shown on the screen in concert or in transposed pitch depending on the setting of

Score:

Show in Concert Pitch

. If you want to view or edit parts in the keys of transposing instruments, be sure to uncheck this option.

This feature is useful in a number of situations:

Printing out parts for multiple players in an ensemble piece. If you are writing a string quartet, for instance, you might want to print out four parts: Violin I, Violin II, Viola and Cello, without changing your score in any way. Use
for this purpose.
Updating and re-printing a single player's part after you change it.
Editing a set of one or more related parts without the visual clutter of the other parts. For example, you might want to view or print just the reed section of a band arrangement.

Whenever individual parts are selected for viewing, a special group of Document Layout settings is used: the Parts tab. This is useful because individual parts are generally shown with a larger staff size than ensemble scores; also, the system breaks from the ensemble score generally are not useful in an individual part. See within Formatting for more information.

Note: when a score is opened, it displays only the set of parts that were being viewed at the time it was saved.

Edit Items Independently in Parts

The following items can be edited in individual parts independently from the full score:

, and

If you change the position or color of one these items while viewing an individual part via the Parts panel, the item changes only in that part.

If you then move one of these items vertically while viewing the full score, i.e. when all parts are selected and visible in Parts, then that item’s vertical position when viewed in the individual part will not change. The item can be moved horizontally in an individual part, but if it is then moved horizontally in the score, that new horizontal position chosen in the score will apply to all parts, overriding the position previously chosen in the part.

If you delete one of these items in any view, it is removed entirely and disappears from all views.

If you change the color of one of these items in full score view, the color is changed for that item in the parts as well. But if you have previously changed the item's color in an individual part, it will stay as that color in the part.

Parts for Transposing Instruments

Some parts are for transposing instruments, whose parts are written with notes at some fixed interval from concert pitch. Noteflight can optionally show these parts at their transposed pitch, so that they can be read directly off the chart by performers without having to transpose from concert pitch. Noteflight scores can even be edited in this mode, using transposed note names and accidentals. In the following transposed view, the clarinet part is transposed to the instrument's key of A, yielding a different key signature from the other parts:

To view all such parts at their transposed pitch instead of concert pitch, turn off

Score:

Show in Concert Pitch

. This setting is saved along with your score, although anyone viewing the score is free to change it (much as with the zoom scale)

Percussion Instruments

The "Drum Kit" instrument uses a 5-line percussion staff with a fixed set of assignments from staff lines to drum sounds. With this staff, stems are forced up or down to correspond to parts of the kit that are played with the hands and feet respectively; also, note head styles are defaulted appropriately for cymbals.

Some examples of percussion instruments can be found here:

Tablature

Creating a New Tablature Part

Premium includes a number of guitar and bass instruments that can be used in both standard and tablature notation. For these instruments, tablature notation can be selected in the instruments dialog by picking the instrument with the word "(Tab)" after it:

How Tablature Is Displayed

Noteflight can show tablature in two ways. By default, Noteflight shows rhythmic information like stems, flags, rests, ties, beams and dots:

This makes editing simple because notes in a tab staff work a lot like notes in a regular staff. Noteflight can also leave this information out, which results in a more traditional style of tab that is easier to read but which does not communicate the rhythm of the music:

You can switch between these modes by using the Show Guitar Tab Rhythm setting in the tab within Formatting. Our suggestion is that you create and edit your tab music with the rhythm displayed, since it gives the most complete information about your music and makes editing simpler and clearer. You can turn it off later when you are finished editing, if you prefer not to show the rhythmic information to people viewing the score.

Putting Music into a Tablature Staff

There are two ways to create music in a tab staff: you can enter it directly into the tab staff using the mouse and keyboard, or you can copy and paste music from a regular staff into a tab staff (drag/drop works too). Entering the music directly requires that you specify the string and fret number for each note, while copying and pasting will result in automatic string and fret assignments that may need to be changed.

Direct Mouse Tab Entry. Open string notes ("fret 0") can be entered with the mouse by hovering over the string where you want the note to appear, and then clicking:

The keys F1 through F6 and A through F also work in the same way, causing a new open-string note to appear on the corresponding string number.

Once entered, the fret of any selected note can be changed by typing the fret number on the keyboard.

Direct Keyboard Entry. The tablature editor in Noteflight has been optimized for quick entry by using the arrow keys to move around and type fret numbers on any string or note. As always, the mouse may be used at any time to select a new place to start entering new tabs.

Entering a new note:

Replacing an existing note:

Moving Between Strings. The ↑ and ↓ keys will move the cursor between strings in the editor.

Moving Forward and Backward. The ← and → keys will move the cursor forward and backward in the editor, while remaining on the same string. Moving forward at the end of the piece will cause a new measure to be created, and moving forward into a rest will convert that rest's duration to that of the note before it.

Copying between regular and tab staves. This method is a good way to enter a tab part if you already have the music in regular notation, or if you are more comfortable editing on a regular staff. You can simply use the Copy/Cut/Paste functions to move the music, or you can select and drag music from a regular staff to a tab staff:

When you copy music from a regular staff, Noteflight will automatically pick strings and frets for the copied notes, using a simple automatic method. While this method is predictable, it does not always produce a correct result: the music will usually require some manual adjustment to strings and fret positions. See below for more information on editing notes, strings and frets in tab notation.

You can also copy music in the other direction: from tablature to regular staff. In some cases you will find that notes are not "spelled" correctly after such an operation because when you enter a note on a tab staff, Noteflight can't tell what regular staff line the note belongs to.

As you can see from the above example, the result is two staves with the same music; one in tablature and one in conventional music notation. This is often a helpful choice when preparing parts for performers with different kinds of music-reading skills.

Changing Frets and Strings

Changing frets. The Shift+↑ and Shift+↓ keys will move all selected notes up or down by a single fret. Dragging selected notes vertically does the same. If only a single note is selected, you can also simply type the fret number that you want. Transposing a note too low to play it on the given string will cause a regular round notehead to be displayed instead of a fret number.

Changing strings. The Ctrl+↑ and Ctrl+↓ keys will move all selected notes up or down by one string, adjusting the fret of each note to keep its pitch the same. This is a very valuable tool for adjusting the fingering and hand position used to play a given set of notes on a fretboard instrument. For example, here are two passages containing the same notes. The second passage has exactly the same pitches as the first, but played on lower strings and in a higher position on the neck:

The tab editor will only allow movement of notes to strings that they will remain playable on

Changing Tuning of a Tablature Clef

The tuning of a tablature clef may be changed by selecting "Instruments" in the top panel, or in the 'score' palette in the dropdown menu, then clicking on the tuning-peg icon.

After selecting the tuning at the top of the headstock, a list of tunings will be shown at the right side of the dialog. Selecting any of the tunings will strum the tuning and update the tuning diagram.

You may also select and change single notes of the tuning by clicking the desired tuning peg and selecting from the list on the right.

Finally, you can change the capo position by selecting the capo and choosing the desired capo position from the list on the right.

Other Tablature Editing Features

Muted notes may be indicated by using

Note:

Cross

Muted notes can also be created by using

Tab:

Palm Mute

and placing the dashed line over the notes and chords that need to be muted.

For information on bends, slides and techniques please see Tab Palette.

Audio Playback

PlaySpace

To begin playing a score, choose

Play

or press the Space key. Noteflight will play your score starting from the first selected measure, or from the beginning if nothing is selected. Expect a short delay before playback as Noteflight begins to convert your score into audio data.

The shortcut key P will start playback, but always from the beginning.

To play from any measure in view, click or tap the numbered "measure marker" above that measure, and a small play button appears in the marker. Click or tap this button, and playback starts from that measure:

As soon as you begin playback, Noteflight enters Playback Mode. In this mode, the top toolbar and palette is limited to a set of actions that affect playback:

Click or tap any measure to move the playback cursor to that particular measure. Editing the score is not allowed in playback mode, so you don't have to be concerned about exactly where you click.
Click or tap
Edit
to end playback and immediately leave Playback Mode. The Esc key also has this function.
Click or tap
Pause
to pause playback, but remain in Playback Mode. When paused, this button changes to
Play
which will resume playback at the last measure played. During playback, the Space key serves both of these functions.
Click or tap
Beginning
to move the playback cursor to the beginning of the score.

While playback is active, a triangular pointer moves continuously along the top of the score to show the current playback position within the music.

When playing a score from the beginning, repeats, endings and other aspects of musical form are played back in the correct sequence dictated by the form. Repeats without endings are taken twice. If you start playback from a measure inside a repeating section, playback will begin at the first occurrence of that measure within the form.

Looped Playback

Loop playback for any selected measures. Click or tap the numbered "measure marker" above a measure and select all the measures you want to loop. Then click the loop icon (two small arrows) to the right of the Play button:

Sound:
Speed

In Playback mode, the Speed action adjusts the playback speed to go slower or faster than the regular tempo:

You can slow the piece down to half the normal tempo, and speed it up to twice the normal tempo. Unlike the actual tempo, this setting is not saved with the score: it is only a temporary adjustment to what the user is hearing.

Sound:
Grace Note Options

This panel displays options that control the performance of grace notes.:

When Link To Tempo is unchecked, all grace notes have the same duration throughout your score, regardless of tempo changes. You may use the Grace Note Length slider to adjust this duration.

When Link To Tempo is checked, grace note duration is linked to the tempo marking in your score. That is, the faster the tempo, the faster grace notes are played. You may use the slider to adjust the duration, relative to the tempo. At the midpoint setting of the slider, a grace note sounds close to a 32nd-note (assuming that a quarter note equals one beat).

Live Audio Recording

(This feature is only available in Noteflight Premium and Learn. It requires either Google Chrome or Firefox.)

You can record a live audio performance of a musical part in a Noteflight score, while Noteflight plays the other parts (or a metronome) to accompany you during the recording. This creates a new Track for that part, which Noteflight will use to play the part instead of its built-in instruments. Use this feature to add real live performances to your own music, or to share your live performances of other people's music.

To prevent the recording from picking up the sounds of the metronome or accompanying parts, it is best if headphones or a headset are used to record the performance.

How to Record an Audio Track

Choose

Record

at the top of the screen. This will display the recording toolbar:

Setting Up the Microphone

The first time you use recording, use the

Setup

action to set up the correct microphone volume and audio timing. This will display a panel that walks you through the process.

The initial step measures your microphone volume. When you are finished, if your microphone volume was OK you'll see a display like this:

If the volume was too quiet or too loud, then instead you'll see something like this. In this case, adjust your computer's mic volume and try again, or choose Skip This Step if you're not able to make the adjustment:

The next step measures the audio timing of your computer, so that recording and playback can be perfectly synchronized. This requires Noteflight to play a tone through your computer's speaker or headphone. The tone must be detectable using the computer's microphone. The panel looks like this:

Choose Start to begin the measurement, or Skip This Step to proceed without measuring the timing.

Select The Place To Record

In Recording Mode, you can click any measure in any part to determine where recording will begin, and which part will be recorded. A special highlight appears on the playback cursor to show this point. In the screen below, the Viola part will be recorded starting from the given measure:

Record The Audio Track

Choose

Start

to begin live recording. You'll be given a certain number of measures to be counted in with the metronome (you can change this with

Sound:

Options

You can control whether you hear the metronome or not using

Sound:

Metronome

. You can also choose whether or not you hear the existing Track for the part you are recording, by using

Sound:

Mute Selected Part While Recording

You can record multiple "segments" for a Track by starting and stopping recording as you please. Each segment will overwrite any previous segment at the recorded location. You can always use

and

to get rid of or reinstate any segment.

Working With Tracks

Once an audio track has been created, it will appear in the Tracks tab of the Mixer Panel, and a waveform display will be shown in the score to show recorded regions. Each stretch of live recording will have brackets around it:

The icon in the upper left corner of the score controls whether the waveform is visible or not. By default, waveform display is enabled if a score belongs to you or if you have permission to edit it.

In the Mixer Panel, the Tracks panel will display an entry for each part including any audio track created by its user:

The most important feature of this panel is the Play button, which determines which Track is heard for any given part. Noteflight's built-in synthesized performance is always shown as "Noteflight", and any additional Tracks for you and for other users. The selection of which track to play is remembered along with the rest of the score.

In the Tracks panel, the icon controls whether the waveform for this track is visible. The icon displays information about the recorded segments, and the icon deletes the Track.

Transcribing a MIDI Performance as Notation

(This feature is only available in Noteflight Premium and Learn.)

You can use a MIDI instrument to perform a musical part while Noteflight plays the other parts (or a metronome) to accompany you. As you play, Noteflight records the music you are performing. When you are done, your performance is converted into music notation and is copied into the score. Currently this is only supported by Google Chrome.

How to Transcribe a MIDI Performance

Choose
Transcribe
at the top of the screen to open the transcription toolbar:

Select the measure in the score where you would like transcription to begin, within the part that you want to record. Note that transcription will affect only one specific part at a time, starting with the selected measure. A highlight will appear, like this:
Use the metronome icon to toggle the metronome playback on or off. You will usually want the metronome for the first part in a score that you record, but once you have several parts recorded you may wish to turn it off.
Use
Sound:
Speed
to control the speed of the metronome. Recording at a slower than normal speed will generally work much better.
Adjust the Options (described below) and Playback Speed as desired.
Click the Start button, which will immediately change to read Stop. Some number of measures will be counted in before transcription begins; the number of remaining count-in measures is shown in the display area to the right of the button.
When the count-in is complete, you can start playing your MIDI instrument. The notes you play will be shown graphically while you are recording, and a cursor will follow along in the score to show the current transcription position. When you reach the end of the score, you can keep on transcribing -- this will add new measures to the score as needed to capture your performance. (Notation won't be shown until the transcription is complete.)
Click Stop. The transcribed performance will be converted to notation and will appear in the score at this time.

MIDI Transcription Options

A number of options control the behavior of

Transcribe

Count-in measures allow you to control how many measures are counted in after pressing the Start button before recording begins.
Detect triplets lets you decide whether you want MIDI Recording to try to detect triplet rhythms. If you turn this off, any triplets will be notated using dotted note values.
Echo notes controls whether or not you hear the notes you play through Noteflight, as you play during recording.
Split staves controls the optional pitch that will be used to divide a recording between two different staves of the same part, such as a piano. Notes at or below this pitch will be placed in the lower staff. If this box is not checked, then notes will go only into the first selected staff.
Minimum note duration supplies an optional minimum duration for notes in the notated performance. This option can be useful in forcing rhythms to be notated more simply.

Transcription Tips

Please keep in mind the following tips:

Make the performance as accurate as possible.
It is better to slow down the performance by moving the playback speed slider to the left. The performance will be more accurate and the results will be better.
Record short parts of the score in separate takes. Do not try to play an entire score with only one recording.
If you are transcribing a piano staff, we recommend that you play first one hand and then the other one. Remember to disable "split staves" in the transcription settings.
If you know the score does not have triplets, disable it in the transcription settings.

Synchronizing External Audio/Video Media

The

Score:

Sync Audio

action allows you to play back any YouTube video, Soundcloud track, or MP3 audio file hosted on the web, to create a multimedia presentation and also as a way to allow any musical performance to accompany a score for playback. In order to do so, Noteflight provides measure mapping, a procedure in which you play the video or audio all the way through and manually tap a key or the mouse button to indicate where each measure of the score starts. Once you have done so, playback from the score works the same as with built-in instruments, but using the external media instead. You can also start playback from any point within the video or audio, and the score will follow along correctly.

The following types of external media are supported by Noteflight:

YouTube Video. Any YouTube video can be synchronized to a Noteflight score. The video will appear along with a play button and position slider in a pop-up window when the score is viewed.
SoundCloud Track. Any SoundCloud track can be synchronized to a Noteflight score. The track will appear along with a play button and position slider in a pop-up window when the score is viewed.
MP3 Audio, MP4 Audio, MP4 Video, OGV Video. If the file has been uploaded to the internet and has a unique URL / web link leading to that specific file, which includes the file extension (e.g. .mp3) at the end of the link, then that file can be synchronized to a score. A play button and position slider will be displayed for the audio when the score is viewed, along with any video material.

Here's how to do it.

After choosing

Score:

Sync Audio

you will have the opportunity to paste the URL of the audio or video into the sync media panel:

Now choose Load. After the media is loaded, the panel will display the video or audio and additional controls:

Next, cue the media to some point at or just before where the performance begins, using the Play and Pause buttons:

At this point, you are ready to begin showing Noteflight where the measures are in the video or audio. To do this, you must click the M key or tap the Measure button at the start of each measure. The media don't actually have to be playing when you do this. Often it's easiest to begin by pausing a little before the start of the performance, so that you can sync the first measure just after you start playing the media. As you sync each measure, it will be entered into a progress bar showing the time of each measure:

You can go back over parts of the score and redo the sync. Whenever you click Measure, all measures after the new sync point are removed so you have a clean score to work with.

You can also use the button Clear to clear all marks starting at the position of the cursor.

If you need to tweak the position of some of the measure marks, just drag and drop them to the new position. If you select one of them, it will show the synced time.

When you are finished synchronizing your score, click Done and save your score.

Use the Parts section of the Mixer to play back either the synced media or any selection of the built-in Noteflight instrument sounds. You can choose to hear the media and Noteflight sounds at once.

In the Tracks section of the Mixer: if you have created an in-staff recording on a given part, you can use the checkboxes to select whether you will hear your recording or the Noteflight sound for that part. You can choose to hear both at once.

After you have finished syncing the audio, a window will appear displaying your selected media source.

You can select the white header where it says "Synced Media" and drag it anywhere on your score to move the window. Selecting the expand button on this header will display your media at the top of your score.

Premium and Learn users can also use the Mixer to choose to hear either the synced media track or the original Noteflight instrument sounds.

Formatting

This group of settings controls the appearance of the document. The full score and individual parts can be formatted independently.

Vertical positioning and coloring of System Text, Rehearsal Letters, Repeat Brackets, Segnos, and Codas is also independent between full score and individual parts. See Edit Items Independently in Parts for more info.

Access formatting settings in two ways:

Use the button in the top panel (may not appear on smaller screens):

Find the same button in the 'score' palette in the left dropdown menu:

To format your Noteflight Score and Parts:

First, select what you are formatting: the Full Score, all individual Parts at once, or an individual Part separately.
Then adjust the settings using four tabs: General, Sizing, Text, and Page Setup.

Selecting Format

On the left, choose what you are formatting:

Full Score settings apply when any more than one of the parts / instruments that exist in your Noteflight file are shown using the Parts panel (see Viewing Parts for hiding and showing parts). For example, if your score contains three instruments and two of them are selected to be visible in Parts, then ‘Full Score’ formatting settings will apply.

Parts settings will appear the same across all individual parts.

Use the ‘eye’ icon to show how each part will look with the all-parts settings you are applying:

Select any individual Part to format that part only. Any settings adjusted just for that part make it different from both the Full Score and all other individual Parts.

Once you have selected what you are formatting (Full Score, All Parts, or a single Part), then you can adjust the settings as follows.

General Formatting Settings

The General tab controls the sizes and distances used to lay out music in Noteflight.

The options are slightly different for Full Score versus Parts.

General Settings: Full Score

The Show bar numbers setting controls whether a measure number is displayed at the beginning of each system/line.
Show bar numbers above every measure displays a number above every bar line.
Show part names determines whether part names appear in the left margin.
The default font is the Standard Font. You may switch between the Standard and Jazz Fonts by clicking the corresponding radio buttons.
The checkbox Center chord symbols causes chord symbols to be centered above each note instead of left justified.
The checkbox Keep chord symbols apart causes Noteflight to push notes apart to make sure that chord symbols do not overlap.
Show guitar tab rhythm determines whether flags, ties and dots are shown in guitar tab parts.
With the Automatically create multi-measure rests option selected, any sequence of measures that are empty (containing only a default whole rest) in all displayed parts will automatically appear as a multi-measure rest. This setting does not override individual multi-measure rests the user creates using the button in the Measure Palette palette.
Allow multiple hyphens between lyric syllables controls whether more than one hyphen is automatically displayed between lyrics, when the lyrics are hyphenated. The number shown below, Minimum space between lyric hyphens, controls the minimum distance between hyphens in terms of a number of staff lines.
Show copyright on all pages displays the copyright text, normally shown at the bottom of page 1, also on all subsequent pages.

General Settings: Parts

Parts offer two additional General formatting settings, highlighted here:

Select Show Part Names to show two options: Place individual part name next to the staff (default) shows the Part name in the margin directly to the left of the first staff. Place individual part name at the top left of the page shows the Part name at the upper left corner of the page. Display part name on every page shows the name on the upper left of every subsequent page in the part.
Use system breaks from score means that line/system breaks created while viewing the Full Score will also appear in each part. By default this box is not checked, meaning that they have no effect. Typically one would not want to respect the score’s system breaks in an individual part because they would have been defined for the way that the entire score looks, not a single part.

Sizing Settings

The same set of Sizing options are available for Full Score and Parts.

Please note: these settings apply only when in Page view (see

View:

Page View

The note size slider controls the distance between adjacent staff lines in pixels at a zoom scale of 100%. This note size is a "master setting" that determines the size of many other elements of the document including notes, fonts, and so on. It also supplies the units for the following two settings. Keep page text proportional to note size allows page text like Title, Composer etc. to become larger or smaller as you change note size; un-check this box to keep Page text at a fixed size.
Staff spacing is the distance between staves in the same system, in staff line units.
System spacing is the minimum distance allowed between systems on the same page, in staff line units.
System stretch is the maximum extra spacing that Noteflight can add between systems on the same page, in staff line units.
First staff spacing is the extra space above the first system on the first page of the score, in staff line units.
Note spacing allows you to control the horizontal density of the music layout.
Indentation spacing allows you to indent the first line/system toward the right.
Select Automatically space staves and systems to let Noteflight decide how much vertical space to put in between staves and systems, based on the contents of the music. It also affects the vertical position of lyrics.

Text Settings

This tab controls the size of text items: Title, Subtitle, Composer and Lyricist, Prompt, Copyright, Page Number, Lyrics, Performance Text, and Chord Symbols.

The check box in the Sizing tab, Keep page text proportional to note size, affects these text items; check the box to make these text items larger or smaller as you change Note size, and un-check the box to keep them at a fixed size.

Page Setup Settings

Set the Paper Size, Page Orientation (Portrait or Landscape), and Page Margins.

Reset to Defaults

Reset to Defaults restores settings for ALL tabs at once (General, Sizing, Text, and Page Setup) to the defaults that existed when you first created the score.

Use the X in the upper right to close the formatting dialog.

Use the

View:

Score Details

action to share your score with other Noteflight users, to decide how the score is shared, and to embed scores in your own web pages. This button displays Score Details, where a score's sharing, embedding, social media and commentary are displayed and controlled. Premium users may use Score Details to sell their scores on Noteflight.

Note: You must activate your Noteflight account before you may share with others (this restriction does not apply to Noteflight Learn sites).

Private and Shared Scores

All newly created scores are private by default: no other users can see the score even if they know its web address. Private scores are never displayed in pages seen by other users who are browsing or searching in Noteflight. A private score is yours alone. For a brand new private score, Score Details looks like this (Selling is only available to Premium users):

You can make the choice to Share your score so that other people can view your document, and may also have other capabilities that you give them. How much access others have is up to you.

You can also decide whether you are sharing only with people that you give the score's web address to, or whether you are sharing your score with the whole Noteflight community. This makes the existence of your score known to any Noteflight user who visits Public Scores or uses the Browse or Search features on the site.

Click to expand the sharing section and then Edit to change access to the score. This permits you to choose several different groups of people you can share with:

Share with Everyone

'Anyone with a link can' determines what people can do if they have the exact URL/web address to your specific score:

View. This choice means that other users can view and listen to your score, but can't make any change or comments on it. They do not have to be signed in to Noteflight to access it.
Comment. This choice means that other users can add comments to your score, in addition to viewing and listening to it. To add comments, they must be signed in to Noteflight.
Edit. This choice means that other users can edit your score and save the changes they make, in addition to viewing, listening to and commenting on your score. To add comments or make changes, they must be signed in to Noteflight.

Choose Next: the dialog will ask you to choose whether your score is an original work or an arrangement of an existing work. If it is original, select Save to close the dialog.

Copyright Information: If your score is an arrangement of a public domain or copyrighted work, we ask you to identify that work. Learn more.

The dialog asks you to find and select the original work you are arranging:

Anyone can search/browse to find it: It is very important to decide how you want to set this option. If you select it, you are letting other users browse and search for your score on Noteflight by title, composer, author, and other search options. Your score will appear publicly, to anyone on the internet who visits Noteflight even if they are not signed in, in the Public Scores section of the site under Community.

If you do not select this option, then the only way other users can find your score is by knowing its exact web address (URL). Leaving this box unchecked is similar to Youtube's "unlisted" option. It's a good way to selectively share your score with certain people without requiring any special action on their part — they don't need to be registered or logged into Noteflight to view it. Anyone with the URL can see the score, signed in or not, but only if they have the link. The web addresses for scores are specially randomized and are not possible to guess; if someone doesn't know the web address, they won't be able to figure it out or accidentally stumble on it.

Share with Groups

To share with one of Noteflight’s many user-created Groups, select the middle Groups option. Then begin typing the name of the Noteflight Group you want to share with. Noteflight will detect and auto-complete the Group name:

After you select the Group(s) you want to share your score with, and click 'Save', the score will appear in each of those Groups when members visit the ‘Scores’ section, in the left panel inside the Group. The score will only be visible to people who are members of that Group:

Share with Selected People

Noteflight Premium and Learn subscriptions only.

Premium subscribers can choose individual users with whom they wish to share a score, and each user can be assigned a unique level of access to the score. To get started, choose Individuals when sharing. To add a user to the list of individuals with whom you're sharing the score, begin typing that person's Noteflight user name (not their email address and usually not their real name). Noteflight will detect and auto-complete the user name. Keep typing until you see the user name you need:

Once you have selected a user, you'll be able to determine whether they can View, Comment or Edit:

It's important to choose carefully so you only give editing access to those you intend. You can add as many users as you like to the list. To remove someone, use the

button with the minus sign, to the right.

When you share a score with someone (or someone shares a score with you), Noteflight will automatically send out an email with a notification about the sharing. Inside the email will be the score's name and the URL / link that takes you to the score.

Also, the score will appear in the recipient's Scores Shared with Me folder in their My Scores page.

Other Sharing Options

Let people copy & export this score permits other users to save an exact copy of your score, as a new score in their account. Be very careful if you choose this option! The score will appear in that person's account with their user name showing as the "source" or "owner", and they can make any changes they want, including to the title and composer text fields. This is useful in some situations, but avoid this option if you don't want someone to do this without your permission. If you leave this box unchecked, then other users can't use the 'Save a Copy' button in the 'score' palette.

Make this score as an activity template is only available to users with a Noteflight Learn subscription. It permits the score to be used as a template for activities by others. (See below.)

Activity Templates

Noteflight Learn subscriptions only.

When you select the Activity Template option upon creating a new score, or when you check the Sharing box titled Make this score an activity template, a score becomes a special kind of document: an activity template. This is a score that is designed as a starting point for students to create a new score from, simply by accessing the template. As soon as a student accesses your activity template, Noteflight automatically makes that student a unique copy of the template. This copy becomes their own private document. What is special about these copies is that your original activity template "keeps track" all of its copies, and you can easily access all the copies created from each of your templates.

This feature is ideal for assignments of any kind that involve notation, recording, transcription or analysis. For example, suppose you create an activity template called "Write A Bass Line", consisting of just a melody and an empty bass-clef part. This template is a music writing exercise that you are making available to your students.

Let's say that you have posted a link to your template somewhere, and two different students access the link. Noteflight will automatically make a copy of the document for each student. The original template will show up in My Scores with a "puzzle piece" icon and a special link to a listing of the student copies:

The same link will appear in Score Details for your score. Clicking on this link causes a listing to be displayed of all the individual copies of the template, along with user names that link to the users who created the copies:

As a teacher, you automatically have permission to view, comment on and edit any student score, even if the student hasn't changed their sharing settings in order to share with you. And of course, that includes these copies. So you can simply click any of the links in the listing to access each student's work. As a teacher, if you view your own or another teacher's activity template, you will access the actual document rather than a copy — be careful before editing it!

You can remove a score from this listing without deleting the student's score, since the score doesn't belong to you.

Linking to a Score from Web Pages

In Noteflight, you can take any shared score and link to it from any web page on the Internet. This allows you to put references to your scores anywhere on the web; if people click the link, they will go to a page that allows them to view your score, or even edit your score if you allow that.

To share a link to a score, open Score Details and make sure that your score is shared, not private. Then click the button with the share icon and choose Copy Link to Score.

You will see a confirmation that the link has been copied to your clipboard. You can then paste this link into any web page that accepts HTML tags, or email, or SMS text.

Embedding a Score in Web Pages

You can take any shared score and embed it in any web page on the Internet. This allows you to create musical scores in Noteflight, then show them anywhere on the Web: on your blog, a personal web page, school website, or any other page.

To embed a score, open Score Details and make sure that your score is shared, not private. Then click the button with the share icon and choose Embed Score.

This opens a box with the embedding options:

You can then copy and paste this HTML into any web page that accepts HTML tags. When that web page is viewed, the embedded score appears in the place where you placed these tags. Unlike a score viewed on the Noteflight web site, no menus or panels appear -- just a Play/Stop button. Users may select objects in the score to listen to them selectively, but cannot edit the score.

Embedded scores are displayed in Strip View by default; the surrounding page can include descriptive information as needed in HTML.

You can control the detailed appearance and behavior of embedded scores:

The Width, Height and Scale options control the size and magnification scale of the embed.
The Allow in-place editing checkbox permits the embed to actually be edited on the page, although its contents cannot be saved back to the original. This is useful for activities or exercises.
Hide playback cursor hides the vertical line that normally shows the current location during playback.
The Preview button pops up an additional browser window that shows the embed exactly as it will appear when the embed text is copied into a web page.

Changing a Score's Description

Use the score description to provide viewers with more information about it. To edit the description, type in the (Description) area of Score Details:

Favorites and Comments

Scores can have favorites and comments. Both of these features are available in Score Details.

Favorite Scores

Anyone can make a score that's been published for searching and browsing a favorite, which means that they can easily get to the score from a list of personal favorites on their My Scores page. Each score's favorite count is also shown on listings of that score, and contributes to its position in the Public Scores pages on Noteflight.

To make a score a favorite of yours, click the "Favorite" button.

To see the list of everyone who has favorited the score, use the link that shows the count of people who have favorited the score.

Commenting on Scores

You can create any number of comments to accompany a score, which are shown in a separate panel from the score. If it's your own score, you are always able to add comments; if it's someone else's score, then you can add comments only if they allow others to do so (see Score Details).

Each comment shows the user's name and avatar image. Clicking on either one will display that user's public profile page on Noteflight, allowing you to investigate that user's own scores and favorites.

To add a comment, type it into the comment box and press the "Comment" button. You can delete your own comments by clicking on the comment and choosing "Delete" from the popup menu, and if it's your score you can delete anyone else's comments too.

Each score's comment count is shown on listings of scores, to make it clearer when there is commentary that accompanies the music.

Importing Files into Noteflight

To import a score into Noteflight, choose this option when creating a new score:

Click Choose File(s) to display a dialog allowing you to designate the files you want to import. The following sections describe the kinds of files that may be imported.

Note that some errors or warnings may appear immediately after importing, depending on the validity of the imported file and whether the Noteflight import translator encounters unexpected conditions in the file.

Importing MusicXML

MusicXML is an industry standard file format for representing music notation. It is very useful for exchanging scores between different programs. Because Noteflight supports MusicXML, you can easily move scores between Noteflight and another notation program that also supports it.

Although MusicXML is a standard industry format for notation, it is supported to varying degrees by different notation programs. The results you get from exchanging scores via MusicXML very much depend on the program you originally exported it from, or import it into. In general, you can expect to perform some degree of cleanup on imported scores to get them to look good in Noteflight.

Some options are presented when you import MusicXML:

Use original text positions instructs Noteflight to place text at its original position in the imported file, not at the default position it would normally be placed by Noteflight.
Use original system breaks tells Noteflight to pay attention to the system breaks in the imported file. By default these are disregarded.
Use original stem directions tells Noteflight to pay attention to the note stem directions in the imported file. By default stem directions are determined by Noteflight's automatic layout.
Use original slur directions tells Noteflight to pay attention to the slur orientations in the imported file. By default slur orientations are determined by Noteflight's automatic layout.
Combine voices with same stem direction tells Noteflight to combine notes from different voices whose stems go in the same direction and have the same note values.
Optimize layout adjusts size and spacing settings in the imported score to produce the best results.

Importing 'Noteflight Score' Files

When you export a score using Noteflight Score , Noteflight downloads a type of XML file to your computer hard drive. This file can be imported back into Noteflight in the same way as other XML file Importing MusicXML.

Importing this 'Noteflight Score XML' file creates an exact copy of the originally exported Noteflight score.

Importing MIDI

Like MusicXML, MIDI is an industry standard file format, but it was not designed to represent music notation. Rather, MIDI is a way to capture a musical performance, down to very precise details of timing and dynamics. Despite this fact, however, many musical scores are available in MIDI format, and MIDI continues to play a role in exchanging music between different music notation programs despite its shortcomings. For this reason, Noteflight supports MIDI for both import and export.

Because MIDI accurately represents music as it is played, rather than as it is written, it is necessary to make a number of assumptions and guesses in order to convert this performance back into music notation. In some cases these guesses work well; in others, they may not. The results of importing MIDI will vary a lot, depending on the nature of the performance in the file and how easily it can be interpreted as notation according to these guesses.

Because of the need to make some guesses about how to best turn performance into notation, Noteflight gives you a number of choices when you import a MIDI file:

Here's what those various options do:

Create parts from Tracks: This option, which is enabled by default, causes each track of the MIDI file to be considered as one part in Noteflight.
Create parts from Channels: this option causes each channel number used in the MIDI file to be considered as a single part in Noteflight. This option can be helpful for "type 0" MIDI files in which separate tracks are not employed.
Quantization: this option controls how rhythms in the performance are quantized, or "rounded off", to the nearest notated note value. The default setting of AUTO indicates that Noteflight should automatically determine the best way to do this. Other settings specify the smallest note value that Noteflight will use when quantizing.
Quantize dotted durations: this option indicates that Noteflight should permit dotted durations to be recognized and used as part of the rhythm quantization process.
Extend short notes through rests: this option causes short notes to be extended through a following rest of comparable duration. This can be useful when correcting for extra rhythmic spacing present in a MIDI performance, which is sometimes more a reflection of the performer's phrasing rather than of the actual notated time value.

Importing Multiple Files at a Time

It's often convenient to import multiple files of the same kind at once, creating a set of multiple documents in your Noteflight account. You can do this by selecting more than one score in the file chooser dialog that appears when you give the Import command. Each of the selected files will be imported. At the end of the import process, the last score in the list will be loaded into the Score Editor.

If you have access to Noteflight's collection feature, all imported scores will be placed in the same collection as the score in the Import command was used. This is very convenient for keeping sets of imported files together.

Exporting Files from Noteflight

When using the

Score:

Export

action, the following dialog appears allowing you to choose the type of file to be exported:

Each of these formats is described below.

Note: Exporting is only allowed if you are the author of the score being exported, or if the author has selected "Let people copy & export this score" in Score Details under sharing settings.

Exporting PDF

Scores may be exported as PDF files. There are two flavors of export available: PDF of the full score, or PDF of all individual parts (paid versions only).

Exporting MusicXML

MusicXML is an industry standard file format, as mentioned above. Export in this format if you want to bring a Noteflight score into a different music notation program, or if you want to keep an archival copy of your music for future purposes in an editable format (a PDF will not let you edit the music).

Exporting MIDI

When exporting MIDI, a choice of options is available:

Choosing for musical performance indicates that you intend the MIDI export to be played back for listening purposes, and causes the exported music to include performance features such as articulation expression and swing eighths. This is ideal for exporting into a digital audio workstation (DAW) application.

Choosing for import into another notation editor, on the other hand, causes the exported music to be simplified so that it imports as cleanly as possible into another editor.

Open in Soundtrap

Soundtrap is a web-based Digital Audio Workstation (DAW). If you have a Soundtrap account, you can open your Noteflight score as a Soundtrap project to view it as midi data in "piano roll" format, with the sounds and editing tools available in Soundtrap.

Exporting WAV Audio

The current mix of a score may be exported as a 44.1 kHz stereo WAV audio file.

Exporting MP3 Audio

The current mix of a score may be exported as a MP3 file.

Exporting a Noteflight Score (XML)

Choose this option when you want to export a score so that you can place it into another Noteflight account with no changes introduced by converting into a non-Noteflight format. This is also an XML file format.

Miscellaneous Notation Features

Slurs, Hairpins, Trills and Lines

Slurs and hairpin dynamic symbols are similar in that they can span any number of measures in a Noteflight score. In Noteflight, these kinds of symbols are referred to as "lines". Other types of lines are also supported by Noteflight including trills, 8va/8vb, and more.

What all lines have in common is that they have a starting point and an ending point, which can be placed independently. The general way to make a line notation is to select the starting and ending points by using Staff selections and then asking Noteflight to create the slur, hairpin, or other line notation based on that selection.

It is also possible to create a line-type notation by selecting just one note. This usually makes a line between that note and the note that follows it.

Selecting a line-type notation also causes it to display small draggable "handles" that can be repositioned with the mouse, Typically there is one handle for the starting point, one for the ending point. There may also be other handles depending on the symbol in question.

Best Practices for Dynamic Playback

Follow this guide when writing dynamics into your score so that you will hear the most accurate results on playback.

Use the wedge symbols
Dynamics:
Crescendo
and
Dynamics:
Diminuendo
or the lines
Dynamics:
Crescendo
and
Dynamics:
Diminuendo
to create crescendos and diminuendos.

Do not write crescendo or diminuendo using
Dynamics:
Expression Text
which will not affect playback.

Correct: Here, dynamics were added using
Dynamics:
Crescendo
,
Dynamics:
Diminuendo
,
Dynamics:
Crescendo
, and
Dynamics:
Diminuendo
:

Incorrect: Here,
Dynamics:
Expression Text
was used to add dynamics.
For the most accurate crescendos and diminuendos, specify start and end dynamics using
Dynamics:
Expression Text
. If start and end dynamics are not specified, the performer will assume a dynamic change of two levels (for example, mp will crescendo to f in this default setting).

Good: no specific starting or ending dynamics, so the performer will start at the most recent dynamic marking and assume dynamic change of two levels

Better: specific starting dynamic, so the performer will start at this dynamic and then crescendo two levels to mf.

Best: specific starting and ending dynamic, so that the intensity of the crescendo is exactly how you want it.
Avoid overlapping dynamics or putting two explicit markings at the same time.

Incorrect: overlapping crescendo and diminuendo. The performer will play the leftmost notation. In this example, it would play the crescendo.

Incorrect: overlapping explicit dynamics. The performer will play whichever dynamic you entered last.
When you are writing for a grandstaff instrument, like the left and right hands of the piano, put shared dynamics--dynamics that you want both hands to play--between the two staves.

Put specific dynamics for the right hand above the staff and for the left hand below the staff.

This allows you to make complicated grandstaff dynamics, like a shared crescendo that starts at the same dynamic but crescendos with different intensities for each hand
For complex forms like songs with repeat signs or codas, be as specific as possible with any dynamic changes by specifying the dynamic you want with ppp, pp, p, mp, mf, f, ff, fff before repeat signs or coda signs.

Incorrect: Here, the crescendo inside the repeat will be a “default” crescendo--it will crescendo two dynamic levels, from pianissmo to mezzo piano. Then in measure 2 it will be subito forte.

Correct: If you want a pp to f crescendo, specify the ending dynamic inside of the repeat. Both times, measure 1 will crescendo from pianissimo to forte. The dynamic in measure 2 will remain forte.

Adjusting a measure's overall width

In some cases you may wish to change the visual width taken up by a particular measure in the score for reasons of clarity or aesthetics. Noteflight determines the width of any given measure using a complex set of calculations, but you can "inflate" or "deflate" the result of these calculations by manually adjusting this width.

To do so, simply drag a measure's ending bar line from side to side. This adjusts the measure's width and causes the measure to take up proportionally more or less room in the score layout.

In the special case of dragging the last bar line in the score, this causes the last line of the score to become shorter or longer. This is useful when the last line contains only one or two measures.

Once you have made such changes to a measure, they will persist. You may remove a custom width setting for some measure by selecting the measure and using

Layout:

Reset Layout

Slash and Hit Notation

Slashes and hits are unpitched notations that behave much like notes. They indicate a set of beats where improvisation occurs, or where the rhythm is specified but not exact pitches. They are particularly common in conjunction with chord symbols (see below). They look similar, except that slashes do not have stems.

To place a slash at the location where the next note is to be entered, click the / icon on the Object Editing Palette or else type the the / key on the keyboard.

To convert a slash to a hit, select it and click or type / again. The distinction is only important in the case where the slash duration is a quarter note and hence lacks a stem.

Slashes and hits always occupy the middle line of a staff. They do not have a pitch, and are therefore unaffected by transposition commands. Accidentals are not added to them.

Editing the Score's Title, Composer and Copyright

In Page Layout mode, the first page of the document always shows the score's title, composer and copyright info. These fields may be edited by simply clicking in them and typing. Use Enter to separate multiple lines of text. Press Esc when done, or click elsewhere in the page.

If you have not provided this information, the fields are shown with "(Edit Title)", "(Edit Composer)" and "(Edit Copyright)" in dimmed text. Clicking on them causes the dimmed text to disappear so that you can insert your own text. Should you choose not to fill them in, the dimmed text will not be printed; they only appear while editing on the screen.

Note in order to rename a score in Noteflight, you simply edit the score's title.

Adjusting Symbol Positions

You can adjust the vertical position of any rest or chord symbol by selecting it and using the ↑ or ↓ keys to move it up or down. Dragging with the mouse also works.

Text can also be moved from side to side using the ← and → keys.

These adjustments are not possible if there are also selected notes or chords, since this would confuse changes in position with actual pitch changes.

Support and Feedback

Troubleshooting and Support

Feedback

Inappropriate or Offensive Content

Copyright Violations

Keyboard Shortcuts

Searching Help

Quick Start

Click the "Create" button at the top of the page to create a score.

Decide where you want a new note to go.

Enter a note with the mouse

Change a note you just made

Rests

Select objects and measures before changing them.

Add measures

Delete measures

Add parts

Score Details

Adding and Editing Notes

Using the Mouse

Using the Computer Keyboard

Using the Visual Piano Keyboard

Using a MIDI Controller

Create a Rest

Moving Notes with the Mouse

Selecting Music

Object selections

Score selections

Staff selections

Dragging Selections with the Mouse

Clearing the selection

Filtering the selection

Actions and Palettes

Palette Buttons

Browsing and Pinning Palettes

Score Palette

Score:Parts

Score:Formatting

Score:Show in Concert Pitch

Printing a score

Page Setup

Score:SaveCtrl+S

Score:Save a Copy

Score:Export

Score:Versions

Score:Sync Audio

Score:Statistics

Edit Palette

Undo and Redo

Cut, Copy and Paste

Edit:Delete⌫

Edit:RepeatR

Edit:Select AllCtrl+A

Edit:Filter Selection

Edit:Keyboard Shortcuts

Duration Palette

Choosing Note or Rest Duration

Making Notes or Rests Longer and Shorter

Duration:Rhythm Dot.

Duration:Double Dot

Duration:Tie,

Duration:Incoming Tie

Duration:L.V. Tie

Rhythm Palette

Tremolo Lines

Rhythm:Start Tremolo

Rhythm:Roll

Adjust Beams

Rhythm:Add Slash/

Grace Notes and Appoggiaturas

Tuplets

Pitch Palette

Accidentals

Pitch:Transpose

Move Up or Down

Transpose Up or Down Chromatic

Transpose Up or Down Octave

Pitch:Enharmonic ShiftZ

Pitch:Courtesy Accidental%

8va and 8vb Lines

Score:
Parts

Score:
Formatting

Score:
Show in Concert Pitch

Score:
SaveCtrl+S

Score:
Save a Copy

Score:
Export

Score:
Versions

Score:
Sync Audio

Score:
Statistics

Edit:
Delete⌫

Edit:
RepeatR

Edit:
Select AllCtrl+A

Edit:
Filter Selection

Edit:
Keyboard Shortcuts

Duration:
Rhythm Dot.

Duration:
Double Dot

Duration:
Tie,

Duration:
Incoming Tie

Duration:
L.V. Tie

Rhythm:
Start Tremolo

Rhythm:
Roll

Rhythm:
Add Slash/

Pitch:
Transpose

Pitch:
Enharmonic ShiftZ

Pitch:
Courtesy Accidental%

Tempo:
Fermata^

Tempo:
Caesura

Tempo:
Breath Mark

Text:
LyricsCtrl+L

Text:
Performance TextT

Dynamics:
Expression TextCtrl+E

Text:
Chord SymbolK

Text:
Rehearsal Letter

Text:
Text Block Before System

Text:
Text Block After System

Text:
System Text

Text:
Annotation

Text:
Show Prompt

Text:
Text Border

Measure:
Add Measure After

Measure:
Add Measure Before

Measure:
Delete Measures

Measure:
Reset Measure Numbers

Measure:
Change Time Signature

Measure:
Change Key Signature

Measure:
Hide/Show CautionariesCtrl+Enter

Measure:
Hide/Show Measures

Measure:
Multi-measure Rest

Layout:
System BreakEnter

Layout:
Page BreakShift Enter

Layout:
Split System

Layout:
Create System

Layout:
Keep With Next

Layout:
Reset Layout

Repeat:
Repeat Ending

Repeat:
Repeat Ending Final

Articulation:
SlurS

Ornament:
Trill

Ornament:
Arpeggio

Ornament:
Glissando

Note:
Cue

Note:
Parentheses`