I recently started writing ukulele tablature in Musescore, not because I don’t love Finale (I’ve been using that as my main notation program since the late 90s and will still use it for publishing purposes), but because I wanted to see if it would be a good free option for my students to make their own sheet music who can’t afford Finale‘s somewhat hefty price tag. Bottom line, Musescore will make very nice looking tablature, but (like all software) comes with a somewhat frustrating learning curve that isn’t always intuitive. It’s not THAT painful though and you can’t beat the price (just your time to learn it). Download the free software at Musescore.org

If you’re interested in taking this learning leap and making your own ukulele sheet music in instrumental tablature, I’ve eased the process somewhat by creating a template to help you get started. You can download it here: Ukulele Tablature Template – Musescore File (Google Drive link).

A few tips:

• Notes can be entered by selecting the note value and clicking on the score.
• Note values can also be selected with the number pad on your keyboard (5 = a quarter note, 4= an eighth note, etc.).
• Once a note value is selected you can enter notes with a midi keyboard if you have one connected to your computer. I use a Korg Microkey, with my laptop so I can write anywhere, but any midi keyboard will work.
• You can edit fret numbers on the tablature by deselecting note entry, clicking on a number and then using up/down keys to change the number (if you’re getting a sharp showing up when you want a flat in the staff, go above the note and then back down to switch the accidental).
• Musescore has a reference page on tablature if you have other questions.
• Getting around in the program takes some learning and google searches, but once you get a few tricks down and get your first score finished you can go to ‘file,’ hit ‘export’ and turn out a pdf you can print or share with the world.

Post filed under All UkulelePlay! Blog Posts, Ukulele Education, Ukulele Tips.