+Keywords: midi notation music typesetting gnu font
+Subject: LilyPond 0.2 released - The GNU Project music typesetter
-CALL FOR HACKERS: LilyPond, the Music Typesetter
+GNU LilyPond - The GNU Project Music Typesetter
-[Sorry if this is a bit off-topic; I want to announce this software to
-small crowd, because it is still test-stage]
-Hi net!
+WHAT IS LilyPond?
-this is to announce the availability of the first public release
-(v0.1) of my music typesetter.
+GNU LilyPond is the GNU Project Music typesetter: it reads a music
+definition file and outputs formatted sheet music to a TeX file or
+(mechanical) performances to MIDI files.
-WHAT IS LILYPOND
-Technically it is a preprocessor which generates TeX
-(or LaTeX) output which contains information to typeset a musical
-score. Practically it is a typesetter, which only uses TeX as an
-output medium. (this is handy because there exist music fonts for TeX)
+WHAT'S NEW SINCE VERSION 0.1?
-HOW DOES IT WORK
+* LilyPond now includes a completely new music font: the Feta font.
+ We were quite disappointed with available music fonts, so we rolled
+ our own. We did our best to copy the best symbol designs available,
+ and we think that we've succeeded in doing so. We're proud of the
+ result, and we hope you agree, so go check it out!
-The input is a script file (example appended) which is read. The
-script file is a "music definition", ie, you type the melody as if it
-is read out loud
+* More elegant output due to
-LilyPond interprets this melody and generates appropriate output items
-(balls, stems, beams), and calculates where they should be put. Then
-it outputs a TeX file. Warning: this said calculations is *slow* (a full
-page of music typically takes 1 minute on my 486/66)
+ * better spacing
+ * better line breaking
+ * better font design
+ * PostScript output for variable symbols
-WHY IS THIS A TEST VERSION
+* Lots of bugfixes
-There a lot of advanced features (grace notes, piano staffs) which are
-VapourFeatures (tm). We're not sure about the language. It may change;
-having a large user base is a burden then.
+* More robust, flexible, tweakable design
-WHY A CALL FOR HACKERS
+* Better MIDI importing
-Currently, the development has three people. I'd this project to have
-more people working on it (there is a lot of work to be done) I think
-this program is pretty original, so join in if you anything about
-music and computers!
+* Easier to use due to better shell scripts and input format
+enhancements
-As an aside, I really like the anarchist approach of linux development.
+* MusixTeX not needed anymore
-WHAT HAS TO BE DONE
-LilyPond is written in Gnu C++, and it is (imo) written very cleanly
-(Lots of classes, lots of comments, small files/small functions) and
-with extensions in mind.
+WHAT CAN LILYPOND DO?
- - Coding. For this time, there won't any biggish (global)
-source hackings. There are a lot of small projects which could use
-some work.
+ASCII script input (mudela), with identifiers (for music reuse),
+customizable notenames.
- - Some TeX hacking. I know little about TeX
+MIDI output lets you check if you have entered the correct notes.
+MIDI to Mudela conversion through the mi2mu program.
- - Documentation. I don't have time for this
+Font size selectable (from 26pt downto 11 pt) for each score.
+Multiple staffs in one score. Each staff may have various different
+meters. Multiple voices within one staff (up to four handled
+graciously); beams optionally shared between voices. Multiple scores
+within one input file. Each score is output to a different file.
-I WANT MORE INFO!
+Beams, slurs, chords, super/subscripts (accents and text), general
+n-plet (triplet, quadruplets, etc.), lyrics, transposition, dynamics
+(both absolute and hairpin style), clef changes, meter changes,
+cadenza-mode, key changes, repeat bars.
-You can download it at:
+Integration with LaTeX through Perl scripts.
- ftp://pcnov095.win.tue.nl/pub/lilypond
-or visit the incredibly lousy webpage at:
+MORE INFO
- http://www.stack.nl/~hanwen/lilypond/index.html
+Sources for this project are on
+
+ ftp://pcnov095.win.tue.nl/pub/lilypond/ (Europe)
+ ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/ (US)
+More detailed info and examples can be found on the webpage at
-EXAMPLE INPUT
-
- % twinkle twinkle little star
- melody = music {
- $\clef\violin
- c c | g g | a a | g g |
- f f | e e | d d8.( e16 | )c2 |
-
- g g | f f | e e | d d |
- g g | f f | e( e8. f16 | e )d |
-
- c c | g g | a a | g g |
- f f | e e | d d8.( e16 | )c2
- $
- }
-
- text2 = music {
- @
- \textstyle "roman"
- When the bla- zing sun is gone,2
- When he no- thing shines up- on,2
- Then you show your lit- tle light,2
- Twin- kle, twin- kle, all the night.2
- Twin- kle, twin- kle, lit- tle star,2
- How I won- der what you are!2
- @
- }
-
- english_staf = staff {
- lyric
- music { text2 }
- }
-
- score {
- staff { melodic music { melody } }
- staff { english_staf }
- paper {
- unitspace 2.5cm
- }
- commands {
- meter {2 * 4}
- skip 24*2
- bar "||"
- }
- }
+ http://www.stack.nl/~hanwen/lilypond/index.html