Tablet music writing app ? What I'd like to see...

This is something I've been wondering about for a while now. I'm thinking maybe it exists but figure probably not. I wanted to inquire here and if it doesn't exist maybe this will toss it out into the universe and plant a seed. The android apps I've browsed through for notation look like toys.

I'm looking for a tablet app (I have an android 7" Acer) that is graphics based - no midi input or output - that would allow for input onto a music score/staff screen via a capacitive stylus. The staff could be magnified while you're tapping the screen to "write" the note on the "staff paper" - the screen then shrunk back down to display what you've written so far. It would allow you to write chord symbols (i.e. C7 , C 7 +9 etc. ) on the bass cleff as in lead sheet style, but also break out of that and enter a specific chord voicing. Flexibility you can't seem to have in a midi based notation program.

In other words, the anything you could do on paper with the advantage that things you could do in a word processing document like say having a section with a an alternate sequenct of maybe 8 measures (like virtual tracks in recording) that you could try out with a cut/copy and paste. And the neatness of published music script.

This would be used for music composition. Maybe not for creating choir or orchestral scores. Right now, I improvise and stumble on an idea I like and notate it. Then add something to it later. Then play around with it but rewrite a few measures of it and end of having to draw arrows on the paper to the alternate section. Sometimes I write a few measures in another spiral bound manuscript book. It's a creative process I'm satisfied with, but I'm thinking that a stylus, tablet and the right software would be well suited to the piano music stand.

Genre wise, the models for what I'm working on composition wise might be Ellington/Strayhorn, Monk, Mingus etc.

Sorry if my decription is awkward and wordy. I was trying to communicate a visual image.

David

This doesn't have to do with your post specifically - I don't know the answer to it - but after considering the iPad and wrestling with some of the issues that are important to me (especially for photography), such as having more storage capacity, more horsepower under the mood, more I/O, and being able to run Photoshop CS4, I've been thinking that maybe getting something like an Mac Air or Toshiba Portege might be a better way to go. As a bonus, this also offers a larger screen.

So I mention this in case it helps. It is admittedly more expensive, but not by *that* much:

That's a great idea. I haven't heard of it existing (yet). You'd think Finale and Sibelius would be racing to beat each other to the punch with something like that.

The thing is, an iPad is not a replacement for a laptop, nor (and this is important) vice versa. Some of their duties intersect, but there are a lot of things I do on my iPad that either can't be done on a laptop or wouldn't be as convenient/enjoyable/whatever, and vice versa.

I do know that, but in regard to the OP, I am simply wondering whether a laptop (or an "ultrabook", to use the marketing term) might be a better fit. I've used my situation merely as an example in the event that it helps someone. If, OTOH, there is a perfectly good app that can be used with a table, I say great!

Yeah, I am not aware of such an app for Android tablets. I can certainly see why the OP would rather use a tablet to compose, and read, music than a laptop, though - it's definitely one of those things that lends itself well to the tablet interface.

I guess there's a pretty narrow niche for what I'm suggesting. I still think it has real uses in environments like universities for theory and composition students. I suppose more people "write" music into a microphone than onto paper these days.

Hopefully I planted a seed anyway.

David

Yeah, there are some apps like that for the iPad, so I imagine at some point there will be for Android tablets.

If there is not one for a tablet, perhaps some sort of a laptop with a touch-screen might be the only solution, albeit an expensive one???

BTW, it looks like I am slowly dipping my toe in the tablet waters. Sort of. I'm getting a Kindle for my birthday/Christmas. Not the Fire, but the e-Paper one.

You may have a better experience with a Fujitsu Notebook (with tablet capability) or Lenovo (with tablet capability). I saw a NEW Fujitsu with that capability for around $600 Canadian a few days ago.

Dan

I'm pretty dissapointed with the lack of decent Android music app offerings. I've thought about getting an iPad solely for it, but I bet one day I'm gonna hit a wall and be like "damn I should have just gotten a MacBook"