transpose guitar chords into sheet music

Subject: transpose guitar chords into sheet music
From: GUEST,gezell
Date: 21 Feb 09 - 07:54 AM

Is there a free software program that will translate Guitar chords into sheet music. In other words, if I have the chords worked out for a song, but need to have it in sheet music format, is there a program where I can type in the chords and have sheet music created from that?

Subject: RE: transpose guitar chords into sheet music
From: GUEST,Ed
Date: 21 Feb 09 - 08:06 AM

Not as far as I'm aware.

How could the software know which inversion of any given chord you were playing???

Subject: RE: transpose guitar chords into sheet music
From: GUEST,Jack Campin
Date: 21 Feb 09 - 08:42 AM

What market is there for chords in staff notation without the tune?

There are ABC utilities that can convert guitar chord names into explicit pitches, like BarFly for the Mac. But chords voiced for the guitar are no use to players of any other instrument (they will never fit under the hands on a keyboard) and guitarists themselves prefer to just read chord names. So the point of this capability eludes me.

What are you actually trying to do? More details please.

Subject: RE: transpose guitar chords into sheet music
From: GUEST,Mark
Date: 21 Feb 09 - 10:50 AM

You can't do it. Years ago I did some work for a publisher of folk songs and had to convert guitar chord symbols into a piano score. It's not just a matter of converting the symbols into notes, you also have to work out how the chord is played- is it strummed, picked, etc., and convert that into a pianistic style.

There is a good piece of software called Virtual Guitarist that will generate MIDI information from chords and will simulate a finger-picking style. You could then feed the MIDI info into a scorewriting program like Finale and produce your score from that. But you have to be able to play the chords on a keyboard first.

Subject: RE: transpose guitar chords into sheet music
From: Nick
Date: 22 Feb 09 - 10:22 AM

You can easily do it with Guitar Pro 5 and choose the inversion you want etc but it's not free. It will produce what you want though

Subject: RE: transpose guitar chords into sheet music
From: Leadfingers
Date: 22 Feb 09 - 07:57 PM

But the Chord run has a choice of notes , minimum three notes to a chord , so NO WAY can any programme sort which note of several is intended . I think you are asking the wrong question !

Subject: RE: transpose guitar chords into sheet music
From: GUEST,DonMeixner
Date: 23 Feb 09 - 12:05 AM

And somewhere along the way the melody of the song needs to be considered. The computer won't have clue what the melody is.
Unless you are just sticking in staff notations and if so, why bother, A pianist who reads music will likely know the chord structures anyway if you just use common chord notation over the words to the song. A piano just clobbering chords can be a bit ponderous.
Chord inversions create a worry I suppose but not so much.

Them pianists will sort it out to suit themselves anyway.

Don

Subject: RE: transpose guitar chords into sheet music
From: GUEST,Mark
Date: 23 Feb 09 - 03:12 AM

My mistake- my earlier post should have read REAL GUITAR not Virtual Guitarist, which is something else.

Subject: RE: transpose guitar chords into sheet music
From: Nick
Date: 23 Feb 09 - 04:04 AM

Well whatever anyone else keeps saying Guitar Pro 5 DOES do it. You have the option to add a chord but then have the option of choosing which particular inversion or position that you play the chord - I'll post a couple of screenshots later to demonstrate what it does and what the output looks like

Subject: RE: transpose guitar chords into sheet music
From: Nick
Date: 23 Feb 09 - 09:40 AM

Here are a few links to how Guitar Pro 5 works. You can download a demo for 14 days so if you have limited amounts to do you might even be able to do it for free.

When you enter a Chord into the tab and choose C,F,G or whatever it comes up with one of these boxes which allows you to choose which fingering/inversion of the chord you want. It will then put the notes in (and tab with fingering) as below:

C chord
F chord
G chord

As sheet music

Subject: RE: transpose guitar chords into sheet music
From: Jack Campin
Date: 23 Feb 09 - 09:53 AM

It does the same as BarFly.

Do you expect a pianist to play from a score like that?

And where's the tune?

What use is that staff notation to anyone?

Subject: RE: transpose guitar chords into sheet music
From: Nick
Date: 23 Feb 09 - 11:39 AM

Absolutely useless. Couldn't agree with you more, Jack.

But that wasn't the question.

It's much like if someone asked - "Is it possible to play the fiddle with your feet?" If the answer is 'yes' it doesn't mean that it's a desirable thing to do.