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ms3 - Parsing MuseScore 3 and 4#

Welcome to ms3, a Python library for parsing MuseScore files.

Statement of need#

Here comes a list of functionalities to help you decide if this library could be useful for you.

parses MuseScore 3 and 4 files, dispensing with lossy conversion to musicXML. The file formats in question are
- uncompressed *.mscx files,
- compressed *.mscz files,
extracts and processes the information contained in one or many scores in the form of DataFrames:
- notes (start, duration, pitch etc.) and/or rests,
- measures (time signature, lengths, repeat structure etc.)
- labels, such as
  - guitar/Jazz chord labels
  - arbitrary annotation labels
  - expanded harmony labels following the DCML annotation standard
  - cadences (part of the same annotation syntax)
  - form_labels (annotation standard currently in press)
- chords, that is, onset positions that have musical markup attached, e.g. dynamics, lyrics, slurs, 8va signs…
- metadata from the respective fields, but also score statistics, such as length, number of notes, etc.
stores the extracted information in a uniform and interoperable tabular format (*.tsv)
writes information from tabular *.tsv files into MuseScore files, especially
- chord and annotation labels
- metadata
- header information (title, subtitle, etc.)
- note coloring
uses a locally installed or standalone MuseScore executable for
- batch-converting files to any output format supported by MuseScore (mscz, mscx, mp3, midi, pdf etc.)
- on-the-fly converting any file that MuseScore can read (including MuseScore 2, cap, capx, midi, and musicxml) to parse it
offers its functionality via the convenient ms3 commandline interface.

For a demo video (using an old, pre-1.0.0 version) on YouTube, click here

Installation#

ms3 requires Python >= 3.10 (type python3 --version to check). Once you have switched to a virtual environment that has Python 3.10 installed you can pip-install the library via one of the two commands:

python3 -m pip install ms3
pip install ms3

If successful, the installation will make the ms3 commands available in your PATH (try by typing ms3).

Quick demo#

Parsing a single score#

import ms3
score = ms3.Score('musescore_file.mscz')

Parsing a corpus#

import ms3
corpus = ms3.Corpus('score_directory')
corpus.parse()

Parsing several corpora#

import ms3
corpora = ms3.Parse('my_research_corpora')
corpora.parse()

Making Changes & Contributing#

This project uses pre-commit to ensure code quality. If you are a developer, please make sure to install it before making any changes:

cd ms3
pip install -e ".[dev]" # includes "pip install pre-commit"
pre-commit install

Acknowledgements#

Development of this software tool was supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation within the project “Distant Listening – The Development of Harmony over Three Centuries (1700–2000)” (Grant no. 182811). This project is being conducted at the Latour Chair in Digital and Cognitive Musicology, generously funded by Mr. Claude Latour.

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