[Perform-Talk] DottedNotes — bidirectional braille ⇄ LilyPond/MusicXML translator (built out of my own frustration transcribing orchestral scores)

Tue Aug 11 13:35:08 UTC 2026

Hi Judith. Are ChatGPT and copilot also an option? Cause with Claude, I discovered last night that there's a limited amount of how many times you can message Claude in the free version. In the free version, the number of messages does reset. I think you can message something like six times and then you get a message saying that the limit will reset at a certain time. Thanks.
Leslie Hamric
Cello and Braille Music Teacher
Vice-President of National Federation of the Blind of Illinois At Large  Chapter

> On Jul 22, 2026, at 10:37 PM, Judith Lung via Perform-Talk <perform-talk at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> 
> hi Ella,
> Yes, experiment with Claude and see how it works out for you. PlayScore 2's MusicXML exports can be a bit buggy, like placing 3 dots after a note when only 2 are allowed in the standard MusicXML. I really should start gathering a list of bugs for the developers to fix.
> If you encounter an error transcribing the file into braille, just paste the entire error message from Sao Mai or BrailleMuse into the chat and Claude will generate a new file with the fixes. You may have to have Claude make a few passes of the piece before it's good enough for the braille music converters. For larger files like a symphony, you could have Claude break up the PDF into smaller files, one file per movement, before importing them into PlayScore 2. That way, bugs are caught earlier and the transcription process moves faster. The only task I didn't have success with Claude was transposing parts to concert pitch, the sharps and flats just weren't in the right places.
> It's a great feeling to be able to just download scores from IMSLP and have it transcribed into braille in just 30 minutes or an hour.
> Judith
>> On 2026-07-22 20:18, Ella Yu via Perform-Talk wrote:
>> Hey Judith, the Claude AI thing sounds really interesting, because yeah for
>> me I use PlayScore 2 but the resulting XMLs have to go through a sighted
>> person for fixing, which isn't always easy to get but I do want the notes
>> to be 100% at the very least, so... Just for clarity for everyone reading
>> (not necessarily the OP) MuseScore does not turn PDF to XML, it is notation
>> software.
>>> On Wed, Jul 22, 2026 at 7:14 PM Judith Lung via Perform-Talk <
>>> perform-talk at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>>> For music scanning software I like using PlayScore 2, which costs about
>>> $30/year. It scans PDF scores I download from imslp.org and exports them
>>> as MusicXML or MIDI. MuseScore Studio is a free alternative. However I
>>> have not used it and therefore cannot attest to its quality.
>>> To correct errors, I just attach the original PDF and the MusicXML files
>>> to a chat with Claude AI. I would then prompt Claude to insert part
>>> names and fix code errors. It's not 100% accurate, but it gives me
>>> pretty usable results.
>>> Judith
>>>> On 2026-07-22 19:48, Melissa Riccobono via Perform-Talk wrote:
>>> > Sorry... I now see I need an XML score to make this work, but I'd guess
>>> > I could get my hands on that fairly easily perhaps? I'll have to do
>>> > some research.
>>> > Melissa
>>> >
>>> > -----Original Message-----
>>> > From: Perform-Talk <perform-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org> On Behalf Of
>>> > Judith Lung via Perform-Talk
>>> > Sent: Saturday, July 18, 2026 5:19 PM
>>> > To: perform-talk at nfbnet.org
>>> > Cc: judith at judithlung.com
>>> > Subject: [Perform-Talk] DottedNotes — bidirectional braille ⇄
>>> > LilyPond/MusicXML translator (built out of my own frustration
>>> > transcribing orchestral scores)
>>> >
>>> > Hi everyone,
>>> >
>>> > I'm a blind composer, and for years my biggest bottleneck wasn't
>>> > writing the music — it was getting it out of braille and into something
>>> > a publisher, ensemble, or sighted collaborator could actually use.
>>> > Transcribing an orchestral score from braille into LilyPond by hand
>>> > could eat several days of work before I'd even gotten to the actual
>>> > engraving and proofing. That grind is what pushed me to build
>>> > DottedNotes.
>>> >
>>> > It's a free, bidirectional translator between:
>>> > - Braille music (.brf / .brl)
>>> > - LilyPond (.ly, which compiles straight to publication-quality .pdf
>>> > and
>>> > .midi)
>>> > - MusicXML (.musicxml / .mxl)
>>> >
>>> > So you can go from a braille manuscript to a publisher-ready PDF and
>>> > MIDI in one pass, or take a print/MusicXML score and export a proper
>>> > braille edition — with BANA validation built in (standard or strict
>>> > profile), configurable compression levels, and layout presets for solo
>>> > piano, art song, chamber, orchestral, and lead sheet scores, since
>>> > orchestral formatting has its own headaches that a generic converter
>>> > won't get right.
>>> >
>>> > It's also useful if you're a sighted composer, engraver, or publisher
>>> > who needs to move a score between these formats, or produce a braille
>>> > edition without knowing braille music code yourself.
>>> >
>>> > Free to use here: https://www.dottednotes.net/
>>> >
>>> > I built this to solve my own problem, but I know braille music
>>> > workflows vary a lot person to person, so I'd genuinely appreciate
>>> > feedback from other blind musicians — especially anyone who's dealt
>>> > with the same orchestral-score transcription slog. Bug reports, edge
>>> > cases in the braille code handling, feature requests all welcome.
>>> > Best,
>>> > Judith
>>> >
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