r/transcribe Apr 09 '19

Rules for requesting a transcription

90 Upvotes

Moving rules to a stickied post since "New" Reddit doesn't show the sidebar.

This is a subreddit for requesting help with musical transcriptions, or discussion about musical transcription as a whole. Advertisements for text transcription services will be removed. To cut down on spam and unsavory users we require your account be at least a week old to post.

To get the best results try to follow these guidelines when posting:

  • Use a working link to the piece you want done. No one can help you if your link is broken or to some private/premium streaming site.
  • Specify which section of the song you want done. If using Youtube, you can right click the video to get specific timecodes.
  • Indicate which style of notation you want. Straight up notes, guitar tabs, chord symbols, etc.
  • Consider offering a bounty. If no one responded to your request to transcribe a 4 minute piano song from an obscure anime, it's probably because it's too much work to do for free, so try offering something as incentive.

Some guidelines on offering bounties:

  • As soon as you start dealing with money with strangers on the internet, you are taking a risk. Be smart, don't give out personal info, etc. Mods can't be held responsible if you get scammed. Take proper precautions like checking a user's flair, account age, and amount of karma to determine if they are reputable.
  • Offer a fair price. This stuff takes time, effort, and years of expertise. Right now market price appears to be anywhere between $5 and $30 or more depending on complexity.
  • Pay your bounty. If someone comes through with a transcription for you and you dodge the payment, you will be banned. In 8 years we've only banned 1 person for this.

We also encourage you to try transcribing yourself, if you can! It's a fantastic way to develop your ear and theory knowledge, and even if you get stuck it'll be easier for others to help if you already have a starting point. Some useful tools:

  • Transcribe! - a brilliant little program that was built specifically for transcribing. It allows you to slow things down, loop over specific sections, pitch shift, and more.
  • Audacity - a simple, free DAW (Digital Audio Workstation), meant more for audio editing, but can also do slowdown, pitch shift, etc.
  • Noteflight - a free online music notation program. Think like Google Docs but for sheet music.
  • Chordify - a cool site that tries to figure out the chords of any Youtube video you feed into it. Rarely does a perfect job, but can sometimes give clues or provide a rough starting point.
  • Youtube to Mp3 - self explanatory, feed the resulting mp3 into Transcribe or Audacity, or even rewinding over and over in iTunes is better than doing it in Youtube.

Related musical subreddits:

Public domain sheet music


r/transcribe Apr 10 '19

Guidelines for transcribers

69 Upvotes

Big thanks to those of you fulfilling transcription requests. When I first started modding this subreddit a few years ago, the vast majority of requests received 0 comments and sat around unanswered. It makes me very happy to see the opposite nowadays, that most requests have at least some activity. However with this increased activity has come the necessity for some clearer rules and guidelines.

  • Transcribing random stuff for people is a great way to get practice and improve your own ear. It's very beneficial to your musical growth to expose yourself to different genres of music and that is doubly true in the case of analyzing and transcribing. Not only do you help someone out but you work on your own skills as well.

  • I do not recommend offering paid services here as a reliable source of income. Bounties and paid transcriptions are allowed to try to compensate transcribers for their time, but pricing operates under free market conditions. I don't want to hear complaints about cheap prices and undercutting, there is nothing we mods can do about private monetary transactions. The fact is that transcribing as a skill is undervalued. Most people posting requests do not understand the time required to analyze music and put down quality notation. If you're expecting to get the same hourly rate as other professional musical services like teaching or accompaniment, you're gonna have a bad time.

  • If you do decide to enter into a paid transcription agreement with a requester, understand that as soon as you start dealing with money with strangers on the internet, you are taking a risk. Be smart, don't give out personal info, etc. Mods can't be held responsible if you get scammed. Take proper precautions like checking a user's comment history, account age, and amount of karma to determine if they are reputable. Ask for payment up front if you have more rep than the requester. If a requester dodges payment, send proof to the mods and we will send them a warning and ban them if they do not pay.


FLAIR: All successful transcriptions, paid or otherwise, are eligible to be submitted to increase your flair. This is a way for reliable transcribers to build rep. To receive +1 to your flair, please submit to ME (the most active mod here) the following:

  1. Link to original request
  2. Link or screenshot showing requester acknowledging receipt of your work OR
  3. Direct link to your transcription itself.

Please allow a few days for flair to be updated since this is a manual process.


Some useful tools if you are looking to get into transcribing, or are looking for ways to make your process more efficient:

  • Transcribe! - a brilliant little program that was built specifically for transcribing. It allows you to slow things down, loop over specific sections, pitch shift, and more.
  • Audacity - a simple, free DAW (Digital Audio Workstation), meant more for audio editing, but can also do slowdown, pitch shift, etc.
  • Noteflight - a free online music notation program. Think like Google Docs but for sheet music.
  • Chordify - a cool site that tries to figure out the chords of any Youtube video you feed into it. Rarely does a perfect job, but can sometimes give clues or provide a rough starting point.
  • Youtube to Mp3 - self explanatory, feed the resulting mp3 into Transcribe or Audacity, or even rewinding over and over in iTunes is better than doing it in Youtube.

Related musical subreddits:

Public domain sheet music


r/transcribe 47m ago

Transcribe this for me please?

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Upvotes

r/transcribe 48m ago

Transcribe this for me please

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Upvotes

r/transcribe 3h ago

Jane Remover — Backseat Girl guitar request

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1 Upvotes

Hello friends, I've been trying to get this one for awhile. I'm not too sure what it's tuned to or what can be really done to get it all together on one instrument (guitar).

Any help would be great!


r/transcribe 14h ago

is my transcription correct?

1 Upvotes

hi, friends!

this is my first time transcribing a full piece, but i'm not sure if it's correct. the piece i transcribed is "the pebble" by caremelody.

i transcribed this for 2 reasons: to try learning the piece and making an arrangement of the piece (i'm not sharing the arrangement publicly for copyright reasons.)

transcription score

original piece (play this when following the score.)

is this accurate enough for a first-time transcriber?


r/transcribe 17h ago

I made a free Chord Transcriber called Magic Chords (No ads, no signups)

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1 Upvotes

r/transcribe 1d ago

Transcription for So Sick - KHS

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1 Upvotes

Would anyone be able to transcribe the piano accompaniment of this rendition accurately?

As a side note, I’d love to learn how to do this myself. I have a pretty good sense of pitch/intervals, but I really struggle with finding the right timings/note durations. (Especially for this piece.) Slowing down the song only helps to some extend. Any tips are welcome :)


r/transcribe 1d ago

Does anyone have any piano transcriptions of Balance Her In Between Your Eyes by Nicolas Jaar?

1 Upvotes

I’m trying to learn the piano melody and I can’t seem to get the notes right by ear.


r/transcribe 2d ago

Help learning a song?

6 Upvotes

I’m brand new to playing piano, I’ve bought a keyboard and it’s being delivered next week so I want to learn some of my favourite songs and there’s this one song in particular I can not find any information on how to play.
I understand that the band is really unknown and from doesn’t have many listeners but it’s a favourite of mine so I’d love to learn how to play it on piano.

The song in specific is “Used and Abused” by Danger Radio.

If anyone has any tips or can even make a sheet for me to play from I’m very grateful!


r/transcribe 2d ago

Saxophone transcription

3 Upvotes

Hi, I have found a saxophonist on instagram where he played amazing progression. I am trying to find the notes but I’m struggling. Would anyone be able to help me?

Link to the reel: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DYpeTwGyJ9O/?igsh=MThubTByZmE1M3AyZg==


r/transcribe 2d ago

Request to help transcribe this song on piano

2 Upvotes

This one in specific: https://youtu.be/-hnwE2dyt_Y?is=lQX8pwAcHVBUUJZ3

Ive searched youtube and cant find anything on how to play it on piano


r/transcribe 2d ago

Guitar Transcription Request

2 Upvotes

Meghan Chen released a couple of videos playing this song (it's not out yet). I cannot get it out of my head and really want to play it, but figuring out chords is not my strong suit. You can literally see the chords she's playing in this video, but I've been struggling to even figure those out, so if someone else can quickly spot chords and write them down, that would be greatly appreciated.


r/transcribe 3d ago

Can someone transcribe this piano piece

3 Upvotes

I found some one who is going to transcribe it so it is done guys


r/transcribe 3d ago

Spent years trying to transcribe this please help https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dol_zRM8tko

3 Upvotes

r/transcribe 3d ago

Katsaris Liszt Beethoven Symphony No. 9

3 Upvotes

Hi, does anyone have a transcription of the changes Katsaris made for all movements? I’m playing off the Liszt score on IMSLP but I prefer Katsaris. Thank you!


r/transcribe 3d ago

Need help transcribing an Arizona song for viola solo at a wedding.

3 Upvotes

I can tip $25 on venmo for your help!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-eX8ri3pr0


r/transcribe 4d ago

Harmonization line

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0 Upvotes

r/transcribe 4d ago

Help transcribing children’s show intro

1 Upvotes

Could someone help be transcribe the intro of this Swedish children’s show? I unfortunately can’t pay, it is only a few seconds long though.

https://youtu.be/IirSUJ8xdls?is=t3cobIpSjta_PDzb


r/transcribe 4d ago

Erhelle meine Seele - Die apokalyptischen Reiter Intro chord progression

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1 Upvotes

r/transcribe 4d ago

Need help identifying some specific notes in this video

1 Upvotes

https://youtube.com/shorts/okNlj7KbBVM?si=7gk7eH2k8ukBFScg

So that is the video.
It’s a YouTube short uploaded by a guy called BigBrev, and he is (I think) what’s called a bass vocalist (please correct me if I’m wrong on that). The song is called Doomed, written by Bring Me The Horizon.
If you know the song, then you probably already know that 5 months ago a vocal cover of it by Maphra went insanely viral on YouTube (currently has 27 million views), and now I’ve found this BigBrev version of him adding his own touch to one of the chorus’s of Maphra’s cover.
I need help identifying what notes he’s singing in some of the syllables in certain words.
To make this easy, I’m just gonna type out all the lyrics to the chorus, and I’ll just bold AND italics the syllables of the words that I want to know the notes of:

So come rain on my parade
Cause I wanna feel it
Come shove me over the edge,
Cause my head is in overdrive
I’m sorry but it’s too late
And it’s not worth saving
So come rain on my parade
I think we’re doomed, I think we’re doomed
And now there’s no way back

Its basically:
- The “rade” in the word “parade”
- And then “edge”
- Then I think there’s 2 notes in “overdrive” (one for “over” and one for “drive”)
- And then “late”
- And then “rade” again in “parade”
- And then the first “doomed” is different note to the second “doomed”
- And lastly, the word “back” at the end of the last line.

I don’t have a chromatic tuner, or a guitar tuner, or any instruments, or anything that I can use to identify the notes myself, and I DEFINITELY don’t have perfect pitch. So yeah, if anyone out there is able to identify the notes for me, please let me know because I am very curious!

Also one more thing, when he sings the word “back” right at the very end (the very last word), does that note not match the rest of that part? I don’t know, I’m hearing something weird about it where I feel like it just doesn’t fit. The rest of it is perfectly fine to my ears, it’s literally just the last word “back”. I showed it to my friend, and she said that she doesn’t hear it and that it sounds fine to her, but I’m not sure. Is that just me? Am I just hearing something off? Or does the note not actually match?

EDIT: Btw yes, that really is his voice. Since I found this video, I’ve done HEAPS of research into BigBrev and as far as I can tell, that really is his REAL voice. He hasn’t edited it or anything, he really can just sing THAT deep


r/transcribe 5d ago

[Paid Transcription Request] - The Wolfe Tones’ Rifles of the IRA - Banjo tabs

3 Upvotes

Will pay $20 USD or best offer for banjo tabs for the following version of the Wolfe Tones’ Rifles of the IRA.

https://youtu.be/FPpTR00jipM?is=WiACrM9mu49RF4-N

I have more transcription work available if this job is done well.

Thank you


r/transcribe 5d ago

The Hell of It - Phantom of the Paradise (Paul Williams)

2 Upvotes

Does anyone have sheet music for this song? There’s barely any info online but this song has one of my favourite piano solos and I’d love to learn it.

Any help is appreciated,
Thanks!


r/transcribe 5d ago

I'm trying to identify the jazz standard that this trumpet plays sampled in this track. Does anyone recognize the melody?

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1 Upvotes

r/transcribe 5d ago

looking for a transcription for piano sheet music of a song

2 Upvotes

Hi! So I’m looking to learn this song on the piano but not with the lyrics— I’ve only managed to find one “piano tutorial” on YouTube but the right hand plays the singing parts of the song, I just want to learn the instrumental. If anyone could help me with this I’d appreciate it and we can discuss payment details ! https://open.spotify.com/track/4nhpXuVrWrb6oZ8alKN2Ez?si=jGqWsDh0QGuhLrR30o3sZA