Music Software & Bad Interface Design: Avid’s Sibelius

Tantacrul
17 HN recommenders · recommended in 15 months, 2018–2026
YouTube
1.7M views · 7 years ago · essay · intermediate · dated

Composer and designer Tantacrul, who later led design for MuseScore, takes apart the user interface of Avid's Sibelius music notation software. He walks through specific screens and workflows to show where it breaks basic UI and UX principles.

HN calls it the most entertaining serious UI critique on YouTube, a funny and on-point crash course in bad UX that works even if you do not do music.

“might be the most entertaining serious critique of a software user interface ever posted to YouTube”
Design critique & analysisUI design craft
#uicritique#ux#musicnotationsoftware#baddesign#tantacrul

24 comments from Hacker News

l
@l__l2023 · in “MuseScore 4.1 is now available”
If anyone is yet to see it, Tantacrul (on youtube) is now deeply involved with MuseScore (UX lead or similar?); he put out an awesome vid on the design of MS4 at the beginning of the year: link His video on how Sibelius' UX is a pile of shit remains one of my favourite vids on yt: ▶ this video
Strongly recommendsView on HN
b
@btown2021 · in “‘Jean Sibelius’ Review: An Early Finale”
Since Sibelius and Finale are two industry-leading (and very much competing) music notation software systems, this headline made me do a quadruple-take! link link For those interested in (extremely entertaining) breakdowns of the Sibelius software and other offerings in this space from a UI/UX design perspective, I highly recommend Tantacrul's videos, which propelled him to becoming the head designer for MuseScore and Audacity. IMO, this and his Dorico video are must-watch crash-courses for any developer touching UX design, even outside of music! ▶ this video
Strongly recommendsView on HN
s
@sjwright2020 · in “MuseScore 4: Moving from notation software to composition software”
The cheese melts in the microwave; the music melts in Sibelius. Tantacrul’s review of Sibelius’ might be the most entertaining serious critique of a software user interface ever posted to YouTube. ▶ this video
Strongly recommendsView on HN
d
@derefr2026 · in “Audacity 4.0”
Alternately, if you want to go on the same journey Keary (the person you mention) went on to form an opinion on what constitutes good vs. bad UX design in music/notation/DAW software, they've also put out a whole series of videos taking the piss out of the UX of most of the software in the field: - Reason (link) - Sibelius (▶ this video) - MuseScore (link) - Dorico (link)
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z
@zimpenfish2026 · in “Twenty Years of RISC OS Open”
Obligatory posting of Tantacrul's hilariously vicious kicking of Sibelius[0] "This really is one of the great examples of breaking all UI design principles and every UX design principle too. It's like a design bull in a musical china shop." ▶ this video [0] They may have fixed things in the intervening 8 years, I'm not a composer, I don't know.
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v
@viraptor2025 · in “Blender 5.0”
Have you seen the classic?... ▶ this video
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r
@radicality2022 · in “MuseScore 4”
Obligatory funny video review of MuseScore 3 UI: link Same author also has a funny video on the UI of another music notation program, Sibelius: ▶ this video
RecommendsView on HN
T
@TremendousJudge2022 · in “Clairnote: An alternative music notation system”
We are very, very far away from that. To get a feel of what scorewriter software is like nowadays, Tantacrul's videos[0] on the subject of UI are very good at showing what the state of the art is. On one of his videos he shows that the best score engraving can only be achieved by using a closed source, now-unsupported command line program from the 80s called Score[1] [0] ▶ this video [1] link)
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f
@fredley2022 · in “What Is a Music Engraver? (2016)”
A good rundown of the history of Sibelius, Avid and Dorico is included in this video: ▶ this video
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w
@wexq2021 · in “Audacity Aquired by Muse Group”
OSS needs more UI/UX people, and I think Tantacrul is fantastic for this. His twitter (link) and youtube (link) are full of interesting tidbits, an you can tell he's passionate about things. Even if you don't do music/notation his video on Sibelius, ▶ this video , is ridiculously funny, but also on point.
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o
@orls2021 · in “I’m now in charge of Audacity [video]”
His video on Sibelius is highly recommended if you want more UX laughs. ▶ this video
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J
@JimWestergren2021 · in “Music Software and Bad Interface Design: Avid’s Sibelius (2018) [video]”
Submitted the video to Hacker News.
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