Sheet Music

Sheet Music

Render playable music notation inside your Obsidian notes. Supports ABC notation, strumming patterns, chord sheets, and live MIDI capture.

---

Features

MIDI capture — connect a keyboard and record live playing directly into a midi block.

---

Usage

ABC notation

```abc
T: Greensleeves
M: 3/4
L: 1/8
K: Em
E2|G3A B2|c3B A2|
```

The block renders notation and adds playback controls. Click any note to start playback from that position. Use the transpose buttons to shift pitch up or down by semitone.

Custom render options

Place a JSON object at the top, separated from the ABC body by ---. Any abcjs visual parameter is accepted. Invalid JSON shows an error banner but still renders the notation.

```abc
{"swing": 70}
---
X:1
T: It Don't Mean A Thing
M: 4/4
L: 1/8
K: _B
V:Guitar clef=treble
V:Bass clef=bass
[V:Guitar] _d_d z2 c2 _b,2| G4 z4 |
[V:Bass] _E,,4 D,,4|G,,4 z4 |
```

---

Strumming patterns

The block takes a JSON object. measures is an array of stroke tokens (see table below).

```strumming
{
    "part": "Verse",
    "bpm": 96,
    "denominator": 8,
    "isTriplet": false,
    "measures": [1, 101, 1, 101, 1, 101, 1, 101]
}
```

Use the speed slider to slow down the playback animation while learning a pattern.

Fields

Stroke tokens

---

Chord sheets

Enclose chord names in [brackets] inline with lyrics. Lines containing only a bracketed name are treated as section headers.

```chords
Am[x02210]
C[x32010]
G[320003]

[Verse 1]

[C] La luz de tu mirar[G], tu hermoso caminar
[Am] No existe nadie como [C]tú

[Chorus]

[C]En dondequiera que esté[G]s, ahí esta[Am]ré
```

Define custom voicings by appending a fret string directly to the chord name: Am[x02210].

While editing a chords block (source mode or Live Preview with the cursor inside it), chord names, section headers and brackets stay colour-coded.

Chord chips

Every chords block starts with a slim row of chips. Tap Guitar to show the guitar diagrams of every chord used in the block right below the row, and Piano for the piano diagrams; tap again to hide them. Both can be open at once. Custom voicings are honoured and, if the note's frontmatter has a key, each chord also shows its Roman numeral.

The − / + chips at the start of the row transpose the block by a semitone and write the result back to the note. This works in reading view and on mobile.

Lyrics translation

Translate the lyrics of a chord sheet into the language configured in settings (default: en). Each lyric line gets its translation inserted as a > -prefixed line directly below it:

```chords
[C] La luz de tu mirar[G], tu hermoso caminar
> The light of your gaze, your beautiful walk
[Am] No existe nadie como [C]tú
> There is no one like you
```

Two ways to run it:

• Ribbon button (Translate chord blocks in active note) — translates every chords block in the current note.
• Command palette (Translate chord blocks in all notes) — translates every chords block in the vault. Notes are edited directly; a notice shows progress. If the run stops on an error, run the command again to continue where it left off.

Translation uses Google Translate (internet connection required) with automatic source-language detection. Chord markers are stripped before translating, and section headers, chord-only lines, and custom voicing lines are skipped. Re-running is safe — existing translations are replaced, never duplicated.

The translation toggle (Aa) in the note header toggles translation visibility across all chord sheets without deleting anything; the choice persists across restarts. See Auto-scroll → Header controls.

Roman numeral analysis

Add a key property to the note's frontmatter and each chord diagram opened from the Guitar or Piano chip will show its Roman numeral:

---
key: C
---

With key: C, the diagram for Am is labelled VIm, G becomes V, and so on. Works with minor keys too (key: Am). If the chord cannot be resolved in the given key the label is omitted.

---

Chord progressions

Write progressions as Roman numerals or chord names — the block resolves the other direction automatically.

The first line must be the key (C, Am, F#, Bb, etc.).

Roman numerals → chord names:

```progression
C
I IIm V7 I
IVmaj7 V I
```

Chord names → Roman numerals:

```progression
Am
Am Dm E Am
F C E Am
```

Mixed rows — each line is interpreted independently, so you can freely mix both styles.

Tonal's convention: minor chords use uppercase + m suffix (IIm, VIm), borrowed chords use a flat prefix (bVII).

---

MIDI capture

Recording

1. Open a note in edit mode and place the cursor where you want the recording inserted.
2. Connect a MIDI keyboard.
3. Click Start MIDI capture — the icon changes to a stop square.
4. Play on your keyboard.
5. Click the button again to stop. A midi block is inserted at the cursor.

Playback

The midi block renders an inline player:

• ▶ / ■ — play or stop the recording
• time display — shows elapsed time and total duration
• ↓ — exports a Standard MIDI File (.mid) for use in a DAW or notation app
• device label — shows the MIDI output device being used, or built-in when falling back to Web Audio oscillator synthesis

If a MIDI output device is connected, playback is routed to it. The player automatically switches devices without needing to reload the note.

---

Auto-scroll

Toggle auto-scroll with the action button in the top-right corner of any note. Configure the scroll speed per note in frontmatter:

---
autoscroll-speed: 5
---

If omitted or invalid, the default speed of 5 is used.

When translation lines are visible in chord sheets, the scroll speed is automatically compensated for the extra height, so the song takes roughly the same time to scroll through.

Header controls

In reading view the note header (top-right) shows, left to right:

[Aa]  [−]  [+]  [⏵₅]

• Aa shows or hides chord-sheet translations (only when the chords package is enabled)
• − / + make scrolling slower or faster, one step at a time, effective immediately, also while scrolling
• ⏵ starts and stops auto-scroll; the small badge on it shows the current speed. It turns accent-colored when the speed differs from the note's configured value

Speed changes made via the header buttons are temporary: they last until another note is opened in that pane and are never written back to the frontmatter.

The header translation toggle changes the global setting, so it applies to every chord sheet.

---

Settings

Open Settings → Sheet Music to configure each package independently.

---

Installation

Install via the Obsidian community plugin browser (Settings → Community plugins → Browse → "Sheet Music"), or manually:

1. Download main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css from the latest release.
2. Copy them to <vault>/.obsidian/plugins/sheet-music/.
3. Enable the plugin in Settings → Community plugins.

---

Development

npm install       # install dependencies
npm run dev       # watch mode build
npm run build     # type-check + production build
npm test          # Jest test suite
npm run lint      # ESLint

Requirements: Node 18+, Obsidian 1.5.0+

References

• abcjs documentation
• Obsidian API