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BACKGROUND & HISTORY
Origins: Igor Engraver

FrankenScore's roots trace back to Igor Engraver, a pioneering music notation software developed from 1996 to 2001. Led by Peter Bengtson and a team of 12, Igor Engraver represented a significant investment of $7.5 million USD (adjusted for inflation in 2024) and pushed the boundaries of music notation technology.
Key aspects of Igor Engraver:
Despite its innovations, Igor Engraver faced challenges:
These factors ultimately led to the discontinuation of the project.
Key aspects of Igor Engraver:
- Built entirely in Common Lisp
- Named after composer Igor Stravinsky, with a playful nod to Igor from "Young Frankenstein"
- Offered advanced features for music notation and engraving
- Known for its intuitive and fast input method, mirroring how musicians work with pen and paper
- Extremely naturalistic MIDI playback with humanisation features based on scientific research
Despite its innovations, Igor Engraver faced challenges:
- Management-imposed feature creep
- Venture capital policies
- Economic impact of the 9/11 attacks, which halted mergers and acquisitions worldwide
These factors ultimately led to the discontinuation of the project.
The Birth of FrankenScore
FrankenScore represents a modern revival and evolution of the ideas behind Igor Engraver. While it shares no code with its predecessor, it inherits many of the underlying concepts and goals.
Key differences and improvements:
Key differences and improvements:
- Built using modern technologies: Clojure for backend, Skia for rendering, and gRPC for data querying
- Massively multi-threaded, compared to Igor Engraver's single-threaded architecture
- Open-source core with optional paid plugins, ensuring a sustainable development model
- Emphasis on modularity and scalability
Name & Symbolism
The name "FrankenScore" is a deliberate reference to Igor Engraver:
- It evokes the idea of assembling a powerful, flexible system from various components
- Pays homage to the "Young Frankenstein" connection of Igor Engraver
- Signals a new direction while acknowledging the legacy of its predecessor
Next: Project Goals
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FrankenScore is a modern, open-source music notation software designed to handle complex musical scores with ease. It is designed to be a flexible and powerful music notation software tool providing professional, extremely high-quality results. The core functionality includes inputting music notation, formatting scores and their parts, and printing them. Additional features can be added as plugins, allowing for a modular and customizable user experience.
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