1. What is SwaraSheet?

SwaraSheet is a real-time music notation tool for musicians of all levels. Capture notes from a MIDI keyboard, the on-screen piano, or your computer keyboard — and instantly get notation in Western (C D E F), Indian Sargam (Sa Ri Ga Ma), or Carnatic format. Add chords, section labels, metronome, and export clean PDFs. Available as a web app and a desktop app (Mac/Windows).

2. Three Ways to Input Notes

A. MIDI Keyboard
Connect via USB → click 🔌 Connect (top right) → allow MIDI access → status dot turns green.
⚠️ MIDI requires Chrome or Edge. Firefox and Safari are not supported.

B. On-Screen Piano (🎹 Keys)
Click the 🎹 Keys button to toggle the on-screen piano. Shows 3 octaves (C3–B5). Click any key — the note is added and you hear it play instantly.

C. Computer Keyboard Piano (⌨ KB Piano) — NEW
Click ⌨ KB Piano to turn your QWERTY keyboard into a piano. The octave bar appears below the action buttons showing your current octave.

Z X C V B N M	White keys — C D E F G A B (one octave below base)
S D   G H J	Black keys — C# D#   F# G# A# (one octave below base)
Q W E R T Y U	White keys — C D E F G A B (base octave)
2 3   5 6 7	Black keys — C# D#   F# G# A# (base octave)
I O P	C D E (one octave above base)
−   /   =	Shift base octave down / up (range: 2–6)

Sound plays on every keypress. On-screen piano key flashes. Use − / = keys or the − + buttons in the octave bar to shift octave.

3. Notation Formats

Choose your format from the buttons in the Controls section:

Letter	C D E F G A B C#
With Octave	C4 D4 E4 F4 (includes octave number)
Indian Sargam	Sa Ri Ga Ma Pa Da Ni
Carnatic	S R1 R2 G1 G2 G3 M1 M2 P D1 D2 N3…
Dash	C-D-E-F (hyphen separated)

Switch format any time — all notes automatically re-convert.

4. Octave Indicators (Prime Marks)

SwaraSheet uses prime marks — the traditional Indian music notation standard — to show which octave a note belongs to:

Middle octave	Sa   Re   Ga   (no mark)
High (Tara)	Sa′   Re′   Ga′   (blue ′ above)
Very high	Sa′′   Re′′   (double prime)
Low (Mandra)	Sa,   Re,   Ga,   (amber , below)
Very low	Sa,,   Re,,   (double comma)

These marks appear in both the app and PDF export — consistent with Indian classical music textbooks.

5. Indian / Carnatic Settings

Sa (Root note): Select which key is Sa — C, C#, D… up to B. All Indian/Carnatic note names shift accordingly.

Carnatic Variants: For ambiguous pitches, choose between:
 • D → R2 or G1    D# → R3 or G2
 • A → D2 or N1    A# → D3 or N2

6. Recording Notes

Play your MIDI keyboard, click the on-screen piano, or use KB Piano — notes appear instantly in the sequence box.

⏸ Pause / ▶ Resume: Temporarily stop recording so input is ignored.

Separator: Choose Space, Comma, Dash, or New Line between notes.

Double-click any note to enter edit/replace mode — then play a note from any input method to substitute it.

7. Editing Notes

Delete last note: Press Delete / Backspace, or click ↩ Undo.
Delete any note: Right-click the note → removed instantly.
Undo: Cmd+Z (Mac) or Ctrl+Z (Windows).
Redo: Cmd+Shift+Z (Mac) or Ctrl+Y (Windows).
Font size: Use A− / A+ or type a number directly.
New line: Press Enter.
Bar line ( | ): Press Space or click ⎵ Bar.

Transpose: Use ▼−2 ▼−1 ▲+1 ▲+2 buttons to shift all notes up or down by semitones. Chords transpose automatically. Shortcut: Cmd+↑/↓.

8. Section Labels

Click § Section to open the label panel.

Indian: Pallavi, Anupallavi, Charanam, Sthayi, Antara, Sanchari
Western: Intro, Verse, Chorus, Bridge, Outro
Repeat markers: ↺ Repeat, ×2, ×3 — appear inline on the same line as notes

Type a custom label and click + Add for anything not listed.

9. Chords

Switch to 🎸 Chord mode and hold keys on the MIDI keyboard — the detected chord appears in the "Detected" display.

Click ↑ Apply to attach it to the last note, or click any note's chord label (orange, above the note) to edit or assign a chord directly.

Right-click a chord label to clear it. Chords appear above notes in the sequence and in the PDF.

10. Metronome

Open the Metronome section in the Controls panel.

Set BPM (40–200) and time signature (2/4, 3/4, 4/4, 5/4, 6/8, 7/8). Click ▶ Start — the status dot pulses on each beat and accents beat 1. The BPM is saved with your cloud templates.

11. Copy, Export & Share

📋 Copy All: Copies all notes as plain text — includes chords, octave marks, section labels, bar lines. Paste into WhatsApp, Word, Notes, etc.

📋 per line: Each line has a copy icon — copies just that line.

📱 Share: Formats notes with WhatsApp bold/italic markdown for clean display in chat.

📄 Export PDF: Opens a modal — enter song title, Raag, Taal, choose whether to include chords and section labels, then click Export. Generates a formatted note sheet with academy header and watermark. Voice recorder controls are hidden in the PDF output.

12. Saving & Loading Sessions (Local)

💾 Save: Type a song title then click Save — stores notes, format, Sa, chords in browser/local storage. Same title overwrites the existing entry.

▶ Load: Loads a saved session. Edits after loading don't affect the saved copy unless you save again.

✦ New Song: Saves current notes to history, then starts a fresh session.

🗑 Discard: Discards all current notes without saving to history.

⬇ Download: Saves a .swarasheet file to your computer — use to back up or share.
⬆ Import: Load a .swarasheet file back — works on any device.

Search: Type in the search box to find a saved session by name.

🗑 Bin: Deleted sessions go to Bin first. Click ↩ Restore to recover, or 🗑 to permanently delete.

13. ☁ Cloud Templates — NEW

Click ☁ Cloud to open the Cloud panel. Sign in with your Google account (web) — the desktop app signs in automatically.

Save to Cloud: Type a song title in the title box, then click ☁ Cloud → Save. Saves notes, format, Sa, and BPM to the cloud. The title is used as the template ID — saving the same title overwrites.

Load from Cloud: Your saved templates appear in the list — click Load to restore a template. Notes, format, Sa, and BPM are all restored.

Delete: Click 🗑 next to any template to remove it from the cloud.

Cloud uses Firebase Firestore (free tier). Templates are private to your account. Works across web and desktop — save on one, load on the other.

14. Voice Recorder 🎤

Click 🎤 Sing to open the voice recorder panel. Record yourself singing or humming a melody and save the audio clip alongside your note sheet.

Record / Stop: Click the record button to start and stop recording.
Play: Listen back to your recording.
Save: Give the clip a name and save it — appears in the recordings list below.
Delete: Remove any saved clip.

Voice recorder and audio controls are automatically hidden when exporting PDF — they do not appear in printed output.

Keyboard Shortcuts

Sargam shortcut keys (S R G M P D N) and KB Piano mode are mutually exclusive — KB Piano must be active for the full chromatic keyboard layout to work.