Guitar Pro is a multitrack editor of

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected string ...

and

bass Bass or Basses may refer to: Fish * Bass (fish), various saltwater and freshwater species Music * Bass (sound), describing low-frequency sound or one of several instruments in the bass range: ** Bass (instrument), including: ** Acoustic bass gui ...

tablature Tablature (or tabulature, or tab for short) is a form of musical notation indicating instrument fingering rather than musical pitches. Tablature is common for fretted stringed instruments such as the guitar, lute or vihuela, as well as many fr ...

and musical scores, possessing a built-in

MIDI MIDI (; Musical Instrument Digital Interface) is a technical standard that describes a communications protocol, digital interface, and electrical connectors that connect a wide variety of electronic musical instruments, computers, and ...

-editor, a plotter of chords, a player, a

metronome A metronome, from ancient Greek μέτρον (''métron'', "measure") and νομός (nomós, "custom", "melody") is a device that produces an audible click or other sound at a regular interval that can be set by the user, typically in beats pe ...

and other tools for musicians. It has versions for

Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for se ...

and

Mac OS X macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and lap ...

(Intel processors only) and is written by the French company Arobas Music.

History

There have been six popular public major releases of the software: versions 3–8. Guitar Pro was initially designed as a tablature editor, but has since evolved into a full-fledged score writer including support for many musical instruments other than guitar. Until it reached version 4, the software was only available for

Microsoft Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for ...

. Later, Guitar Pro 5 (released November 2005) undertook a year-long porting effort and Guitar Pro 5 for the

was released in July 2006. On April 5, 2010, Guitar Pro 6, a completely redesigned version, was released. This version also supports

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, whi ...

, with 32-bit

Ubuntu Ubuntu ( ) is a Linux distribution based on Debian and composed mostly of free and open-source software. Ubuntu is officially released in three editions: '' Desktop'', ''Server'', and ''Core'' for Internet of things devices and robots. All ...

being the officially supported distribution. On February 6, 2011, the first ever portable release of Guitar Pro (version 6) was made available on the App Store for support with the iPhone,

iPod Touch The iPod Touch (stylized as iPod touch) is a discontinued line of iOS-based mobile devices designed and marketed by Apple Inc. with a touchscreen-controlled user interface. As with other iPod models, the iPod Touch can be used as a musi ...

, and

iPad The iPad is a brand of iOS and iPadOS-based tablet computers that are developed by Apple Inc., Apple Inc. The iPad was conceived before the related iPhone but the iPhone was developed and released first. Speculation about the development, ...

running iOS 3.0 or later. An Android version was released on December 17, 2014. In 2011, a version was made to work with the Fretlight guitar called Guitar Pro 6 Fretlight Ready. The tablature notes being played in Guitar Pro 6 Fretlight Ready show up on the Fretlight guitar's LEDs which are encased within the guitar's fretboard to teach you the song. In April 2017, Guitar Pro 7 was officially released with new features and dropped Linux support. In May 2022, Guitar Pro 8 was released. It came with a lot of new features, the most significant of which was the support of Macs with

Apple Silicon Apple silicon is a series of system on a chip (SoC) and system in a package (SiP) processors designed by Apple Inc., mainly using the ARM architecture. It is the basis of most new Mac computers as well as iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, Apple TV, ...

Background

The software makes use of multiple instrument tracks which follow standard staff notation, but also shows the

notes Note, notes, or NOTE may refer to: Music and entertainment * Musical note, a pitched sound (or a symbol for a sound) in music * ''Notes'' (album), a 1987 album by Paul Bley and Paul Motian * ''Notes'', a common (yet unofficial) shortened versio ...

on tablature notation. It gives the musician visual access to keys (

banjo The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and usually made of plastic, or occasionally animal skin. Early forms of the instrument were fashi ...

s, drumkits, etc.) for the song to be composed, and allows live previews of the notes to be played at a specified

tempo In musical terminology, tempo ( Italian, 'time'; plural ''tempos'', or ''tempi'' from the Italian plural) is the speed or pace of a given piece. In classical music, tempo is typically indicated with an instruction at the start of a piece (ofte ...

. It allows for certain tracks to be muted and provides dynamic control over the volume, phasing and other aspects of each track. Included in version 4 onwards is a virtual keyboard that allows pianists to add their part to a composition. Guitar Pro outputs sound by means of a library and/or, as of version 5, the "" (RSE) which uses high quality recorded samples for a more realistic playback. By using its live preview feature musicians may play along with the song, following the tablature played in real time. Files composed using Guitar Pro are recorded in the GP, GPX, GP5, GP4 and GP3 format, corresponding to versions 7, 6, 5, 4, and 3 of the software. These file formats lack forward compatibility, and opening them in an older version of Guitar Pro prompts the user to upgrade their software to the respective version. The distribution of these files was widely carried out on the Internet, being produced by fans often by ear, and included songs both of underground and mainstream artists. The main hub for Guitar Pro tabs was (and still is) the Arobas-owned mySongBook. However, the Music Publishers Association (MPA), claiming to represent sheet music companies, raised copyright issues and pressured websites offering the files to cease distribution. This included then-president Lauren Keiser threatening jail time for those involved. Subsequently, distribution became much more dispersed, and mySongBook itself was forced to follow much stricter practices.

References

{{Scorewriters Guitar-related software Cross-platform software Scorewriters 1997 software Software that uses Qt

History

Background

See also

References