Originally Posted by Warren P
Musescore is notation software. Its purpose with having an ability to play your song is like print preview in a word processor. By playing you find wrong notes and missed accidentals.

Its purpose is to produce a score. Not a performance.
The most recent versions of MuseScore are capable of producing a very good performance - especially when using the instruments that are supplied with it.

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If you want to refine your composition to a fine degree or play with realistic expressions you need to just export the midi out of musescore and load it into reaper and then you can use a really good kontakt library with orchestral instruments including strings and articulations.
This is no longer the case. The same company that owns MuseScore owns StaffPad. The instruments have been ported from StaffPad to MuseScore, and access to the different articulations are accessible directly from MuseScore notation.

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If you are not a musician who plays and reads from sheet music, I wonder why you use a certain old version of musescore, or any notation program, at all. Maximum work for mininum reward? Yes you can find more soundfonts but you would be so much better off moving to reaper. Or cakewalk.
If you are a composer who reads music notation, MuseScore allows you to input a music using music notation, and get playback. The most recent version supports VST3 instruments as well.

However, as the OP noted, it doesn't seem to support dynamics for .sfz instruments that well. I know that better integration with .VST instruments is on the way, but doesn't seem to be there quite yet.

For example, I just created a score in MuseScore, with a whole note tied across the bars and a hairpin underneath. It started at ppp and ended with ppp. For the sound, I chose VST3|Plogue Art et Technology|sforzando, which is a .sfz player. I chose various .sfz - some from Garritan libraries I owned, and others from free SoundFonts I'd acquired.

For some of the instruments, I didn't get any sound playback. Others seemed to work fairly smoothly, while still others I could hear a distinct "stepping" sound at fff - about 8 steps per bar. So hairpin support for .sfz instruments was uneven.

On the other hand, choosing the built-in sounds (SoundFonts|MS Basic or Muse Sounds) gave good results.

The question I have is: What instruments can't you find in the supplied MuseScore library? It's got good coverage of the orchestral instruments and most of the basic keys (piano, organ, celesta, harpsichord, electric pianos) and guitars (nylon, steel string, electric, bass).

-- David Cuny
My virtual singer development blog

Vocal control, you say. Never heard of it. Is that some kind of ProTools thing?