MusEdit does Midi playback of your score based on the musical notation, so if there are errors in the notation Midi playback might not sound the way you would have expected.  Here are some of the most common sources of playback problems:

Notation Errors

Accidentals, ties, dots, and slides entered at wrong location

    These symbols need to be precisely associated with the note they affect, so they must be entered at the same vertical location as the note they are modifying.

    Other symbols which affect the sound or duration of a note, such as bend, staccato, fermata, and accents, affect the whole chord, not just a single note in the chord, so they can be placed at any vertical position rather than at a specific note's exact vertical position.

Midi Playback Timing Errors

    Because MusEdit is very flexible about allowing you to enter notes of any time value in a measure, this can result in a notation error which might cause a sudden speeding up of the tempo during Midi playback.  This is usually caused by a timing mismatch between lines of music in a line group or in a single line of music with multiple voices.  For example, a line group with two treble lines might have an extra 16th note's worth of time in a measure in one line, but not in the corresponding measure in the other line.  This can cause MusEdit to "steal" a 16th note of time from the next measure in the second line or voice to try and make things match up, but this will then cause some notes to come up short at the end of the measure.   This error can keep propagating to following measures with the effect of speeding things up due to the confusion from the extra or missing 16th notes.  Many of the following notation errors can result in this kind of effect... 

"Dot" on dotted note in the wrong location

     The "dot" on dotted notes must be entered on the same vertical staff position as the note being dotted, otherwise it will not extend the duration of the dotted note.  This can result in a timing mismatch, especially in a line group.

Rest Problems

Missing rest

    When there are two voices in a single staff it is very important to make sure the timing in both voices match up by inserting rests where they are needed.

Incorrect rest

    In this example the pair of notes in the upper voice add up to a dotted 8th, but in the lower voice they initially added up to two full 8th notes.  

Rest in wrong location

    In general, the rests in multi-voice music or line groups have to line up the same way notes of the same duration would have to line up.  The only exception is when the only rest in a measure is a whole rest: a whole rest can be put in the middle of the measure even if notes in the other staff lines are located at the start of their measures. 

Triplet Problems

    Three 8th notes normally will have a total time of 1/8 + 1/8 + 1/8 = 3/8.  But when the 8th notes are affected by a triplet bracket the three 8th notes add up to 1/4 instead.  Each 8th note has a duration of 1/12 in this case ( 1/12 + 1/12 + 1/12 = 3/12 = 1/4 ).  If the triplet bracket only affects two of the three notes, and the remaining note is "untripletized" the total time of the combination will be   1/12 + 1/12 + 1/8 = 7/24 instead of 6/24 (1/4).  That is 1/24 longer than it should be, and that will very likely lead to timing problems.  That is why it is important to make sure triplets are notated correctly.  Here are some examples of common errors with triplet notation:

Triplet in wrong location

    Although MusEdit does allow some flexibility, the ends of the triplet bracket should encompass the notes to be tripletized.

Triplet too short

    Similar to the problem above.  Make sure the triplet is long enough to reach over all three notes (or more in the case of a tuplet).

Triplet For Down Notes Above Staff (and vice versa)

  or  

    If there are two voices represented by upstem and downstem notes at the same location, an up-pointing triplet bracket below the staff will only tripletize the downstem notes, and a down-pointing triplet bracket above the staff will only tripletize the upstem notes.  Therefore, in the first example above, the triplet bracket will cause the quarter note to have a timing value of 2/3 * 1/4 = 1/6, while the 8th notes will have a timing value of 1/8 + 1/8 + 1/8 = 3/8.  That will cause confusion during Midi playback... 

Triplet sometimes need to include rest

    Even though triplets usually apply to notes, sometimes they are applied to rests too.  In the example shown here, if the triplet is supposed to include the rest, but it just brackets the two notes, the rest will not be tripletized, and that will probably lead to Midi playback timing problems.

Line Group Problems

Misaligned music

During playback MusEdit plays all vertically aligned notes at the same time, then it moves on to the next note or stack of notes.  For this reason it is important for notes which should be played together to be in proper alignment.  In the misaligned example to the left, MusEdit will first play a treble note, then when it is finished it will play a tab note, then a treble note, etc.  In the second example the treble and Tab notes are lined up properly, so they will be played together, as they should. 

Unmatched triplets

Sometimes a triplet will be inserted in one line of a group, but it will accidentally be left off one or more of the other lines.  This will cause the notes in one line to take up, say, 1/4 note's worth of time, while the notes in the other line will take up 3/8.  This will lead to a timing mismatch...