I am NOT a musician by any stretch of the imagination, but I am a Traditional Japanese Music Enthusiast. Never having a strong background in music was a plus in the beginning because native Japanese musical notation is significantly different than traditional 5-staff notation.

I only mention this because I originally purchased Notation Musician so that I could transcribe MP3 files of Koto music, etc that I could then try to reproduce(badly) on my Koto. In that respect Notation Musician was exactly what I was looking for. Unfortunately I do not recall the specific mechanism that lead me to Notation Musician. It was probably Yahoo or Google when I was looking for a way to turn an MP3 file into Sheet Music.

I purchased Notation Composer because I am branching out into another Japanese Instrument: the Kokyu. Unlike Koto, or Taiko, or Shamisen, etc. English language material for or on the Kokyu is virtually non-existent. I decided to run with the theory that since the Kokyu was replaced in the Traditional String Ensemble(Koto, Kokyu, Shamisen), by the Shakuhachi, I would try to play Shakuhachi music with my Kokyu.

Notation Composer is WONDERFUL for this because a) I am terrible at sight-reading music and Notation Composer(along with Music Theory for Dummies; sad but true) allows me to convert Shakuhachi music into a MIDI file so I can hear what it's supposed to sound like and b) Since many of the Koto pieces I have are scored for one or two Kotos and Shamisen and/or Shakuhachi, I can easily transcribe the parts I want or put them all together to hear what the entire composition would sound like. Very cool.