I struggle to get LilyPond running on MacOS - is it easier on Linux? It would be great for us but my mates all use Windows or MacOS, so we resort to graphical notation programs, where version control and portability is hard
The problem I've always had with the language is that it's quite arcane and if you want to do anything weird (like, a tie to nowhere) you're either at the mercy of somebody else having solved the problem first, or failing that, a huge learning curve. It's a lot like latex in that way. That said, if you just need to do simple stuff, the language almost magically gets out of your way.
It has a `lilypond` formula that has worked fine for me. Beware though that it installs some kind of TeX repository sized 7 GB.
Sorry I can't be of more help immediately!