Tech: Sheet music manager for iPad

Subject: Tech: Sheet music manager for iPad
From: Tootler
Date: 12 Sep 13 - 01:22 PM

I'm looking for a sheet music manager for iPad. I have both song sheets in the form of lyrics with chords and tune sheets in standard musical notation. All are in PDF files.

From a hunt round the web, two seem to have consistently good reviews; On Song and Forscore.

If you have either or, even better, both of these, what are your views and how do they compare? What are the pros and cons of both?

Any others worth a mention?

Subject: RE: Tech: Sheet music manager for iPad
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 12 Sep 13 - 09:39 PM

For a relatively small fee you can get Apple's Pages, on which you can store word docs as well as PDFs., so it covers your lyric sheets as well as your sheet music. And you can edit too.

Subject: RE: Tech: Sheet music manager for iPad
From: Jim McLean
Date: 13 Sep 13 - 04:19 AM

I scan the music sheets and put them in the camera roll in Pictures. I can then play from the picture (on piano) and with a quick flick with my finger, move to the next page.

Subject: RE: Tech: Sheet music manager for iPad
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 13 Sep 13 - 07:06 AM

Jim's idea is great, or you could also try this: I put the PDF's in my Dropbox, then open them up on the iPad, go to full screen and if need be, expand them by reverse-pinching (whatever you call that movement) and then play away. As with Jim's method, you can swipe the page turns.

Sending PDF's to Dropbox is a great way to get all sorts of material to an iPad. If you tap the star button you can read everything offline. I do this with web pages I want to save there too. And both this and the above method are Freeeeeeee

Subject: RE: Tech: Sheet music manager for iPad
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 13 Sep 13 - 07:09 AM

PS You can Dropbox with JPG & other image files too.

Subject: RE: Tech: Sheet music manager for iPad
From: Sir Roger de Beverley
Date: 13 Sep 13 - 10:45 AM

My musical partner uses onsong and it seems to be very easy to set up and operate. As far as I can see two features that are useful are the transposition tool and the scrolling that can be set so that the music moves up the page in time with the song.

R

Subject: RE: Tech: Sheet music manager for iPad
From: Tootler
Date: 13 Sep 13 - 05:26 PM

I use Dropbox to transfer my music sheets to the iPad and, at the moment, I transfer them to a standard PDF reader to actually read them.

I was wondering if the likes of on song or forscore enable you to index the files and organise them in sets on the fly. That would be particularly useful for ceilidhs if we need to vary our standard sets for any reason.

Subject: RE: Tech: Sheet music manager for iPad
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 14 Sep 13 - 01:17 AM

I have ForScore, although I've not done a lot with it yet. It does seem to work well and does have the option of creating and editing set lists easily. I can't remember how much it cost (and the cost doesn't show for me now since I already have it), but it was a reasonable amount for the quality of the product, I think.

~ Becky in Long Beach

Subject: RE: Tech: Sheet music manager for iPad
From: Tootler
Date: 15 Sep 13 - 01:42 PM

I've downloaded Forscore, though I've not yet put anything in it. I'll give it a try and if it doesn't suit I can try On Score. Forscore is the cheaper of the two but neither is particularly expensive.

Subject: RE: Tech: Sheet music manager for iPad
From: GUEST,NjDave
Date: 13 Sep 14 - 11:56 PM

ForScore is the way to go. I am a church Musician and a local cafe performer. Now that I have ForScore I can only tell you I am enjoying my music more than ever. I am now very organized , I have all my music in my iPad . I feel like I am ready to go. No more music books. I can get to any song at a moments notice. Annotating is very easy. If you have a question, ForScore tech is available . They do respond quickly. Can't say enough. You will love it!

Subject: RE: Tech: Sheet music manager for iPad
From: CupOfTea
Date: 16 Aug 16 - 08:26 AM

A band mate who has been incredibly helpful and knowledgeable about iPad functions turned me on to ForScore. I had been using iBooks as a repository of PDF versions of a variety of tune books I'd found online. I had even put together one with the whole repertoire of the contra dance band we're both in. Another person had done extensive bit of work, purring in links on his PDF version, but I found it impractical and annoying because he'd put in multiple test versions of sets along with the one we'd settled on & mixed in other sections alphabetically ... All of which took away from the usability factor.
I have also been using an ABC file app called "the Craic" for obtaining, learning and sharing tunes for about a year. Spent hours transcribing tunes from hard to read hand notations.

My personal lyric/chord fakebook (8th edition) with 250+ songs went in iBooks. Having the fakebook and band music on iPad was gloriously liberating....but ...couldn't highlight or make notes on how I need to play a tune, change chords, edit words. ForScore seems to solve this problem- highlighting, annotating, even erasing the PDFs entered is possible. Nancy, who got me started with this app, was able to send me a file with a all the work she'd done in creating bookmarks (to get to a particular tune) for one of the books we use.

The advantages of this app are just starting to sink in, particularly for use in a band situation. Creating a set list for a dance or concert, so you needn't look up each piece each time, can be done in advance AND shared among the band, so yer literally on the same page. I am still a beginner with this app, and am far from tapping most of the other cool functions. I would love to hear from others who've been using ForScore or otherwise using an iPad instead of hauling big binders when you play.

Joanne in Cleveland