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How to organize sheet music....suggestions, please!


Nancy Lawing

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I don't have an I-pad.  I do have a large piece of cardboard on my music stand to clip several sheets to so I can see all the pages at once.  But what do I do with those sheets to store them?  Starting to get a lot......my husband uses a porta-file with 26 spaces but the music sags and curls up.

Any suggestions?  Thanks......

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Sounds like you're still going to have to use binders

And decide if to organize them by alphabetically or by subject.

My church binder is sorted in groups alphabetically.  Season Easter has all the Easter songs, Same for Christmas, etc

But I use both a Samsung Android tablet running Mobile Sheets ($15 app)

And I have a new iPad Pro running ForeScore music app

(I do use my tablets for practice but their primary function is for gig's)

Edited by Eracer_Team-DougH
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Nancy, I like my paper music, but it takes effort to keep the paper controlled. I keep songs that I’m actively working on grouped in letter trays on desk space around the music stand. Other songs go into loose leaf binders. I have only a few pieces of 9x12 sheet music, and I keep these with my song books in magazine holders. Music stand extenders like this give you more real estate.

I have friends who swear by their paperless systems on their tablets, with foot switches for page turning. Nice for performing. But my music stand iPad is devoted to logging practice, watching Steve’s lessons (via Dropbox), and playing along with YouTube. I need to be able to write directly on the page of the music as I’m working, and for this I prefer paper and pencil.

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Hello Nancy,

I used to keep my music in ring binder folders, at first punching holes in the sheet music and then I moved to using inserts which unpunched sheet music can be put in and kept without curling the corners.

image.jpeg.0420c0c3b08fe452ff712603f1e02383.jpeg

I now use an iPad and as Diane says above, I am one of those that cannot imagine being without it. I am not suggesting you go down that path but if you did ever wonder whether that would be a route to consider, have a look at the conversation a few of us had a while ago, here.

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Thank you so much Doug, Diane and "Fretless".....all very helpful and I'm ready to do some shopping and organizing now.  The iPad video was interesting, and I'd been curious about how effective they are at storing music....thanks.  I may go that route one day!

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