Sheet music is written representation of music. This is an arrangement of a traditional piece entitled Adeste Fideles.

For other uses, see Sheet music (disambiguation).

Sheet music is a hand-written or printed form of musical notation; like its analogs -- books, pamphlets, etc. -- the medium of sheet music typically is paper (or, in earlier times, parchment). Screenshot of Lilypond-generated score for Adeste Fideles. ... Screenshot of Lilypond-generated score for Adeste Fideles. ... Adeste Fideles or O Come All Ye Faithful is a Christmas carol commonly attributed to John Francis Wade in approximately 1743. ... Music notation is a system of writing for music. ...

A common synonym for sheet music is score, and there are several types of scores, as discussed below. (Note: the term score can also refer to incidental music written for a play, television programme, or film; for the last of these, see film score.) Incidental music is music in a play, television program, radio program or some other form not primarily musical. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... Film refers to the celluloid media on which movies are printed. ... A film score is the background music in a film, generally specially written for the film and often used to heighten emotions provoked by the imagery on the screen or by the dialogue. ...

Purpose and use

Sheet music can be used a record of, a guide to, or a means to perform, a piece of music. Although it does not take the place of the sound of a performed work, sheet music can be studied to create a performance and to elucidate aspects of the music that may not be obvious from mere listening. Authoritative musical information about a piece can be gained by studying the written sketches and early versions of compositions that the composer might have retained, as well as the final autograph score and personal markings on proofs and printed scores. To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article may require cleanup. ...

As with literature, one must be able to read musical notation in order to make use of sheet music. The skill of sight reading is the ability of a musician to perform an unfamiliar work of music upon viewing the sheet music for the first time. Sight reading ability is expected of professional musicians and serious amateurs who play classical music and related forms. An even more refined skill is the ability to look at a new piece of music and hear most or all of the sounds (melodies, harmonies, timbres, etc.) in one's head without having to play the piece. Literature is literally acquaintance with letters as in the first sense given in the Oxford English Dictionary (from the Latin littera meaning an individual written character (letter)). The term has generally come to identify a collection of texts, which in Western culture are mainly prose, both fiction and non-fiction... Music notation is a system of writing for music. ... Sight reading is reading and performing a work of music without having seen it before. ... Look up melody in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Harmony is the use and study of pitch simultaneity and chords, actual or implied, in music. ... In music, timbre, also timber, (French, IPA /tæmbər/ as in the first two syllables of tambourine) is the quality of a musical note or sound which distinguishes different types of sound production or musical instruments. ...

With the exception of solo performances, where memorization is expected, classical musicians ordinarily have the sheet music at hand when performing. Even in jazz music, which is mostly improvised, sheet music is used to give basic indications of melodies, chord changes, and arrangements. Jazz is an original American musical art form originating around the early 1920s in New Orleans, rooted in Western music technique and theory, and is marked by the profound cultural contributions of African Americans. ... Improvisation is the act of making something up as it is performed. ... Look up melody in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... The examples and perspective in this article or section may not represent a worldwide view. ... In popular music an arrangement is a setting of a piece of music, which may have been composed by the arranger or by someone else. ...

Sheet music is less important in other kinds of music, however. Although much popular music is published in notation of some sort, it is quite common for people to learn a piece by ear. This is also the case in most forms of western folk music, where songs and dances are passed down by oral -- and aural -- tradition. Music of other cultures, both folk and classical, is often transmitted orally, though some non-western cultures developed their own forms of musical notation and sheet music as well. Popular music is music belonging to any of a number of musical styles that are accessible to the general public and mostly distributed commercially. ... Learning music by ear is done by repeatedly listening to other musicians and then attempting to recreate what one hears. ... Folk Music, in the original sense of the term, is music by and of the common people. ... A song is a relatively short musical composition for the human voice (possibly accompanied by other musical instruments), which features words (lyrics). ... Dance as a musical form is a smaller musical composition intended for the presentation of dance. ... Music notation is a system of writing for music. ...

Although sheet music is often thought of as being a platform for new music and an aid to composition (i.e., the composer writes the music down), it can also serve as a visual record of music that already exists. Scholars and others have made transcriptions of western and non-western musics so as to render them in readable form for study, analysis, and recreative performance. This has been done not only with folk or traditional music (e.g., Bartók's volumes of Magyar and Romanian folk music), but also with sound recordings of improvisations by musicians (e.g., jazz piano) and performances that may only partially be based on notation. An exhaustive example of the latter in recent times is the collection The Beatles: Complete Scores (London: Wise Publications, c1993), which seeks to transcribe into staves and tablature all the songs as recorded by the Beatles in instrumental and vocal detail. Béla Bartók in 1927 Béla Viktor János Bartók (March 25, 1881 – September 26, 1945) was a Hungarian composer, pianist and collector of Eastern European and Middle Eastern folk music. ... Magyars are an ethnic group primarily associated with Hungary. ... In musical notation, the staff or stave is a set of five horizontal lines on which note symbols are placed to indicate pitch and rhythm. ... Tablature is a form of musical notation which tells the player where to place their fingers on a particular instrument rather than which pitches to play. ... The Beatles were a pop and rock music group from Liverpool, England, who continue to be held in the very highest regard for their artistic achievements, their huge commercial success, and their groundbreaking role in the history of popular music. ...

Types of sheet music

Modern sheet music may come in several different formats. If a piece is composed for just one instrument or voice (for example, a piano or an a cappella song), the whole work will be written or printed in its own sheet music. If an instrumental piece is intended to be performed by more than one person, each performer will usually have a separate piece of sheet music, called a part, to play from. The sung part(s) in a vocal work usually are not issued separately today, although this was historically the case, especially before the advent of music printing. A grand piano A piano is a musical instrument that is classified as a keyboard, percussion, or string instrument, depending on the system of classification used. ... A cappella music is vocal music or singing without instrumental accompaniment, or a piece intended to be performed in this way. ... A song is a relatively short musical composition for the human voice (possibly accompanied by other musical instruments), which features words (lyrics). ...

When the separate instrumental and vocal parts of a musical work are printed together, the resulting sheet music is called a score. This term has also been used to refer to sheet music written for only one instrument or voice. The distinction between score and part applies when there is more than one part needed for performance. Scores come in various formats, as follows:

A conductor's score

• A full score is a large book showing the music of all instruments and voices in a composition, lined up in a fixed order. It is large enough for a conductor to be able to read while directing rehearsals and performances.
• A miniature score is like a full score, but much reduced in size. It is too small for practical use, but handy for studying a piece of music, whether it be for large ensemble or solo performer. A miniature score may have some introductory remarks.
• A study score is sometimes the same size as, and often indistinguishable from, a miniature score, except in name. Some study scores are octavo size, thus somewhere between full and miniature score sizes. A study score, especially if it is part of an anthology for academic study, may include extra comments about the music and markings for learning purposes.
• A piano score (or piano reduction) is a more or less literal transcription for piano of a piece intended for many performing parts, especially orchestral works; this can include purely instrumental sections within large vocal works (see vocal score immediately below). Such arrangements are made for piano solo (two hands) or piano duet (one or two pianos, four hands). Extra small staves are sometimes added at certain points in piano scores for two hands in order to make the presentation more complete, even though it is usually impractical or impossible to include them while playing. As with vocal score immediately below, it takes considerable skill to reduce an orchestral score to such smaller forces. Sometimes markings are included to show which instruments are playing at given points. While piano scores are usually not meant for performance outside of study and pleasure, ballets benefit most from piano scores, because of their practicality in allowing unlimited rehearsal before the orchestra is absolutely needed. Piano scores of operas do not include separate lines for the vocal parts, but may add the sung text above the music.

Excerpt of a piano-vocal score (from the opera William Ratcliff, by César Cui).

• A vocal score (or, more properly, piano-vocal score) is a reduction of the full score of a vocal work (e.g., opera, musical, oratorio, cantata, etc.) to show the vocal parts (solo and choral) on their staves and the orchestral parts in a piano reduction (usually for two hands) underneath the vocal parts; the purely orchestral sections of the score are also reduced for piano. If a portion of the work is a cappella, a piano reduction of the vocal parts is often added to aid in rehearsal. While not meant for performance, vocal scores serve as a convenient way for vocal soloists and choristers to learn the music and rehearse separately from the instrumental ensemble. The vocal score of a musical typically does not include the spoken dialogue, except for cues.
  • The related but less common choral score contains only the vocal parts.
• A short score is a reduction of a work for many instruments to just a few staves. Rather than composing directly in full score, many composers work out some type of short score while they are composing and later expand the complete orchestration. (An opera, for instance, may be written first in a short score, then in full score, then reduced to a vocal score for rehearsal.) Short scores are usually not published; they may be more common for some performance venues (e.g., band) than in others.
• A lead sheet, also known as "fake" music, gives the least information of the types of score listed above. Almost exclusively limited to vocal music, it indicates the melody and lyrics, but usually shows the harmony only by placing indications of the underlying chords above the melody. Thus, in effect it is an enhanced vocal part rather than a detailed representation of the piece. It is commonly used in popular music and jazz. A collection of fake sheets is known as a fake book.

Download high resolution version (1557x927, 153 KB) File links The following pages link to this file: Sheet music Conducting Categories: GFDL images ... Download high resolution version (1557x927, 153 KB) File links The following pages link to this file: Sheet music Conducting Categories: GFDL images ... See Conductor for other possible uses of the word. ... Octavo has more than one meaning: Octavo is a bookbinding term for a sheet printed to form eight pages of a book when folded, and also a particular size of book. ... In music, transcription is the act of notating a piece or a sound which was previously unnotated. ... Duet may refer to: Duet, musical form Duet, Fox sitcom This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... William Ratcliff (Вилльям Ратклифф or Вильям Ратклиф in Cyrillic; Villjam Ratkliff or Viljam Ratklif in transliteration) is an opera in three acts, composed by César... César Antonovitch Cui (Russian: Цезарь Антонович Кюи) (January 6/18, 1835 – March 13, 1918) was a Russian composer and music critic of French and Lithuanian descent. ... Sydney Opera House: one of the worlds most recognizable opera houses and landmarks Opera refers to a dramatic art form, originating in Europe, in which the emotional content or primary entertainment is conveyed to the audience as much through music, both vocal and instrumental, as it is through the... Musical theatre (sometimes spelled theater) is a form of theatre combining music, songs, dance, and spoken dialogue. ... An oratorio is a large musical composition for orchestra, vocal soloists and chorus. ... Cantata (Italian for a song or story set to music), a vocal composition accompanied by instruments and generally containing more than one movement. ... In music, solo means to play or sing alone. ... A choir or chorus is a musical ensemble of singers. ... In musical notation, the staff or stave is a set of five horizontal lines on which note symbols are placed to indicate pitch and time. ... Musical theatre (sometimes spelled theater) is a form of theatre combining music, songs, dance, and spoken dialogue. ... In music, a band is a group of musicians, or musical ensemble, usually popular or folk, playing parts of or improvising off of a musical arrangement. ... A simplified form of sheet music, consisting of the tempo, key signature, melody and lyrics to a song, and also the chords to the song as they appear. ... Fake music is a type of condensed musical notation which can be easier to sightread than conventional sheet music. ... Popular music is music belonging to any of a number of musical styles that are accessible to the general public and mostly distributed commercially. ... Jazz is an original American musical art form originating around the early 1920s in New Orleans, rooted in Western music technique and theory, and is marked by the profound cultural contributions of African Americans. ... A fake book is a collection of simplified sheet music (sometimes called fake music or lead sheets), either transcribed manually or copied from some other source. ...

History

A putto holds the score for Saint Cecilia in Domenichino's painting of 1617-18 (Louvre Museum)

Download high resolution version (500x683, 58 KB)St Cecilia, Domenichino 1617-18 (Louvre) The two-dimensional work of art depicted in this image is in the public domain in the United States and in those countries with a copyright term of life of the author plus 100 years. ... Download high resolution version (500x683, 58 KB)St Cecilia, Domenichino 1617-18 (Louvre) The two-dimensional work of art depicted in this image is in the public domain in the United States and in those countries with a copyright term of life of the author plus 100 years. ... The putto is a figure of a pudgy baby, almost always male, often naked and having wings, found especially in Italian Renaissance art. ... Saint Cecilia Saint Cecilia in the Catholic Church the patron saint of music and of the blind. ... Domenico Zampieri (or Domenichino) (October 21, 1581 - April 15, 1641), Italian painter, born at Bologna, was the son of a shoemaker. ... The main courtyard of the Louvre. ...

Manuscripts

Before the 15th century, western music was written by hand and preserved in large bound volumes known as manuscripts. The best known examples of these are manuscripts of monophonic chant. In the case of medieval polyphony, such as the motet, writing space was economized by copying the parts in separate portions of facing pages, thus making possible performance by the few soloists needed. (This process was aided by the advent of mensural notation to clarify rhythm and was paralleled by the medieval practice of composing parts of polyphony sequentially, rather than simultaneously as in later times.) Manuscripts showing parts together in score format were rare, and limited mostly to organum, especally that of the Notre Dame school. (14th century - 15th century - 16th century - other centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 15th century was that century which lasted from 1401 to 1500. ... A manuscript (Latin manu scriptus, written by hand), strictly speaking, is any written document that is put down by hand, in contrast to being printed or reproduced some other way. ... In music, the word texture is often used in a rather vague way in reference to the overall sound of a piece of music. ... Chant is the rhythmic speaking or singing of words or sounds, either on a single pitch or with a simple melody involving a limited set of notes and often including a great deal of repetition or statis. ... Polyphony is a musical texture consisting of two or more independent melodic voices, as opposed to music with just one voice (monophony) or music with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords (homophony). ... In Western music, motet is a word that is applied to a number of highly varied choral musical compositions. ... Menstrual notation is the musical notation system which was used from the later part of the 13th century until about 1600. ... // Rhythm (Greek ρυθμός = tempo) is the variation of the duration of sounds or other events over time. ... Polyphony is a musical texture consisting of two or more independent melodic voices, as opposed to music with just one voice (monophony) or music with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords (homophony). ... This article is about a style of music. ... The group of composers working at or near the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris from about 1170 to 1250, along with the music they produced, is referred to as the Notre Dame school, or the Notre Dame School of Polyphony. ...

Even after the advent of music printing, much music continued to exist solely in manuscripts well into the 18th century. (17th century - 18th century - 19th century - more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 18th century refers to the century that lasted from 1701 through 1800. ...

Printing

There were several difficulties in translating the new technology of printing to music. The first printed book to include music, the Mainz psalter (1457), had to have the notation added in by hand. This is similar to the room left in other incunabulae for capitals. Later staff lines were printed, but scribes still added in the rest of the music by hand. The greatest difficulty in using movable type to print music is that all the elements must line up - the notehead must be properly aligned with the staff, or else it means something other than it should. In vocal music text must be aligned with the proper notes (although at this time even in manuscripts this was not a high priority). A page from a rare Blackletter Bible (1497) printed in Strasbourg by J.R. Grueninger. ... Capital letters or majuscules (in the Roman alphabet: A, B, C, ...) are one type of case in a writing system. ...

The first machine-printed music appeared around 1473, approximately 20 years after Gutenberg introduced the printing press. In 1501, Ottaviano Petrucci published Harmonice musices odhecaton A, which contained 96 pieces of printed music. Petrucci's printing method produced clean, readable, elegant music, but it was a long, difficult process that required three separate passes through the printing press. Petrucci later developed a process which required only two passes through the press, but was still taxing since each pass required very precise alignment in order for the result to be legible. This was the first well distributed printed polyphonic music. Petrucci also printed the first tablature with movable type. Single impression printing first appeared in London around 1520. Pierre Attaingnant brought the technique into wide use in 1528, and remained little changed for 200 years. Events Ottoman sultan Mehmed II defeats the White Sheep Turkmens lead by Uzun Hasan at Otlukbeli Axayacatl, Aztec ruler of Tenochtitlan invades the territory of neighboring Aztec city of Tlatelolco. ... Johannes Gensfleisch zur Laden zum Gutenberg (circa 1398 - February 3, 1468), a German metal-worker and inventor, achieved fame for his contributions to the technology of printing during about the 1450s, including a type metal alloy and oil-based inks, a mold for casting type accurately, and a new kind... The printing press is a mechanical device for printing many copies of a text on rectangular sheets of paper. ... 1501 was a common year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... Tablature is a form of musical notation which tells the player where to place their fingers on a particular instrument rather than which pitches to play. ... This article is about the British city. ... mary elline m. ... French Music printer, active in Paris, b. ... Events June 19 - Battle of Landriano - A French army in Italy under Marshal St. ...

Fronticepiece to Petrucci's Odhecaton

A common format for issuing multi-part, polyphonic music during the Renaissance was part-books. In this format, each voice-part for a collection of 5-part madrigals, for instance, would be printed separately in its own book, such that all five part-books would be needed to perform the music. Scores for multi-part music were rarely printed in the Renaissance, although the use of score format as a means to compose parts simultaneously (rather than successively, as in the late Middle Ages) is credited to Josquin Des Prez. Josquin Des Prez Josquin Des Prez (diminutive of Joseph; latinized Josquinus Pratensis) (c. ...

The effect of printed music was similar to the effect of the printed word, in that information spread faster, more efficiently, and to more people than it could through manuscripts. It had the additional effect of encouraging amateur musicians, who could now afford music to perform. This in many ways affected the entire music industry. Composers could now write more music for amateur performers, knowing that it could be distributed. Professional players could have more music at their disposal. It increased the number of amateurs, who professional players could then earn money by teaching. Nevertheless, in the early years the cost of printed music limited its distribution. The music industry is the industry that creates, performs, promotes, and preserves music. ...

In many places the right to print music was granted by the monarch, and only those with a special dispensation were allowed to do so. This was often an honour (and economic boon) granted to favoured court musicians.

In the 19th century the music industry was dominated by sheet music publishers. In the United States, the sheet music industry rose in tandem with blackface minstrelsy, and the group of New York City-based publishers and composers dominating the industry was known as "Tin Pan Alley". The late 19th century saw a massive explosion of parlour music, with a piano becoming de rigeur for the middle class home, but in the early 20th century the phonograph and recorded music grew greatly in importance. This, joined by the growth in popularity of radio from the 1920s on, lessened the importance of the sheet music publishers. The record industry eventually replaced the sheet music publishers as the music industry's largest force. Alternative meaning: Nineteenth Century (periodical) (18th century — 19th century — 20th century — more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 19th century was that century which lasted from 1801-1900 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar. ... The music industry is the industry that creates, performs, promotes, and preserves music. ... This reproduction of a 1900 minstrel show poster, originally published by the Strobridge Litho Co. ... Nickname: The Big Apple, The Capital of the World Official website: City of New York Government Counties (Boroughs) Bronx (The Bronx) New York (Manhattan) Queens (Queens) Kings (Brooklyn) Richmond (Staten Island) Mayor Michael Bloomberg (R) Geographical characteristics Area Total 468. ... Tin Pan Alley was the name given to the collection of New York City-centered music publishers and songwriters who dominated the popular music of the United States in the late 19th century and early 20th century. ... Parlor music was a type of popular music associated with the period between the 19th century rise of the sheet music industry and the advent of recorded music. ... A grand piano A piano is a musical instrument that is classified as a keyboard, percussion, or string instrument, depending on the system of classification used. ... (19th century - 20th century - 21st century - more centuries) Decades: 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s As a means of recording the passage of time, the 20th century was that century which lasted from 1901–2000 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar (1900–1999 in the... Edison cylinder phonograph ca. ... The 1920s was a decade sometimes referred to as the Jazz Age or the Roaring Twenties, usually applied to America. ... In the early years of the phonograph in the late 19th century, the music industry was dominated by the publishers of sheet music. ...

Current developments

In the late 20th and into the 21st century, significant interest has developed in representing sheet music in a computer-readable format (see Music Notation Software), as well as downloadable files (see Ovation Press). Music OCR, software to "read" scanned sheet music so that the results can be manipulated, has been available since 1991. (19th century - 20th century - 21st century - more centuries) Decades: 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s As a means of recording the passage of time, the 20th century was that century which lasted from 1901–2000 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar (1900–1999 in the... The 21st century is the century that began on 1 January 2001 and will last to 31 December 2100. ... An illustration of a modern personal computer. ... Music notation software are computer programs that are used to create and print sheet music. ... Music OCR is the application of optical character recognition to sheet music. ...

Of special practical interest for the general public is the Mutopia project, an effort to create a library of public domain sheet music, comparable to Project Gutenberg's library of public domain books. The Mutopia project is an effort to create a library of public domain sheet music, in a way similar to Project Gutenbergs library of public domain books. ... The public domain comprises the body of all creative works and other knowledge—writing, artwork, music, science, inventions, and others—in which no person or organization has any proprietary interest. ... Project Gutenberg (often abbreviated as PG) is a volunteer effort to digitize, archive, and distribute cultural works. ...

See also

• Music theory
• Musical composition
• Musical notation
• public domain
• Music markup - Meta

Music theory is a field of study that describes the elements of music and includes the development and application of methods for analyzing and composing music, and the interrelationship between the notation of music and performance practice. ... Musical composition is: an original piece of music the structure of a musical piece the process of creating a new piece of music // A musical composition A piece of music exists in the form of a written composition in musical notation or as a single acoustic event (a live performance... Music notation is a system of writing for music. ... The public domain comprises the body of all creative works and other knowledge—writing, artwork, music, science, inventions, and others—in which no person or organization has any proprietary interest. ...

External links

• IMSLP - International Music Score Library Project
• Project Gutenberg - Sheet Music section of Project Gutenberg
• Choral Public Domain Library (ChoralWiki) - Free sheet music archive with emphasis on choral music.
• Mutopia project - Free sheet music archive
• Sheet Music Archive - Free, large archive
• Classical Sheet Music - Free classical sheet music.
• Free scores - Free scores files and directory
• ENMD L'École Nationale de Musique et de Danse de Grand-Couronne - free musical score downloads (site is French-language)

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

Category:Sheet music