Free Sheet Music On The Net - Truth or Fiction?
Typing "free sheet music" into google or any other search engine
will have tempted anyone looking for sheet music on the net. And
indeed, the search engines respond by giving us page after page
of hits. But what does the user really get on these pages - and
is it legal?
This article has a look at the current state of "free sheet
music downloads".
The search "free sheet music" (without the inverted commas) on
google spews out an impressive 17,300,000 pages. Even the most
inexperienced internet-user will immediately realize that the
truth cannot be quite so bountiful. I click on the first hit on
google (results on yahoo and msn will differ) and am promised
thousands of downloadable scores. On closer inspection this
turns out to be a number of Irish tunes at most, with most of
the promised pieces in fact consisting of links to more so
called "free sites". Funnily enough the owner of the website at
one point even points out not to send him any nasty e-mails
about the lack of free scores on the site.
So let's try the second hit. After navigating round the site
promising me free scores, I always end up on a page telling me
that all of these scores are free to download - for a small fee
of 20 Dollars a year. As a user I am starting to feel confused -
I haven't seen a single piece of sheet music. Can I trust this
site? What would the quality of the scores be if I paid the 20
Dollars?
Frustrated, I move on to the next search engine result. This
site at least has the courage to tell me on the main page that
the so-called free scores will cost me 30 dollars a year, yet
once again, I fail to detect a single quaver or treble clef. No
scores are available for preview. This is starting to remind me
of the "free DVD" I get with my Sunday paper. Only that I have
to purchase the Sunday paper first.
Yet another site turns out to be just like the first, the
promised pieces of sheet music being links to more so-called
free sheet music sites. I am starting to get bored of being
re-directed. Aren't there any sheet music sites out there?
The story of my search continues in similar fashion, until I
encounter a site that does offer sheet music, albeit a limited
quantity. I download a score only to find that the graphics
aren't quite where they should be, and this makes me wonder
about the general quality of the scores and the arrangements
that are available. Indeed. Why should anyone create a score and
put any effort into the arrangement and editing, if they aren't
making any money through direct sales?
Even other hits take me to a site where I am charged $1.60 for
the "privilege" of downloading a badly scanned copy of a Bach
composition. Hm.
Frighteningly, I also find a site that offers extremely basic
versions of John Lennon's "Imagine" and other music that is in
fact still under copyright. This website is clearly an illegal
operation, and one that might find itself in the crosshairs of
the Music Publishers' Association (MPA). The MPA, as highlighted
in a recent article on the BBC Website
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/4524086.stm) is
intending to clamp down on websites selling music still under
copyright, or where the arrangements are still under copyright.
In a way the publishing world is doing what record labels
started a few years ago by actively prosecuting those
participating in illegal download of sheet music.
I eventually find a project similar to the Gutenberg Project
where people contribute scores freely. The quality seems ok, but
I am restricted to pieces by a handful of classical composers,
and with anything relying on donations and free contributions, I
doubt there are regular updates. However, as with Wikipedia, the
authenticity of the product has to come into question. The
standard review process that an encyclopaedia has and Wikipedia
and other websites dependent on volunteers lack will have to be
considered when downloading scores (or any other information for
that matter) for free: does the end-user believe all the notes
are accurate? When the founder of Wikipedia himself was found to
manipulate information on the very site how much can these
so-called democratic sites be trusted? Obviously no one would
benefit from changing a note in a score, so no one would
deliberately manipulate a piece of music. But what are the skill
levels of those involved in the creation of these scores? It is
highly unlikely that a trained musician would edit these - he
would be destroying his own industry to a certain extent.
Furthermore I will not be able to find simplified arrangements
of a piece, as this is a time-consuming effort, and anyone
engaging in such an operation would clearly charge for the
service.
After many days of searching, I give up in my quest in search of
good free scores.
But what is one to make of all this? Why are there so many sites
that don't actually sell anything, and what is the point of them?
The problem is created by advertising. The people who run these
sites own the most obvious url titles (i.e. the web site
address) that one might type in when looking for free scores. As
an example: if you were looking for free glasses, one might type
in www.freeglasses.com. Hence, these sites get a lot of direct
traffic. Furthermore they have also done a very good job at
search engine optimisation, which makes you wonder whether
google and Co are actually missing a trick here. Yet as these
sites have nothing to sell they try and get the frustrated user
to click on one of the many adverts, and many of these are
so-called google ads. Every time someone clicks on one of these
ads or paid-for links, the aforementioned website earns a small
amount of money (so-called click-through). What is even more
disconcerting is that some of these ads lead to legitimate sheet
music download sites, making it even harder for the user to
distinguish between the real thing and some dodgy operation
trying to make a buck on click-throughs. This clearly does not
help the industry.
Well, what about those free scores then? Well, there are some
out there, basically a handful to be found on the five or six
legitimate sites that are out there. These sites have the
highest quality in terms of the arrangements, the quality of the
score both graphically and in print-out quality.
So why no free scores?
Think about it: why should anyone go through the effort of
either A) scanning hundreds and thousands of pages of music, and
then offering them for free?
Or
B) creating hundreds and thousands of arrangements for free?
Exactly. If you were to upload loads of tunes, you'd want to
make money out of it.
Lincoln Jaeger