A songbook is a collection of sheet music, usually designed to be sung. It is organized around a central unifying factor, such as an era, song style or composer. You can create a songbook according to any unifying factor. Alternatively, you could base it upon your favorite songs. Create your own free songbook by exploring the thousands of public-domain songs available.
Things You'll Need:
- Three-Ring Binder
- Three-Hole Punch
Collect files of rights-cleared songs. Look at some public domain archives online (see Resources) or use songs that you've written yourself or family and friends who have given you permission to use them.
Make a list of the songs that you've collected. Organize them in the desired order. If you have you only have a few songs to browse, order doesn't matter. But if you have many songs, consider organizing the songs alphabetically, according to a composer or title. Alternately, organize the songs by genre or era, if applicable.
Arrange all the songs into a single document. If they are image files, use a word processor program to arrange them as one song per page. If they are PDF files, use a PDF editing program (not a viewer) to arrange them. Alternatively, convert them to to JPEG or document files (see Resources). Place the songs in the order that you want to print them.
Print the songs in the desired order for your book, but print only every other page in the document (you may have to do this one page at a time). Flip over the stack in the printer, then print the other half of your songs in the order that they occur. This will enable you to print on both sides of the paper, in the correct order.
Collate the songs in order and punch holes in them with a three-hole punch. If you have many pages, punch a few pages at a time. Keep the edges of the page lined up with one another as you do this to ensure that the sheet music will bind together in a tidy fashion.
Use a word-processing program to create a front-cover page. Include a table of contents to help you quickly locate them.
Place all the music in a clear three-ring binder. Start from the back of the book and work your way forward to make it easy for you to see what you're doing as you go.
Resources
Writer Bio
Lauren Vork has been a writer for 20 years, writing both fiction and nonfiction. Her work has appeared in "The Lovelorn" online magazine and thecvstore.net. Vork holds a bachelor's degree in music performance from St. Olaf College.
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