Many of today's young music lovers may not even know what sheet music is, and that's a shame because band music is still one of the most beautiful forms of art available to us. And many of the ones that do know what concert band music or band music is, think that it is some magical pieces of writing that can only be read by accomplished musicians. Nothing further from the truth, sheet music is just a form of transcribing music using musical notes.
First, it was transcribed on parchments, later on paper, and recently by employing the use of computers and computer programs, it is finding its way to those interested in the form of .pdf files. The meaning of the term sheet in sheet music, is so that we can differentiate between this type of writings and standard writings which are considered to be presentations.
Sheet music is also referred to as score. Band music scores or sheet music scores have a wide variety of uses. The most basic definition of sheet music pieces are simply a form of helping musicians to reproduce a specific tune with the greatest accuracy possible, or just a way of recording in writing a tune using musical notes. It is not, as many may think, a way of replacing the performance of a tune.
Some consider these sheet music scores to be a genuine hand from God, as music lovers are able to study various sketches of great works of art, thus having the possibility to follow the creative process that some of the greatest music composers have gone through. And by making such sketches public, musicians can also get feedback from their audience, before putting their final touch on a tune.
Reading these sheet music pieces, requires people to become acquainted with a technique called musical notation. Some of us just can not do it, while others are gifted with an innate ability to virtually read and record music as they hear it, thus creating sheet music pieces in their mind. This is the initial definition for the expression "to play by ear". Like any special abilities, they are rare, only few people being able to do this.
Concert band music normally employs the use of music sheets for playing vast tunes. Because a difficult tune has a lot of information, normal people can not possibly remember all the notes to a tee. They are not only used by classical concert bands, but also by piano players, and even jazz orchestras. However, jazz orchestras only use sheet music pieces that are general, thus leaving space for improvisation.