Tablet for music use recommendations
  • Heath
    Posts: 933
    I'm considering the use of a tablet for choral/accompaniment use. I'd love to hear what you use, why, and how it's working out!

    (Links, of course, are most welcome)
  • francis
    Posts: 10,668
    iPad has everything on it

    Organ music
    Chant
    Hymns
    Polyphony
    Jazz fake books
    Guitar sing alongs

    Books...
    LU
    PBC
    Hymnal 1940
    NOH
    Graduale
    Kyriales

    And the list goes on

    I finally bought a foot switch so I can turn pages. However, still not a good solution for playing the organ.
  • ServiamScores
    Posts: 2,721
    iPad (the larger pro version) is really the gold standard here. The problem is you'll pay mightily for the privilege. But iPads have the most app and universal support. All the major players in the music-app space (forscore, nkoda, etc.) are all on iPads. And if you're really fancy, you'll get two and link forscore so that it pages both at the same time.

    FWIW, I have a regularly-sized iPad and I lament that it is not one of the larger ones, since the size of the larger ones is close to US letter size. You'll have to shrink things down if you get a regular iPad.
  • Heath
    Posts: 933
    Thank you, gents!

    I'll be curious to hear from non-Apple users, too. The price of iPads will probably be a non-starter, unfortunately. :(
  • francis
    Posts: 10,668
    Oh... use PDF Expert. It is free and automatically sizes down... but you gotta be willing to read smaller scores.
  • francis
    Posts: 10,668
    Throw in the extra hundred bucks for an apple. I don’t think it is worth getting anything else.
  • SponsaChristi
    Posts: 392
    iPad Pro. There’s a really awesome app program for music called Pro Score. It’s only $27.99 CAD.
    https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/forscore/id363738376
    Thanked by 1sdtalley3
  • sdtalley3sdtalley3
    Posts: 260
    I often thought much of getting some form of Tablet strictly for use during service….I just don’t know if my fellow Trad-Cats would be so conforming to use?…
  • francis
    Posts: 10,668
    Trad-Cats can have an aversion to Tech-Trad-Cats... However some of our Trad-Cats use their phone... So I guess I’m allowed to continue using my iPad... (Now if they were only willing to sing some of my original music! Blasted!)
    Thanked by 1sdtalley3
  • MarkB
    Posts: 1,025
    The only restriction I'm aware of is that the USCCB has decreed that tablets or similar digital content devices may not be used at the altar nor at the ambo: only physical books or sheets of paper may be used.
    Thanked by 2Don9of11 CharlesW
  • ServiamScores
    Posts: 2,721
    I'll be curious to hear from non-Apple users, too. The price of iPads will probably be a non-starter, unfortunately. :(
    the basic iPads are affordable. c. $300 at any given moment. Honestly, android tablets are an absolute wasteland. Basically the only ones worth having are the large Samsung tablets, but they are priced to match the more expensive iPads, and they don't benefit from the iOS ecosystem. Android apps are a much more mixed bag.
    Thanked by 1francis
  • Chris Garton-Zavesky
    Posts: 6,902
    Heath,

    Do you mean that you use the apple device to contain and display musical scores whose physical, material copy you do possess? Do you use the apple device to emit the sound of the music whose electronic copy you possess?

    I'm sorry to be so thick-headed, but as the last remaining specimen of the species "Natural Isbest", I don't understand the question you're asking. You may correctly surmise that I'm not an apple-device user on a regular basis, but I have used one from time to time.
  • Heath
    Posts: 933
    Chris, I'll admit that, when I start a new thread, I aim for a) concision, yet b) enough info that CGZ doesn't ask for clarity. It seems I failed. ;)

    Tablets can be used to download and store thousands upon thousands of pages of music, all of which can be accessed quickly and marked up (assuming a stylus) just like a physical copy.

    I occasionally sing with grad students at the local university, and more and more they've turned to tablets, as have many of our church music colleagues.
  • ServiamScores
    Posts: 2,721
    I occasionally sing with grad students at the local university, and more and more they've turned to tablets, as have many of our church music colleagues.
    And I'd wager that of that pool, 95%+ are using iPads.
  • Chris Garton-Zavesky
    Posts: 6,902
    Heath,

    I hope you don't always set the bar based on my need for clarity! Nevertheless, you're generous to note my confusion.

    I've never marked up a page of electronically stored music with a stylus (but that's because I don't own a stylus or a touch-screen). I would think that there's more than one intelligent avenue to explore here, though. First, is it dignum et justum to use an electronic resource, complete with screen, in the specific context of music at Mass? Next, are you using the ipad so you can read the music and make the sound, or so that the computer can do these things?

    How near is your nearest electrical outlet?
  • LarsLars
    Posts: 116
    tablets or similar digital content devices may not be used at the altar nor at the ambo


    where I am the archbishop uses an iPad to read his homilies from. very hip and cool, sigh...
    Thanked by 1ServiamScores
  • francis
    Posts: 10,668
    Hahaha!!! How near is your nearest ethical outlet?

    WI, i dont know i
    FI know!!
    Thanked by 1ServiamScores
  • ServiamScores
    Posts: 2,721
    where I am the archbishop uses an iPad to read his homilies from. very hip and cool, sigh...
    Still preferable to our former parochial vicar who used his iPad mini in lieu of a missal…
    Thanked by 1Lars
  • francis
    Posts: 10,668
    Those are called iMissaletes.
    Thanked by 1Lars
  • Chris Garton-Zavesky
    Posts: 6,902
    Francis,

    I was only partly speaking in jest. The same plug for the simulacrum I use at present powers the air filter and a standing lamp and, I think the PA system for the parish's new chapel.
  • francis
    Posts: 10,668
    Chris

    So far today I think I have mostly been only a Jester. Mea culpa my dear brethren and sistern!

    I will admit I do love using the technology for reading music. If I had to print out everything on my iPad I think it would be stacked a mile high.
  • davido
    Posts: 873
    How quickly does your tablet need replacing?

    I am fearful of the cost/lifetime ratio as well as forgetting to charge it or technical glitches at key moments
  • francis
    Posts: 10,668
    Apple products last a significant time... never had an iPad till a couple of years ago, but computers last 10 years
  • ServiamScores
    Posts: 2,721
    My iPad dates to 2017 and is only now starting to show its age (needs a battery replacement and I could benefit from the higher ram in the newer models). Still runs smooth as butter though.
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 1,939
    Yeah, I second comments about Android tablets. I don't even own one, but my parents do or have, and it's a pain. The iPad is superior to all but the top-line Samsung devices, and of course if you like the Apple ecosystem, you can't use it on the Android.
  • Schönbergian
    Posts: 1,063
    I would suggest that one of the Microsoft Surface tablets would be superior to any other device, assuming it's within your price range. I have used one for the last six years and it handles sheet music annotation with aplomb. I personally prefer to do such work on real paper lately, though.
  • vansensei
    Posts: 215
    I have a cheap $100 tablet from Amazon. It does its main job, which is choral music. Served me last two years of undergrad well and some subbing gigs.
  • GambaGamba
    Posts: 539
    One could always buy a used/refurbished iPad from BackMarket or some other place and save a whole lot. What we use them for doesn’t require much computing power, so even older iPads are fine for ForScore.
Add a Comment