Recommendations for Software to Create a Song Book

So do you have to edit the tabs in ultimate guitar and import the data into Songbook Pro or do you edit in Songbook Pro directly?

Not sure what you mean, unless you are creating your own UG entries ?

I will import tab from UG and tidy it up and if needed (frequently) make corrections in Songbook Pro.
Or I will write my own tab direct in the application itself.
Or you could copy and paste the tab from another source.
Most are based on Chordpro format, which you can write yourself.

Chordpro format is the standard for most if not all of these Song Book type apps.
Once you know how to write in Chordpro(itā€™s really easy to learn) you can write youā€™re own tabs and song sheets in Note pad on your computer(mush easier than your phone or Tablet) and import them into which ever app you choose.

Hereā€™s an over view of Chordpro Format.

https://linkesoft.com/songbook/chordproformat.html

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Iā€™m going to give Songbook Pro a go on my iPad. Iā€™ve downloaded the trial which allows me to import/create 12 songs, more than enough to experiment with. After that itā€™s a one off payment of 6.99 US dollars or Ā£5.72 in real money, so cheap as chips!

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Gordon @sairfingers
Definitely worth a try, less than the cost of a decent bottle of wine.
I have all my songs on this as well as hard copies. I actually have two copies one for iPad the other on iPhone, only because the iPhone has a work Apple account. I donā€™t really have any issues sync the two.
Michael

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Thank you all for your help and support!!!

ā€œcheaperā€ than chips these days ?

The only issue I had was with the auto sync running across PC and two Android devices, phone and tablet. I now update the ā€œcoreā€ version on the PC and back up manually when Iā€™ve finished (adding or editing etc). I then manually ā€œrestoreā€ the latest back up to the mobile devices. I donā€™t think this is a Songbook issue. More how the Androids interact with OneDrive, as they donā€™t always list all the files.

A little overhead but works fine. One of these days I move the backups to GoogleDrive to see if that works better. But overall very happy with the app given the price.

:sunglasses:

Iā€™ve made a start with importing a few songs Toby and Michael.
A couple of questions if I may.

  1. How do I change or add in chord names? I find if I delete a chord name the others all jump back out of place. If I then replace that chord name with one that has more/fewer characters the other chord names jump forward/backwards out of place and so on.

  2. Your ā€˜white rabbitā€™ example above shows a six line tab. How do you do that?

Thanks in advance. I was going to DM you both but thought perhaps others reading this thread might be interested.

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This has been a super useful thread resurrection, my printed songbook now runs to two folders and is just nor practical!! thank you all :slight_smile:

Sorry Gordon but its all very manual and depends on how you want things presented.
Kinda are you creating a score or just a guide.

Q1.

Think this very much depends on how the original ā€œChordsā€ tab was written. Also which presentation of the chords and lyrics you have chosen ie Chords over lyrics or embedded.
I prefer Chords over and use a combination of spaces and deletes to get things realigned, if I have added subtracted or amended. eg If I am changing a chord name Iā€™ll type the new chord name directly in front of the one that is there and then deleted the old entry. That should realign the chords further down lyric line.

When I start to learn a song I verify that the lyrics and chords align anyway, as a lot of Chord tabs are inaccurate with there chord placement when compared the originals.
Iā€™ll dry run a song to hear if anything is out of whack, it usually is somewhere and the use a similar method to Justinā€™s song lessons to correct the synchronisation. eg Please allow me to introDuce myself, where the original tab had the D over myself. So you may have to delete a couple of spaces for example to pull the D back into place. But then add a couple after to realign the following chords. Iā€™ll do the whole song like that line by line especially when the syncopation is a bit tricky. My Staind covers where a right PITA for that !

Q2 Multiple choice
You can copy and paste the tab from the TAB version of the song from UG for example.
Section by section


one at a time

Or write it by ā€œhandā€ starting with an entry like the example below. I did the WR Intro that way, as I wanted to do via recall having memorised it reasonable well. How you do this is personal and down to how accurate you want the listing. As per the D line you could use 16 dashes - to represent 16th notes, or go a little more freestyle like my WR example as I had the flow and vibe in my head, so didnā€™t need verbatim score.
Down to your usage, crib or guide ?

e|----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
B|----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
G|----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
D|----------------|----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
A|---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
E|---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|

Another option is to import the song via a PDF file. Not something I have done before, so just experimented. And might explore now Iā€™ve tried it.

So for example if you use GuitarPro you could export a GPx file as PDF and import to Songbook that way. Quite useful if you where writing you own solo lines and fills to your own material on an existing song that needed spicing up,

Hope all that helps.

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Gordon @sairfingers
Toby @TheMadman_tobyjenner

Not sure if I am miss understanding what the query is but let me explain what I do.

I only need chords and lyrics, and want chords over lyrics, donā€™t use tabs.

Import the nearest to what I want from UG, into my iPad. Then to edit I connect my iPad to my Windows PC using SongbookPro Manager. Can take a few goes before they talk to each other.

I edit in chord pro view, like this

The key point is that anything in square brackets goes above the lyric line when you switch back to chords over lyrics and it looks like this.

Have to use PC as iPad does not have square brackets. Anything in the brackets also moves if you alter spacing of the words. The chord can be in the middle of a word, the brackets just moves it up. I have noticed some difference in precise layout of the words from using a print out or just looking at it on screen. I work from print outs so that is the key for me. I think there might be other editing features but not come across them yet.

Does this answer your query?

Michael

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@MAT1953 you are using chordpro format to write your song sheets. If you read the overview I posted you will learn how to create sheets with everything including tabs if needed.

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Mine does. They are just hiding,

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Rich @stitch

UG it is more than fifty years since I did anything like this and then it was punched tape or cards.
Did look at your post when it came in and I think it is a chord pro standard that both songbook and SongbookPro use.
Think I will file that in a folder to be looked at in the future, donā€™t need another rabbit hole at present got enough already.
Michael

James @Socio
Found it [ ].
Hidden in plain sight
Thanks Michael

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Hey guys. Thank you so much for your replies, your time is very much appreciated and I feel so guilty for using it up. I thought the technology behind this would be simple, clearly itā€™s not. Iā€™m going back to paper and pencil. Print something out then score bits out and rewrite and scribble all over it. Technology is not for me. :woozy_face:
Thanks again for your time and I so appreciate your efforts to help.

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Gordon @sairfingers

You obviously need to do what you are happiest with, but donā€™t give up on technology too soon. Before I got SongbookPro I used to create them in Word which worked but when I am learning a song I tend to fiddle around with layout which once you have basics down it is easy to do that in SongbookPro

Absolutely no good me using pen and paper, I canā€™t read my own writing. Must admit I was a little surprised that quite of few at the guitar club have most of there repertoire as hand written version, often with lots of crossing outs. But whatever works for you or them thatā€™s fine.

Michael

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@sairfingers

Technology oftentimes has a steep learning curve and seems to overcomplicate things. Once you were able to remove the initial obstacles and managed to figure out a workflow that works for you, technology can be super helpful. Keep working on it for some more days to figure out :wink:

Cheers Nikolas

Any recommendations for best option on a Mac ? Prefer one off payment rather than subscription etc.

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Gordon

Hear where you are coming from but donā€™t give up altogether. Give it some time and run it in parallel to your olde skool tech, for maybe one song. Itā€™s really no different to typing in a text box like this, when you are editing, or any other word/note processing app.

:sunglasses:

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