 | |
Type of site | E-commerce |
|---|---|
| Available in | English |
| Owner | Hal Leonard |
| Created by | Nick Babchuk |
| URL | www |
| Commercial | Yes |
| Registration | Optional |
| Launched | 1996 |
| Current status | Active |
Sheet Music Plus, also known as sheetmusicplus.com, is a global online retailer of sheet music, located in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States. Founded in 1995 by Nicholas Babchuk, Sheet Music Plus offers the largest selection of sheet music, with more than 2 million titles. [1]
Serving musicians and music educators around the world, Sheet Music Plus sells sheet music, instruments, and music-related gear and accessories. [2] Supported ensembles and instruments include choir, concert band, orchestra, piano, guitar, brass, woodwinds, strings, and more. Available musical genres cover classical, jazz, blues, rock, opera, bluegrass, pop, country, Broadway, movie soundtracks, film scores, Latin, R&B, and more.
Sheet Music Plus works with thousands of publishers worldwide—from major publishers like Hal Leonard and Alfred Music, to independent publishers via ArrangeMe. [3] Sheet Music Plus is active in the music community and hires musicians when possible. [4]
Sheet Music Plus specializes in both printed and digital sheet music. Their digital print service offers sheet music titles that are available to print instantly. They currently offer over 1,300,000 digital print titles from a variety of publishers, [5] including Hal Leonard and Alfred Music.
In 2013, the company introduced a new service, Digital Print Publishing (also known as SMP Press and now ArrangeMe), which offers independent composers and arrangers the ability to publish and sell their music digitally in the online catalog. Composers earn up to 50% commission for their titles and gain worldwide exposure. Sheet Music Plus has published over 780,000 titles digitally from independent publishers. [6]
In 1995, Nick Babchuk founded MusicianStore.com, a self-run pilot website, on the 1300 block of Pacific Ave. in San Francisco. At this time they sold guitar strings, drum heads, and musician's accessories in addition to sheet music. According to former CEO Keith Cerny, the company was "profitable from almost the very beginning". [4] As demand for sheet music became apparent along with advantages of shipping printed material the name was changed to Sheet Music Plus. In 2005 the warehouse was moved from San Francisco to Emeryville, CA. The new 25,000 sq. ft. warehouse allowed for more space and better access to shipping routes. Sheet Music Plus currently offers over 30,000 in-stock titles, ready to ship within 24 hours. [2]
In 2007, the company reached 550,000 titles in the catalog. In 2008, Keith Cerny assumed the role of CEO when founder Nick Babchuk became Chairman of the company. [7] Mr. Cerny oversaw the creation of an advanced company data center in San Francisco, [8] which set the foundation for the company's technological future. In 2010, Cerny resigned to become General Director of the Dallas Opera. Long-time Sheet Music Plus employee Jenny Silva succeeded him.
Under Silva's tenure, the company expanded the catalog to over one million titles. [9] She also oversaw the creation and development of the popular Digital Print Publishing program for composers, arrangers and songwriters. Mrs. Silva was also instrumental in the partnership with the Canadian Choral Center in 2012. Silva remained in her role as CEO until she resigned on May 31, 2018.
On 27 February 2017, it was announced that Sverica Capital Management would sell Sheet Music Plus to music publisher Hal Leonard. In 2023, Hal Leonard was purchased by Muse Group, bringing Sheet Music Plus under their purview.
In 2012 Sheet Music Plus partnered with the Canadian Choral Center in Winnipeg, Manitoba in Canada. The founder, Judy Pringle, is a choral music specialist and ran the company herself for many years. The Canadian Choral Center ships to over 10,000 customers across Canada with their exclusive customs-free shipping to Canada. [10] Judy publishes a regular choral newsletter and is a prominent figure in the Canadian choral music scene.
Sheet music is a handwritten or printed form of musical notation that uses musical symbols to indicate the pitches, rhythms, or chords of a song or instrumental musical piece. Like its analogs – printed books or pamphlets in English, Arabic, or other languages – the medium of sheet music typically is paper. However, access to musical notation since the 1980s has included the presentation of musical notation on computer screens and the development of scorewriter computer programs that can notate a song or piece electronically, and, in some cases, "play back" the notated music using a synthesizer or virtual instruments.
Sibelius is a scorewriter program developed and released by Sibelius Software Limited. It is the world's largest selling music notation program. Beyond creating, editing and printing music scores, it can also play the music back using sampled or synthesised sounds. It produces printed scores, and can also publish them via the Internet for others to access. Less advanced versions of Sibelius at lower prices have been released, as have various add-ons for the software.
Stamps.com is a brand and the former corporate name of Auctane, an American company that provides Internet-based mailing and shipping services. Until its acquisition by Thoma Bravo, Stamps.com was a public company traded on the NASDAQ exchange under the symbol STMP. The company's main offices are located in El Segundo, California.
The Real Book is a musicians' fake book – a compilation of lead sheets for jazz standards. Fake books had been around at least since the late 1920s, but their organization was haphazard, and their content did not always keep pace with contemporary musical styles. The Real Book was initially produced by two students at the Berklee College of Music in the 1970s, as an updated fake book. It became so popular that the book was eventually "legitimized" by publisher Hal Leonard, and re-released in a series of editions and transpositions for various instruments.
Liner notes are the writings found on the sleeves of LP record albums and in booklets that come inserted into the compact disc jewel case or cassette j-cards.
"C Is For Cookie", by Joe Raposo, is a song about the letter C performed by Cookie Monster, a Muppet character from the preschool television series Sesame Street. It was first performed in Season 3, although it had been released on The Muppet Alphabet Album. Along with Kermit's "Bein' Green" and Ernie's "Rubber Duckie", it is one of the show's most recognizable songs. The original version was made in 1971 and was one of the few Sesame Street sketches directed by Jim Henson.
The music industry consists of the individuals and organizations that earn money by writing songs and musical compositions, creating and selling recorded music and sheet music, presenting concerts, as well as the organizations that aid, train, represent and supply music creators. Among the many individuals and organizations that operate in the industry are: the songwriters and composers who write songs and musical compositions; the singers, musicians, conductors, and bandleaders who perform the music; the record labels, music publishers, recording studios, music producers, audio engineers, retail and digital music stores, and performance rights organizations who create and sell recorded music and sheet music; and the booking agents, promoters, music venues, road crew, and audio engineers who help organize and sell concerts.
Wise Music Group is a global music publisher, with headquarters in Berners Street, London. In February 2020, Wise Music Group changed its name from The Music Sales Group.
"Nothing Gold Can Stay" is a short poem written by Robert Frost in 1923 and published in The Yale Review in October of that year.
Hal Leonard LLC is an American music publishing and distribution company founded in Winona, Minnesota, by Harold "Hal" Edstrom, his brother, Everett "Leonard" Edstrom, and fellow musician Roger Busdicker. Currently headquartered in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, it is the largest sheet music publisher in the world.
Shawnee Press, Inc., was an independent print and recorded music publisher and for a time, the largest educational music publisher in the world. The Company published several music types including choral, vocal, keyboard, handbell, instrumental, and classroom in a variety of styles. The Company added sacred music offerings with the acquisition of Harold Flammer, Inc., followed by launching GlorySound, an imprint targeted to the growing contemporary Christian market.
Lightning Source is a printer and distributor of print-on-demand books. The company is a business unit of Ingram Content Group. Originally incorporated in 1996 as Lightning Print Inc., the company is headquartered in La Vergne, Tennessee, United States. Its UK operations are based in Milton Keynes. They also have operations in Maurepas, France and Melbourne, Australia.
MusicWriter was founded in 1989 by music industry veterans Jon Monday and Larry Heller to develop and market NoteStation, a kiosk-based retail "point-of-sale manufacturing" system for the distribution and printing of sheet music. Besides having a very large library of songs across all music genres, the NoteStation was able to print the sheet music on demand in any key, as selected by the customer. This reduced the need for retailers to carry a large selection of physical inventory, which was usually only printed in one key.
Cherry Lane Music was an American music publisher based in New York. It was founded in 1960 by Milton Okun in the apartment above the Cherry Lane Theater in Greenwich Village, Manhattan, New York. Cherry Lane Music developed a wide range of high quality sheet music, DVDs, and educational tools for musicians. In March 2010, Cherry Lane was acquired by BMG Rights Management, which had been formed in 2008 jointly by Bertelsmann AG and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. BMG operated Cherry Lane as a subsidiary and is currently an in-name-only unit of BMG Rights Management.
Paul-Agricole Génin was a French flautist and composer for flute. He was a student of Louis Dorus and became first flute at the Théâtre-Italien (Comédie-Italienne) Paris.
Chas. H. Hansen Music Corp. was an American music publisher founded by Charles Henry Hansen (1913–1995) in 1952 and incorporated in New York. Its music covered a broad spectrum of genres that included classical, jazz, folk, rock, country, popular, educational — and music text books. For Beatles fans, the firm was widely known for having been the sole U.S. publisher and distributor of Beatles sheet music, beginning 1964. By the 1980s, Hansen Music ventured away from the pop field, focusing on classics and jazz method books. The firm, in 1980, was also operating 7 retail sheet music stores — two in San Francisco, three in Seattle, and two in Las Vegas. The name — Charles Hansen Music & Books, Inc. — became inactive in 1991. Hansen House Music Publishers — a Florida registered fictitious name of Hansen Publications, Inc. — became inactive December 31, 2009. The Hansen House web page is now inactive, listed as being "parked" by the GoDaddy domain registrar. The internet archive at https://web.archive.org has their latest snapshot of this website being active as in September 2013; contact person listed on earlier versions was Ramon Duran. The larger part of the Charles Hansen catalog was acquired by Warner Brothers Publications, then subsequently sold to Alfred Publications. According to Billboard in 1972, Wometco, headed by Mitchell Wolfson, had a pending offer to acquire Hansen, retaining Hansen and his staff.
Luke Flynn is an American composer of film, television, and concert music. He is most widely known for his compositions Rift, for orchestra, and Beneath the Wave, for SATB chorus.
Robert Hebble, born in 1934, was an American composer, arranger, and organist. He worked as a voluntary assistant to the organist Virgil Fox. He died on February 17, 2020.
'Rollo A. Dilworth is an American choral composer, arranger, conductor, and music educator from St. Louis, Missouri.
Marion Frances Wyma Vree-Brown was an American composer/arranger and music educator.