Clean Up Your GigBook Tunes
There are Just 2 Basics of Housekeeping: Most important is to Clean Out Exact Duplicates of your tunes. The second is to Rename Titles to suit your Searching style.
Recognize Duplicates by the Numbers at the Title’s End & Delete all but 1.
Rather than tell you why you should do this, I ask instead, why would you not do it? You may have a lot of duplicate tunes, but you’re not alone. I’ve seen as many as 5, or more, duplicates of multiple tunes on some iPads. These make scrolling through, when looking for a song, more time-consuming than it needs to be. Take the time to clean those out now. It will be time well spent, and does not have to be done all in 1 sitting.
Tunes that are Exact Duplicates add nothing. You may have the same tune in 2 different keys, but that is not an exact duplicate. The key should be noted in the Title of at least 1 of them so you can easily see which is which. If it isn’t already part of the title, see the next section, “How to Change Titles.” The Banjo Band music sheets almost always note the key in parentheses.
Removing a score from a Binder or Set List does not Remove, or Delete, it from anywhere else. Delete is only available in All Scores or Recent Downloads view.
You Can Create Any Number of Set Lists or Binders Using That Single Tune.
It doesn’t matter how duplicates got into your GigBook app in the first place, but it is almost always because you couldn’t find the song, and thought you didn’t have it, so you downloaded it from Dropbox. Refer to Lesson #1 about best practice Search techniques. There is NO reason to keep exact duplicates of a tune. Even if you use the tune for multiple bands, for instance, SBB & GGG, simply create a Binder with that band’s name, and add the tune to each Binder. Note: Binders remain sorted alphabetically, automatically. If you make any change to a tune that is in a Binder, whether Title, Details, handwritten notes, etc., it will also be made in your Main All Scores List and other binders, and vice versa. This is a Feature, not a Flaw.
If you place a score into a Set List it is similar to making a paper copy, and putting that copy in a separate paper binder. (The main difference to paper is that if you change the Title of a tune, it will be changed everywhere. A Set List is where you want a tune to be if you want to make notes that reflect only 1 band, or if you want to rearrange the order of tunes, See Lesson #3.
Repeating myself here: Deleting tunes must be done from ALL SCORES or Recent Downloads view (the 2 upper left icons: GB or down-pointing arrow). Remember that you can REMOVE a tune from a Binder or Set List at any time, and it WILL NOT DELETE the tune from All Scores.
If, over time, you find you are using a version that does not look like the one your band mates are using, you can download the newer version from Dropbox. Don’t forget that if you you don’t DELETE the older copy first, you’ll end up with a “numbered” score again. If you do end up with a numbered title, which you’ll see most easily in the Recent Downloads –this list has the most recently added tunes at the top of the list, and has no more than 250 tunes listed– delete the older version, or rename it in a recognizable manner. Once you know you don’t have two exact copies of the tune, the number can be removed by following the instructions below about renaming tunes. It’s easy to spot duplicates in the All Scores View. They will be listed together in this alphabetical list.
Just keep in mind that if you want to create Set Lists or Binders before completing the clean-up, make it a habit to ALWAYS use the version without a number –this is generally your first download of a tune. If you do this, then later you can delete any tune with a number knowing it won’t impact existing binders or set lists. What if you delete the “wrong” version? Simply download the tune again, then delete the other version. Good Housekeeping may not be a “once and done,” but maintainance is easy compared to the first clean-up.
Making notes on paper as you start this process is helpful. After you’ve done a few, you’ll not need this assistance.
Renaming Tunes: Why would you want to change a title, and How do you do it?
Make it stand out
This is a screen shot of the Details window that you see after clicking “Details” in the Black Bar.
This is where you can rename your tune, Get the Key to show up on the right side of your GigBook window. (The Key is a drop-down menu; just select the one you want.) Write notes to yourself about the tune.
If you make any changes in this window that you want to keep, don’t forget to click Done.
If you make changes and realize you don’t want them to “stick,” just don’t click on the Done; click Cancel on the upper left.
A Title if a tune that makes it difficult to find is not a good title. A title that begins with The, uses apostrophes, commas, or is different than what you actually call the tune is not a very good title. Examples: ‘Waiting for the Robert E Lee,’ ‘Sailing Down the Chesapeake Bay,’ ‘The World is Waiting for the Sunrise,’ ‘When the Saints Go Marching In,’ are example of titles that might be found more easily, especially if you scroll to find tunes, if you change the name to what you, personally, call it. Punctuation can also change how GigBook alphabetizes your songs lists, and it's not always consistent. What if these tunes were renamed ‘Robert E Lee,’ ‘Chesapeake Bay,’ ‘World is Waiting,’ or ‘Saints’? Change the name to what you usually call it when you try to look for it, if it might be helpful. You can always change back if you don’t like it.
Apostrophes and other punctuation can affect the order of an alphabetized list, and are not always consistent. For example, on my iPad I have lots of tunes starting with “I’ll” which are listed in the order I would expect, but I also have some beginning with that same “I’ll" that get listed after “I’ve.” Go figure! This is a major reason to learn how to Search as described in Lesson 1. Also if a tune is misnamed or misspelled, you can change it.
Use the DETAILS BAR to rename those tunes. Start by revealing that bar by doing a "touch and hold,” either on a score’s title, or when viewing the page. When you see the Bar, touch the word “Details.” You will now see a screen window pop-up like the picture above. Using the keyboard that shows at the bottom of the screen, use the Delete key to back space to remove the part of the name you want to change and type in the change. If all you want to do is remove the word “The,” or the number at the end of a tune’s title, place your cursor (the blinking bar) just after the word, and backspace it out.
You can also use this Renaming technique to add the Key to the title if it will help you. This is the standard practice of most of the SBB music sheets. Just be consistent in your style.
And be sure to touch Done when you’re done. Even if you don’t want to bother with changing titles, DO get rid of those duplicates. You’ll be glad you did.
Some Differences between how Set Lists and Binders Work
This section is probably more than you want to know now, but may be helpful in the future as you become more proficient in using DeepDish GigBook.
Things that change universally, whether you change them in All Scores, a Binder, or within any Set List: Title, Composer, and Genre only. The only one of these you will, probably, be dealing with is the Title. These change are even made in pre-existing binders and set lists. You wouldn’t want a title to be different just because it’s in a separate binder, right? So, this makes sense.
Designating Composers and Genres is an advanced section, so I will not cover that here. Do know though, that if you want to play with those features, you will do no harm. If you care to see how I use them, just ask me.
What Changes are Not changed universally?
Changes made to a tune in All Scores or Binder view will not have ANY impact on a copy in an EXISTING Set List, except for the items mentioned above.
Writing directly on a score, or making notes in a details window, while in All Scores view, Recently Downloaded view, or a BINDER view, will show in every other view, except pre-existing Set Lists.
Advanced features such as Key, Tempo, or Duration will not change any tune that is already in a Set List. Remember where I said that putting tunes into a Set List is quite similar to using a paper copy? The only bits that change universally in either direction are the ones mentioned earlier: Title, Composer, Genre.
The only thing that is important for more basic users is to keep in mind that if you make a “beyond the basics” change on a song sheet, and then can’t seem to find it, you may have made the notation on a sheet that was inside a particular Set List.
Once you put a copy of a song sheet into a Set List, notes made on that copy, will not impact the All Scores original, or any copy of the tune in a Binder.
Once a tune is inside a Set List, you can change the tempo, write directly on the sheet, add notes to the Details pane of the tune without changing anything on the original score. This can be quite helpful, especially if learning new music, but these areas are where your biggest learning curve will be.
A Final Note regarding these lessons…. This is the Last of the DeepDish GigBook lessons. If ever people ask for more, I will be pleased to continue, there is so much more one can do with this app! For now, these 6 lessons cover everything that basic users will ever need to use the iPad app successfully. Most important is Search, followed by Set Lists, and how to rearrange the order of songs in a Set, whenever you want, as often as you like, to suit any particular gig list.
I hope that these have been helpful to some. They will remain online here at SacramentoBanjoBand.com.