In the most recent years of my life, I have been privileged enough to sing in many different types of choir settings – and luckily, the majority of my experiences have been good ones. I have talked in my blogs before about the wonderful perks to singing in a choir – but it is also true that being in many ensembles can get a bit chaotic at times. And in the midst of the hustle and bustle of concert season, the last thing anyone wants is to feel the overwhelming dread that they have forgotten their music at home. It is no surprise, then, that a music folder is one of the most important tools that a choir member will carry with them.
But if that is the case, then what is the best type of choir music folder?
I’ve put together a list of requirements that, I think, make a choir folder really stand out above the rest. When I am given a new folder for any ensemble in which I may be singing, these are the qualities that I look for first:
- Sturdiness: Is the folder rigid? Or is it floppy and bendable?
- Can it hold multiple sizes of music?
- Is the music held securely in pl
- Is it a binder or a stringed folder?
- BONUS: is there a spot to hold a pencil?
All of these things, in my opinion, should be qualities that buyers should look for when purchasing choir folders for their singers.
Some singers, however, decide to completely forego the music folder altogether and instead choose to keep all of their music on an iPad or tablet. I am the first person to see all the advantages of doing this: You don’t have to worry about losing individual pieces of music, you have the ability to make the music as large or as small as necessary for you to see it, and carrying around a tablet may end up being lighter than carrying around multiple scores of music! However, putting your music on an iPad or tablet may cause you to run into some legal issues with the publishers of that music. Before downloading any music onto a tablet, make sure that your conductor has permission from the publisher to distribute music electronically to their singers. Doing so without permission can get your choir director in a lot of trouble.
I reached out to the editors at Fred Bock Publishing Group in regards to their favorite kind of music folder to use in performances with their own choirs, and the overwhelming response was “MusicFolder.com”. I reached out to their company and many others in an effort to sample the products and find out which choral music folder really is the best on the market. I never heard back from MusicFolder.com, but I did hear from MyMusicFolder.com, CBPblackfolder.com, and MarloPlastics.com. Each of these companies is a distinguished supplier of choral music folders – as well as other products – so I was very excited to sample the products that they sent me.
Stay tuned on our website and YouTube channel to see the blogs and video reviews that will be out soon of the products sent to me by these distributors. A huge thank you to My Music Folder, CBP Black Folder, and Marlo Plastics for helping me on my quest to find the best choral music folder!