Song book

A song book is a book that contains a collection of songs, often with information on the musical arrangement.

Content

Content cover song books from a wide range, which includes, among other collections of art and folk songs, songs of one or more artist or from a particular subject area. Song books and can contain no text of the songs only the text ( poetry), information on song accompaniment ( for example Chordsheets in the form of chords ) or the complete music notation.

Songbooks, which are used to singing together in a fixed group are - called hymnals - especially in the church.

History

The emergence of the genre of books " Songbook " is closely connected to the recording of vernacular songs in the late Middle Ages and the spread of the printing press since the mid-15th century.

Song manuscripts, ie handwritten song collections as a precursor of the printed song books are handed since the late 13th century. This group includes the oldest known as songbook works, such as the Augsburg songbook of 1454, the Lochamer Songbook ( 1460 ), the Glogau Song Book or the Rostock Songbook (both in 1480 ).

In addition to the text printing with movable type, the development of music printing with movable type by Erhard Oeglin ( ocellus ) was an important stage in the development of the genre of books in 1507. Also of Oeglin dates the oldest known printed songbook, which in 1512 published in Augsburg Songbook, to 4 voices with works by Heinrich Isaac, Ludwig Senfl, Paul Hofhaimer and others. Around the same time, song books published by Arnt of Aich in Cologne and Peter Schoeffer in Mainz.