Virtmus

VirtMus (virtual music) is a free application that allows the user to display sheet music and turn pages without removing the hands (or feet) from the instrument the music is performed on. This feature is very useful during concerts and practice sessions as it allows the musician to focus on performing the music without interruption. The software also allows the users to store and organize their entire sheet music collection on a laptop, making it fully portable and available at a click of a button.

Details:
- Music stands are usually able to accomodate at most a single book or 2-3 pages of loose leaf music at once. When performing a longer piece of music, the musician must often move one of the hands away from the instrument to turn the pages. This interupts the performance and breaks the flow of music especially when the page turn occurs during a musically demanding passage.
- This software allows the user to create "songs" out of sheet music images obtained from a scanner, digital camera, or pdf, and "PlayLists" out of the "songs". During a performance, the user can simply press a mouse button to move to the next / previous page or press various keyboard keys to advance the music.
- USB foot switches are available which emulate mouse button presses thus freeing the hands to play the instrument. Even without a FootSwitch, using a laptop display avoids the problem of books that don't stay open, or loose leaf pages that fly off the music stand when the wind (or HVAC unit) blows.