OnSong

What is OnSong?

1. It’s a mobile app that holds all your music digitally – no more lugging around binders and books!
2. It costs $30, but it’s worth every penny. [Important disclaimer: There are other similar programs, which we haven’t tried, but OnSong works so well we’re not even tempted by them!]
3. It works best on an iPad; it will work on an iPhone or iPod touch, but those are typically too small to see everything on the screen.
4. It allows you to transpose the song on the fly, which is a big win for banjos and guitars using capos.
5. Where do the songs themselves come from? Well, unfortunately, there is no miraculous, central source where all Bluegrass songs every written magically live; you either create them yourself (which is not too hard once you get the hang of it), get them from other OnSong users who share them through OnSong.

How to Populate Your Song Library

Note: these are presented by degree of difficulty; your mileage may vary!

1. Get a Song from a Bluegrass Buddy via Beaming
   1. Make sure you are both on the same WiFi network
   2. Your buddy will choose the “Share” icon, then choose Beam, then verify that your device is listed. Your buddy with then tap “Share” in the upper right.
   3. On your device, you will get a popup that says “Receiving Your Song Set” — choose either “Always” or “Accept” and the song will appear.
2. Get a Song a Song from a Bluegrass Buddy via Cloud File Storage
   1. Your buddy will share a file or folder with you via DropBox or Google.
   2. From “All Songs” choose the “+” symbol in the lower right of the list of songs, and choose your method under the Import section.
   3. This requires some setup. Wayward Strings is currently using DropBox, so please see these instructions.
3. Create a Song from Scratch
   1. Lyrics
      1. Conduct an internet search for the lyrics of your song.
      2. Paste those into the word processor of your choice; Google Doc, iPad Notes app, Microsoft Word, etc.
      3. Extra credit: listen to recorded versions on YouTube, Spotify, etc. to fine tune your results, find extra verses, capture the most accurate version, etc.
   2. Chords
      1.  Conduct an internet search for the chords of your song.
      2. Insert the chords into the lyrics using bracketed chords – see this example
      3. Extra credit: listen to recorded versions on YouTube, Spotify, etc. to fine tune your results.
   3. Method 1 – Import from Google
      1. Create your song lyrics and chords in a Google Doc.
      2. Save that Doc in a folder that will be easy to find in your account; for example, create a folder called “OnSong” and put all your songs in this folder.
      3. On your device, create a new song by tapping the “+” symbol in the lower right list of songs, and choose “Google Drive” from the “Import” section. The very first time you do this you will have to connect your Google account.
      4. Navigate to your folder and select the song(s), and tap on “Import” in the upper right.
      5. Note: the song will be placed in whatever Book you started in when selecting the “+” symbol.
   4. Method 2 – Console
      1. Purchase and setup the Console module.
      2. Within Console, create your song lyrics and chords, and tap the “Save” butotn
   5. Method 3 – Copy / Paste
      1. Copy the text that has your lyrics with embedded chords; this needs to be done from your OnSong device
      2. On your device, create a new song by tapping the “+” symbol in the lower right list of songs, and choose Add / New Song.
      3. Tap the page to activate the cursor, and paste the lyrics and chords into page. Then tap “Done” in the upper right. You now have a new song.
4. Import a Song from Website:
   1. Caveats:
      1. This only works with the Safari web browser.
      2. There’s no guarantee that the lyrics and chords are correct; you are encouraged to verify and fix as needed.
      3. When you import the song, the formatting will almost always be off and you have to do a little (or a lot!) of cleanup. Here’s the result of importing Blue Moon of Kentucky.
   2. Follow these instructions to add the “Add to Safari” extension
   3. Find websites that have song charts.
      1. OnSong (mostly Christian music, FYI, not m/any Bluegrass tunes)
      2. Chordie (not a ton of bluegrass, but some; here’s an example)
      3. Classic Country Lyrics (lots of bluegrass, decent accuracy)