My Music Rest Has Disappeared — Turning the Pergamon into a Digital Music Library

The biggest change I made to my organ wasn't musical at all — I removed the music rest.

When most people look at a large electronic organ such as my Wersi OAX Pergamon, their attention naturally goes to the keyboards, pedals, stops, controls and sounds.

That is understandable. After all, those are the things that actually make the music.

But one of the most useful changes I have made to my own Pergamon has nothing directly to do with the sound of the instrument.

I have effectively removed the conventional music-rest arrangement and replaced it with a large computer screen.

Instead of reaching for folders filled with printed music, loose sheets and photocopies, I can now call up much of my music electronically.

For me, this is not technology for the sake of technology. It is an example of something I enjoy doing in many areas: looking at the way something has traditionally been done, identifying the parts that cause inconvenience, and asking whether there might be a better solution.

In this case, the question was very simple:

Why should an instrument capable of producing extraordinarily sophisticated digital sound still depend entirely on pieces of paper sitting on a wooden or plastic music rest?

The Traditional Music Rest Has Worked for Centuries

There is, of course, nothing inherently wrong with printed music.

It works.

You put the music on the stand, open the book at the correct page and start playing.

There are no operating systems to update, no cables to connect and no possibility of the screen suddenly deciding that it would rather do something else.

Printed music has another enormous advantage: familiarity.

Musicians have been reading from paper for generations. You can make a pencil mark beside a difficult passage, circle a fingering, add a registration note or put a great large warning mark beside the bar where you repeatedly make the same mistake.

A well-used piece of music almost becomes part of the history of learning the piece.

So my aim was never to prove that digital music is universally better than paper.

It was to see whether digital technology could remove some of the frustrations that increasingly appear when a collection of music grows.

The Problem Starts When the Music Collection Gets Bigger

One piece of music is easy to manage.

Ten pieces are not difficult either.

But over many years it is very easy to accumulate hundreds — potentially thousands — of pieces.

There may be:

• individual sheets;

• music books;

• photocopies;

• downloaded PDFs;

• arrangements in different keys;

• different editions of the same piece;

• music for organ;

• music for piano;

• orchestral scores;

• theatre-organ arrangements;

• church music;

• popular music;

• teaching material;

• pieces being learned;

• pieces already mastered;

• and pieces that I might want to play again one day.

Eventually the problem is not owning the music.

The problem is finding it.

That is where a digital library begins to become very attractive.

Hundreds of Pieces Can Be Available Almost Instantly

With music stored electronically, the physical size of the collection stops being particularly important.

A folder containing 500 PDF scores takes up practically no more physical space beside the organ than a folder containing five.

More importantly, those scores can be organised and searched.

Instead of thinking:

"I know I have that arrangement somewhere..."

I can search for the title, composer or filename and bring it onto the screen.

That completely changes the experience of casually choosing something to play.

Suppose I suddenly decide I would like to play a particular film theme, hymn, theatre-organ piece or classical work.

With a paper library, I might have to leave the instrument, find the correct shelf, search through several books and perhaps discover that the music I want is somewhere else entirely.

With the digital system, the search can take seconds.

That encourages experimentation because there is much less friction between thinking of a piece and actually playing it.

A Large Screen Makes an Enormous Difference

Simply replacing paper with a small tablet is not necessarily an improvement.

Music notation contains a great deal of information.

There are notes, accidentals, dynamics, articulation markings, fingering, pedal markings, chord symbols, registration changes and sometimes several staves to follow simultaneously.

That is why I wanted a large screen rather than simply balancing a small tablet where the music rest used to be.

The larger display allows the notation to remain comfortably readable.

And unlike a printed book, a digital score can be enlarged.

That is particularly useful with music that has:

• been scanned from an older source;

• originally been printed in a small format;

• complicated notation;

• several staves;

• detailed registration instructions;

• or awkwardly crowded pages.

A difficult passage can potentially be enlarged temporarily and examined much more closely.

For anyone whose eyesight is not quite what it was decades ago, that alone can be a substantial advantage.

The Page Is No Longer Necessarily Fixed

Printed music has one rather obvious limitation.

The size of the notation was decided when the page was printed.

Digital music does not have to work like that.

Depending upon the software being used, it may be possible to:

• zoom into the page;

• display a complete page;

• display two pages side by side;

• crop unnecessary margins;

• rotate a page;

• change the screen brightness;

• or move rapidly between different sections.

That flexibility can be surprisingly useful.

For example, when learning a difficult section I may care far more about clearly seeing four particular bars than seeing the whole page.

Once the section becomes familiar, I can return to a normal view.

Digital presentation therefore has the potential to change depending upon what I am actually trying to achieve.

No More Loose Sheets

Anyone who has used photocopied or downloaded music will know the problem.

One piece might consist of six separate sheets.

Those sheets then have to be placed in order, kept together and somehow prevented from sliding, falling or becoming mixed with something else.

And, naturally, the sheet you actually need is often the one that has disappeared.

Digital files remove that particular problem completely.

Page 5 cannot accidentally migrate into a different folder.

A gust of wind cannot send page 3 across the room.

And the piece does not suddenly become unplayable because someone has moved one sheet to another pile.

There is something wonderfully satisfying about pressing a few controls and having the complete score appear exactly where it should be.

Organisation Becomes Far More Powerful

A digital music collection does not have to be organised in only one way.

That is another important difference.

A physical book has to sit on one shelf.

A digital file can effectively belong to several categories.

I might organise music by:

• composer;

• musical style;

• difficulty;

• instrument;

• performance;

• practice;

• church music;

• theatre organ;

• classical music;

• film music;

• Christmas;

• teaching;

• or simply favourites.

I can also use filenames intelligently.

A consistent naming system makes an enormous difference once a digital library becomes large.

For example, rather than keeping files with names such as:

scan000347.pdf

it is much more useful to have something such as:

Bach - Jesu Joy of Mans Desiring.pdf

The technology is only useful if the information itself is organised properly.

This is something I encounter in many areas of computing: storing information is easy; being able to retrieve it efficiently is the real challenge.

Annotated PDFs Bring Back Some of the Advantages of Pencil

One criticism of electronic music is perfectly reasonable:

"I like writing on my score."

So do I.

But electronic documents do not necessarily mean giving up annotation.

Many PDF systems allow notes, highlighting, symbols and handwritten markings to be added electronically.

That could include:

• fingering;

• registration changes;

• reminders about tempo;

• notes about articulation;

• rehearsal markings;

• difficult bars;

• pedal instructions;

• or reminders to change a sound or accompaniment setting.

In some respects this can be more flexible than pencil.

A digital annotation can be moved, changed or removed without gradually turning the page into an indecipherable collection of old markings.

It also raises another useful possibility.

You could keep an untouched original score and a separate working copy containing your personal markings.

More Than Just the Score Can Sit Beside the Organ

This is where the system starts becoming more interesting than simply replacing a sheet of paper.

A computer display is not restricted to displaying notation.

Suppose I am learning a piece.

Alongside the music I could potentially have immediate access to:

• a professional recording;

• a backing track;

• a MIDI file;

• a rehearsal recording;

• notes about registration;

• information about the composer;

• alternative arrangements;

• lyrics;

• performance notes;

• or even a video of somebody else playing the piece.

That can turn the organ console into much more of a complete learning environment.

For example, if I am unsure about the intended phrasing in a passage, I can listen to a reference performance.

If I am experimenting with registration, I can record different versions and compare them.

If I am working on a piece for video production, I might also have the accompanying film material available nearby.

The distinction between music stand, computer, recording system and creative workstation begins to disappear.

Electronic Page Turning Could Solve One of Music's Oldest Problems

(The same page turner I use but on the white OAX 800)

There is one problem that musicians have been battling since long before computers existed.

Turning the page.

You reach the bottom of the page.

Both hands are busy.

Your feet may also be busy.

And somehow the page needs to move.

Organists are particularly familiar with this problem because both hands and both feet can be occupied simultaneously.

Electronic music opens the possibility of using:

• a foot pedal;

• a programmable button;

• a touchscreen control;

• a wireless controller;

• or another switching system

to turn pages electronically.

The ideal system would allow the page to change without interrupting the performance at all.

I think this is one of those areas where digital technology is not merely copying paper.

It can genuinely improve upon it.

There Are Disadvantages

It would be very easy to write an article such as this and claim that digital music is obviously the future and everyone should throw away their music books.

I do not believe that.

Digital systems introduce their own problems.

Computers Can Go Wrong

Paper music has an outstanding reliability record.

It does not crash.

It does not install an update immediately before you want to play.

It does not forget which monitor it is supposed to be using.

A digital system therefore needs to be reliable, particularly if it is going to be used for performance rather than simply practice.

Screens Need Power

A printed score keeps working during a power cut.

Admittedly, my Pergamon itself becomes a little less useful if the electricity disappears, but the principle still matters for portable digital music systems.

File Organisation Requires Discipline

A thousand badly named PDF files are not a library.

They are a digital cupboard full of paper.

Files need sensible names, folders and backups.

Scans Vary in Quality

Older music may have been scanned poorly.

Pages might be crooked, dark, incomplete or difficult to read.

Some material is much more pleasant to use as the original printed edition.

Copyright Still Matters

The fact that music can be copied electronically does not mean that everything may legally be copied, shared or distributed.

Digital storage does not remove normal copyright responsibilities.

And Paper Still Feels Different

There is also something that is much harder to quantify.

A good music book is pleasant to use.

You can physically see how far you are through a piece.

You can flick rapidly backwards and forwards.

You develop a memory of where something sits on the page.

An old score can also contain a history.

There may be pencil marks made while learning it twenty years ago.

A particular book may remind you of a teacher, an examination, a concert or another period of your life.

Digital files are enormously convenient.

But convenience is not the only thing that matters.

I certainly do not intend to dispose of my printed music collection.

Instead, I see the digital system as another way of accessing it.

It Is Really an Example of Problem-Solving

The part of this project that interests me most is not actually the screen.

It is the thinking behind it.

I had a conventional arrangement.

I identified several inconveniences:

• limited space;

• increasing amounts of music;

• small notation;

• awkward page turning;

• loose sheets;

• and difficulty finding things quickly.

Then I asked what existing technology might do better.

That is the sort of experimentation I enjoy.

It is the same approach I use in photography, video production, science teaching, electronics and computing.

You do not necessarily need to accept equipment exactly as it arrives from the manufacturer.

Sometimes a piece of equipment becomes much more useful when it is adapted to the way you actually work.

Technology Should Disappear Into the Creative Process

The best technology is often the technology you eventually stop noticing.

If I have to spend ten minutes fighting with the computer every time I want to play something, then my digital music library has failed.

The objective is exactly the opposite.

I want to sit at the Pergamon, choose a piece, bring it onto the screen and start making music.

The screen should not become the centre of attention.

The organ should not become the centre of attention either.

Ultimately, the music is what matters.

That is an important principle as more technology enters music creation.

We now have extraordinary electronic instruments, virtual synthesisers, DAWs, digital scores, software instruments, recording systems and increasingly AI-assisted tools.

All of them can be useful.

But they are tools.

The purpose is not to operate impressive technology.

The purpose is to make something worth listening to.

The Biggest Change Wasn't Musical

Replacing the traditional music rest on my Wersi Pergamon with a large digital display may appear to be a fairly simple alteration.

But it has changed the way I think about my music collection.

Instead of music being something stored in books and folders elsewhere in the room, it can become an immediately accessible digital library sitting directly in front of the instrument.

Thousands of pages can occupy virtually no physical space.

Notation can be enlarged.

Scores can be searched.

PDFs can be annotated.

Recordings and backing tracks can sit alongside them.

Pages may eventually be turned without removing a hand from the keyboard.

And yet the old printed score remains valuable.

For me, that is the important conclusion.

The aim is not to replace traditional music simply because technology exists. It is to use technology where it genuinely makes playing, learning and creating music easier.

My music rest may have disappeared.

The music most certainly has not.