[PianoMan]

If you are looking for sheet music for a specific song, be aware that songs written in at least the last several decades fall under copyright law which prohibits sheet music from being distributed without permission (and thus, without royalty payments) from the original composer. As such, you almost certainly will not find free sheet music for any given song.

You may be able to find sheet music for a song through the purchase of an official songbook, or from a site that specifically sells sheet music.

You may be able to find some free sheet music for older songs from the other stickied thread labeled "Looking for sheet music? Come here first...".

If you are capable of improvising piano parts off of chords, then you can find the chords for various songs in the guitar chords section of this website.

[Folk_guy]

Very good remindier Pianoman, composers make their living off the royalties paid for recording, and sheet music sales, airplay, etc. of their music. If you distribute those items for free then there is no reason for the composer to keep writing new music, and publishing it. Support the artists whose music you admire by paying for it. There are sights where you can download sheetmusic for a modest fee, and the composer will get their share of the money. Illegal copying and distributing of music is stealing, and shouldn't be something a Christian is engaged in.

[musicfunman]

Originally Posted by PianoMan

If you are looking for sheet music for a specific song, be aware that songs written in at least the last several decades fall under copyright law which prohibits sheet music from being distributed without permission (and thus, without royalty payments) from the original composer. As such, you almost certainly will not find free sheet music for any given song.

You may be able to find sheet music for a song through the purchase of an official songbook, or from a site that specifically sells sheet music.

You may be able to find some free sheet music for older songs from the other stickied thread labeled "Looking for sheet music? Come here first...".

If you are capable of improvising piano parts off of chords, then you can find the chords for various songs in the guitar chords section of this website.

As a long-time performing and arranging musician (arrangements can be copyrighted, too), with a master's degree in music and a law degree with a background in copyright law, I am acutely aware of how often people (sometimes innocently, sometimes not so innocently) blatantly violate artists' copyrights.

Not only is printed sheet music affected, but many times I have had to cousel my fellow Christians that, no, they should not copy that music CD or that movie DVD, so they can "lend" it to a friend.

The situation is even more egregious when it comes to computer software. As a person who's had many years experience in teaching computers and software in the workplace, I am especially sensitive when people tell me that they're going to copy a piece of software and not just lend, but give it to a friend, who otherwise couldn't afford to buy it.

Furthermore, I've had many requests from friends and acquaintances to please provide them some technical assistance with their computer. One of the first questions that I ask is: "Do you have a legal copy of every piece of software on your computer?" Sometimes I get the impression that people think I'm nuts when I ask this.

But I will not work on any computer or provide any assistance to anyone who is infringing the copyrights of the software creators -- even though it might be a software giant such as Microsoft.

We must remind ourselves that software is also a work of art.

Sorry I got off the music topic and into computers -- it's just that I see a lot of infringement of all kinds. Sometimes the infringement is innocent, because a person just doesn't understand copyright. Other times, it's intentional and blatant, purposely depriving artists of the royalties that they are due because of their creative efforts.