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Old Sheet Music Collecting Tips

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When you begin a sheet music collection

If you are looking for something to collect, I might suggest starting with old sheet music.

This old paper is easily found just about anywhere due to the music having been published and sold in mass quantities.

Just like the old vinyl records and compact discs of today, sheet music for specific songs sold a million or more copies. Any piano player would buy the music to play for family or friends and these copies have been saved by the generations afterward.

Image Credit: From The Personal Collection of Bev Owens

Contents at a Glance

How do I start my sheet music collection...
Movie Sheet Music Reference Book
Topics To Consider for Your Collection

Example of Pretty Lady Covers
A Guide To Antique And Vintage American...
Well Known Sheet Music Cover Artists

Many people will decide on a particular area or style of sheet music for their collection. Most will chose the sheet music for the illustration on the cover. Popular celebrities, sports icons, historical events and lovely ladies are a few of the most popular types of collections. Some will collect old sheet music from a particular era such as the 1920s.

Old time sheet music is found at garage sales, estate sales, local flea markets, antique shops, and of course on line websites. You should be able to purchase most sheet music for under $10. Beware of sellers who identify sheet music as being rare. It would be highly unlikely that any piece is rare - they were produced and sold by the hundreds of thousands. There are a few in that rare and hard to find area. So politely ask the seller to explain why a piece is particularly rare or hard to find before you purchase it.

Image Credit: From The Personal Collection of Bev Owens

Movie Sheet Music Reference Book

A great genre for collecting sheet music would be to concentrate on the sheets from old movies. This reference book would be very helpful for starting your collection.

The Best in Movie Sheet Music

by: Coates, Dan

Amazon Price: $7.26 (as of 02/16/2012)
List Price: $11.95

Usually ships in 1-2 business days

Topics To Consider for Your Collection

1. Pick a specific era of music such as popular songs of a decade. Maybe songs from the 1930s.

2. Show Tunes - Broadway Songs or songs from movies

3. Pretty women done by popular artists

4. Style of a cover such as Art Deco or Art Nouveau

5. Celebrity Covers

6. Military Songs

Example of Pretty Lady Covers

Very Nice Old Sheet Music To Collect

Will You
Buy This Allposters.com

A Guide To Antique And Vintage American Sheet Music

A wonderful reference to help with collecting old sheet music, it covers 200 years of the song sheets.

American Sheet Music: A Guide to Collecting Sheet Music from 1775 to 1975 with prices

by: Daniel B Priest

Amazon Price: $7.01 (as of 02/16/2012)
List Price:

Usually ships in 1-2 business days

Well Known Sheet Music Cover Artists

One category of collecting old sheet music is by the Artist who illustrated the cover. Here is a list of well known Cover Artists.

Sharmer Brothers - William and Frederick

Edward Pfeiffer

John Frew

Albert Barbelle

R. S. (Rosebud)

Gene Buck

Henry Reichard

Sydney Leff

Frederick S. Manning

Clare Victor Dwiggens

Bill Edwards

Sheet Music Guy Lombardo - Maggie Blues

Some Great Sites to Visit

to find Old Sheet Music

These websites are places that I have visited and think you might like them too.

Antique and Vintage Piano Sheet Music: I sell antique and vintage piano sheet music. Old sheet music is great for framing and decorating your music room, or for its original purpose, playing! All of my music is original from the time period stated. Go check out my eBay store: www.shellyssheetmusicandmore.com!
The Old Rugged Cross: What is your favorite hymn? One of the most popular song is 'The Old Rugged Cross'. It was written in 1912 by George Bennard (1873-1958). This lens is a tribute to this great hymn with links and resources that any Gospel song enthusiast would find useful! ____________ The Old Rugged Cross Lyrics On
My Granny's Attic: We have a full stock of vintage sheet music and collectible sheet music for everyone if you love old songs and sheet music we can help including hard to find and out of print sheet music. Antique sheet music and vintage sheet music.
De Witt & Co - Sheet Music: Offering for sale vintage and antique sheet music from the 1800s through the mid-1900s. Web store featuring vintage textiles, sewing patterns, vintage magazines and ephemera.
The Retrovert Vintage Sheet Music Art: A collection of restored Vintage Sheet Music Art printed on Shirts, Greeting Cards, Postcards, Posters and Coffee Mugs.
Favorite Old Time Song Lyrics: Here are some lyrics to great old time songs the ole folks used to listen to when they'd sing-a-long. When I sang karaoke songs at local nursing homes, some of the ole folks would sing along with me to old time tunes they knew like, 'Down By the Riverside'. It was a lot of fun. Maybe I'll go do that
Old Sheet Music - Antique and Collectable: Old Sheet Music - Antique and Collectible - From Victoria to the 60's! - Hundreds always in stock.
Song Lyrics: Song lyrics database with 750,000+ song lyrics searchable by artist and song name.

Sheet Music Art Print

Football Freddy

Football Freddy, Sheet Music Art Print
12.5 in. x 18 in.
Buy at AllPosters.com

A Price Guide For Vintage Sheet Music

Sheet Music : A Price Guide

by: Debbie Dillon

Amazon Price: $1.99 (as of 02/16/2012)
List Price: $6.95

Usually ships in 1-2 business days

Sheet Music Tweets

Sheet Music Cover Beautiful Star of Heaven

Find Out What Old Time Sheet Music Is Worth

This is a great book to have as a reference for your collection of old sheet music. Having this price guide will help you decide whether a price is too high or not and will also help you value the collection you have.

Sheet Music Reference And Price Guide (Sheet Music Reference & Price Guide)

by: Anna M. Guiheen, Marie A. Pafik

Amazon Price: $9.44 (as of 02/16/2012)
List Price: $19.95

Usually ships in 1-2 business days

Start Your Collection Of Old Sheet Music

You can start obtaining pieces to add to your Sheet Music collection by looking at the popular auction site, eBay. On any given day, you can find a large variety in any genre.

Have Old Sheet Music Printed On Your I-Phone Case

perfect for the collector as a gift!

Red Wing Vintage Sheet Music IPhone Cover by PaperTimeMachine

Add A Musical Note To This Virtual Sheet

Thank you for visiting my tips for collecting old sheet music. Please feel free to leave a little note to let me know you stopped by.

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cindy murphy Jan 25, 2012 @ 6:28 pm | delete

I have a copy of as time goe by sheet music framed by harms. Is it worth anything and should I take it out of the fame. The frame is old and frames byTwin City picture framing in edina new york if that helps thanks alot

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Anne Shriver Jan 19, 2012 @ 9:06 am | delete

My daughter-in-law has just been given a fantastic collection of sheet music ranging from early 1900s to 1980s. I have been helping sort it and wondered what is next. She wants to frame some but she has several hundred pieces. Where do we start?

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Tiffany Pierce Dec 19, 2011 @ 1:26 pm | delete

I have a book that I would like to get more information on. What do you suggest? Its a 1960's best of the best of Broadway volume 7 including all the latest songs plus Beatles hits. No pictures just a book. Has a lot of songs in it. I can't find a publisher or exact year. Any help or insight would be appreciated. bought it at an estate sale along with a bunch of other old sheet music. Thanks so much.

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BevsPaper Dec 19, 2011 @ 2:30 pm | delete

Unfortunately those compilation songbooks aren't very collectible. Without a publisher and a year I would have trouble giving you much information. My educated guess would be it might be worth a couple of dollars at best.

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ottoblotto Sep 29, 2011 @ 8:16 pm | delete

Lovely work; I like old sheet music as well.

Reply

Anahid May 3, 2011 @ 6:11 pm | delete

good information greatlens. All the best. anna

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MamaBelle Jan 31, 2011 @ 4:29 pm | delete

Great Lens, very interesting,Thank You.

Reply

vallain Jul 30, 2010 @ 8:07 am | delete

My sister found "Give My Regards to Broadway" and had it framed to remember all the years we watched Yankee Doodle Dandy every 4th of July. Sheet music makes great wall art.
This is perfect to lensroll to my What's a Cakewalk lens.

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OhMe Jun 8, 2010 @ 5:28 pm | delete

We have some really old sheet music so I need to pay much closer attention to it and maybe get you to appraise some of them for us.