Music engraving is the sister of book printing. The unknown sister, mind you, the one most people have forgotten ever existed. But go back far enough, and there they are, sitting together on the family tree. Back then, in Renaissance Venice, where Manutius and Petrucci frequented the same printing houses.
Since then, the two branches have grown so far apart that it would baffle even the keenest genealogist. Book has had quite a journey. Through fortunate connections, it travelled to France, the Netherlands, England and Germany, rubbing shoulders with the likes of William Morris and Jan Tschichold along the way, picking up typography, grid systems and visual identity as it went. Book has come up in the world.
Sheet Music’s story is rather different. At some point, it was given up for adoption. The new family were lovely, but they knew nothing of its origins. There were the odd holidays to England and the States, but mostly, Sheet Music stayed at home. This family believed nothing should be reserved for the few. Everyone should be free to do as they liked, and Sheet Music was given some rather smart notation software for its birthday. Here, it could publish whatever it fancied.
But somewhere along the way, Sheet Music lost sight of where it came from. It became efficient, democratised, digitised. But its sister, Book? Forgotten entirely. And the old bond with printing and design feels, these days, as though it never really existed.
Perhaps it’s time for a family reunion.
- date
- 23 Jun 2026