Smartphones are excellent tools for listening to and sharing music, but what about for creating it? It turns out there are a wide variety of apps for musicians that can make making music easier.

Whether you’ve been perfecting your musical talents for years or are just starting out, these apps can help you achieve your rockstar dreams.

Metronomes

For live shows you’ve got the drummer to keep the beat, but what about when you’re practicing at home, learning a new instrument, or preparing for a piano recital? There are a lot of different metronome apps, but let’s start with the highest rated. Metronome is a metronome app for iOS devices, and will only cost you $1.99. Mobile Metronome is a free metronome app for Android users.

Tuners

Musicians need to keep their instruments in tune. These are the best apps for keeping your instrument tuned on the go. DaTuner is a chromatic tuner for Android, and it’s available in a free beta version or a pro version for $2.65. For Apple users there’s Cleartune, which is available for $3.99.

Chord!

This app provides an extensive chord dictionary, let’s you hear how a cord should sound, and includes a wide variety of scales. If you’re just beginning, Chord! is a great starting point, and if you’re a veteran it’s an excellent reference. This app is available on Android devices for $3.99

Music Tutor Sight Read

This one’s a great tool to learn how to read and write music. Music Tutor Sight Read provides a variety of games to help make learning music fun. This specific app is only available on the Android market, but Music Tutor (Sight Reading Improver) is a similar app for iOS devices.

Perfect Ear

Here’s another app musicians working on ear training. Perfect Ear provides a variety of tools and exercises to help you better identify pitch from a variety of instruments. This app is available on Android devices for free, and pro versions are available for $0.99.

Setlist Monkey

Setlist Monkey does a whole lot more than just help you manage setlists. You can use the app to create the perfect setlist then share it with your bandmates via email to manage and organize band rehearsals and shows, and make sure your band starts out each song at the right tempo with this app’s included metronome. You can get Setlist Monkey on iOS devices for $3.99 from the Apple app store.

As you can see, there are a wide variety of apps to help musicians perfect their craft. This list really only brushes the surface of apps available to musicians, so get out there and explore to find out which ones are the best for you!

Have you used any of these apps in your quest for musical greatness? Which other apps do you find useful? Sound off in the comments below!

Guest Post: Jenna Markowski is a member of the content team at Quality Logo Products, a top-notch promotional products company specializing in all kinds of logo merchandise. She loves music and frequently writes about social media tips on their marketing blog.