Editing Real Book (section)

==History==
Compositions by [[Steve Swallow]], [[Paul Bley]], and [[Chick Corea]] are heavily represented in ''The Real Book'', along with [[jazz standard]]s and classic jazz compositions. Those were the songs that were played most in Boston in the early 1970s when the book was written.<ref name=":0" /> When Swallow was asked about the origin in February 2018, he said the book was written by students at Berklee who wanted to make money. They asked permission to use some of his songs, and he agreed. Swallow asked Bley and [[Steve Kuhn]] if they wanted some of their songs included, and they did; so they all contributed lead sheets. Swallow helped briefly with editing.<ref name="schroeder">{{cite AV media | people=Schroeder, David (Interviewer) | date=February 14, 2018 | title=Steve Swallow & John Scofield Interviewed by Dr. David Schroeder, NYU Steinhardt Jazz Studies Director | medium=Motion picture | location=New York City | publisher=NYU Steinhardt Jazz Studies}}</ref>

<blockquote>Then I watched these guys finally get the book together. One of them had a beautiful manuscript that subsequently became classic—it's called the Real Book font, and it imitates with uncanny accuracy his hand. He went on to be a big-time music copyist in Hollywood... The irony is that shortly after the book was put out, some other people realized they could photocopy it and sell it themselves, and the two guys who did all the work and put the book together made a lot less money than they had hoped to because there were imitation ''Real Books'' out there almost immediately... ''The Real Book'' was imperfect; there were wrong [[Chord progression|changes]] throughout it, but it was tremendously more accurate than what existed previously. And also, it was a lot more legible; it was easy to read."<ref name="schroeder" /></blockquote>

Only the first volume is the original. The two following volumes of ''The Real Book'' were produced. Volume 2 is printed in characteristically "rough" handwriting and transcription, while the third volume is [[Typesetting|typeset]] on a computer. The transcriptions in ''The Real Book'' are unlicensed; no [[royalties]] are paid to the musicians whose songs appear in the book. Consequently, the book violates copyright and is therefore illegal. In the past, it was usually sold surreptitiously in local music stores, often hidden behind the counter for customers who asked. [[PDF]] editions of the book are often available illegally on [[P2P file sharing|P2P]] networks.

The name is a play on words from the common name for these types of song folios: "[[fake book]]", though it might have been influenced by the Boston alternative weekly newspaper, ''[[The Real Paper]]'', started by writers of ''[[The Phoenix (newspaper)|The Phoenix]]'' newspaper in Boston after a labor dispute.

A variety of dates have been attributed to the book. The April 1990 issue of ''[[Esquire (magazine)|Esquire]]'' featured ''The Real Book'' in the "Man at His Best" column by Mark Roman in an article called "Clef Notes". He stated, "I don't know a jazzman who hasn't owned, borrowed, or Xeroxed pages from a ''Real Book'' at least once in his career," and he quoted John F. Voigt, music librarian at Berklee. "''The Real Book'' came out around 1971.<ref name="Esquire 1990" /> The only material available in print then was crap."

Another feature surfaced on April 10, 1994, in ''[[The New York Times]]'' article "Flying Below the Radar of Copyrights". Guitarist Bill Wurtzel was quoted as saying, "Everyone has one, but no one knows where they come from." The writer of the article, Michael Lydon, said, "I got mine in 1987 from a bassist who lives in Queens and who attended the Berklee School of Music in Boston; many in jazz circles suspect that students there reproduced the first copies of it in the mid-70s."<ref name="NYTs article 1994" />

[[Pat Metheny]] claims that while teaching at [[Berklee College of Music]] from 1973 to 1974, one of his guitar students and one of [[Gary Burton]]'s vibraphone students (both of whom wish to remain anonymous) invented the idea of assembling the anthology that would form ''The Real Book''. Early editions included several compositions by Metheny as "Untitled Tune" as they had not yet been recorded and released.<ref name=":0" />

=== Hal Leonard ===
In 2004, the music publisher [[Hal Leonard]] obtained the rights to most of the tunes contained in the original ''Real Book'' and published the first legal edition, calling it the ''Real Book Sixth Edition'' in tacit acknowledgment of the five previous illegal versions. The cover and binding are identical to the "old" ''Real Book,'' and the books employ a font similar to the handwritten style of the originals. One hundred and thirty-seven tunes were omitted from the 6th edition that were in the 5th, and 90 new tunes were added.<ref name="guide">{{cite web |title=The Real Book Listening Guide · Differences Between the 5th and 6th Editions |url=http://www.realbooklisten.com/realbook6-diffs.php |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130509190718/http://www.realbooklisten.com/realbook6-diffs.php |url-status=dead |archive-date=9 May 2013 |access-date=2 December 2018 |date=9 May 2013}}</ref>

Hal Leonard released ''The Real Book, Volume II, Second Edition'' in answer to the ''Real Book, Volume II''. This was followed by ''The Real Book, Volume III, Second Edition'' (July 2006), ''The Real Book, Volume IV'' (December 2010), ''The Real Book, Volume V'' (June 2013), and ''The Real Book, Volume VI'' (June 2016). These books contain much of the same material as their counterparts, and in most cases charts from Hal Leonard books are compatible with the ''Real Book'' charts. In some cases, compatibility issues occur where corrections have been made to some of the mistakes in the 5th edition charts; in other cases, 6th edition charts reference changes on different recordings from those cited in the previous edition.