Import & Migration

Switching apps shouldn’t mean retyping ten years of repertoire. The importer brings your songs in from a file — and if you’re coming from BandHelper, it migrates the whole band: setlists, gig history, lead sheets, recordings, and MIDI settings included.

Where to Find It

• Go to the Songs tab and tap the Import button
• Or open the command palette (Cmd/Ctrl+K) and run Import Songs
• Or, when creating a new band, pick Import Your Library as your starting point — the importer opens right after the band is created

Supported Formats

Format	Best for
BandHelper JSON export	Full migration — songs plus setlists, gigs, documents, recordings, and MIDI
Tab-separated TXT	BandHelper’s simpler list export
CSV	Spreadsheets and exports from other apps
ChordPro	A single chart, or a zip of them, from OnSong, SongbookPro, Setlist Helper, or LinkeSOFT — song titles, artists, keys, tempos, and chart bodies come across
PDF charts	Loose chart PDFs (or PNG/JPG) from a tool that only exports a picture — each file becomes a song with the chart attached

Import Songs

1. Drop your file in the upload zone
2. Review the column mapping — columns are matched to Gigmeister fields automatically, and you can adjust any of them
3. Fix or skip rows with validation issues
4. Resolve duplicates — songs already in your library are detected by title, and you choose to skip or merge each one
5. Review the preview and confirm

Large libraries import in batches automatically — a few hundred songs go through in one run.

Note

Re-running an import is safe. Songs that already landed are detected as duplicates, so a re-run picks up where the last one stopped instead of doubling your library.

Songs From PDF

Some tools only export a picture of each chart — a PDF with no text behind it, and no list to map. When a stack of chart PDFs is all you have, import them directly: each file becomes a song, with the PDF attached as its lead sheet.

1. Open the Import dialog and pick Songs from PDF
2. Drop your chart files — PDF, PNG, or JPG, or a zip of them, up to 100 at a time
3. Review the titles — each is read from the filename (“All Along The Watchtower Chords.pdf” becomes “All Along The Watchtower”), and the artist is filled in when the name makes it clear (“Oasis - Wonderwall.pdf”). Edit any title, add the artist, or drop a file from the batch
4. Confirm — the songs are created and each chart is attached

The chart stays as the attached PDF, so it’s always there to read. Keys, tempos, and lyrics stay blank until you add them — the titles are a starting point you can fix as you go.

Migrating From BandHelper

Export your account data from BandHelper as JSON and run it through Import Songs first. Song custom fields, tags, keys, tempos, and lyrics come across in that pass. When it completes, the follow-up importers appear on the completion screen — each one reads the export you already dropped, so there’s nothing to upload twice.

Run them in this order:

1. Setlists — setlist names, song order, section markers, and gig dates
2. Gig History — past gigs and rehearsals land in your calendar, linked to the setlists imported in the previous step. History imports are silent — nobody gets paged about a gig from 2019
3. Sheets — attach the documents from your export to their songs
4. Recordings — attach exported recordings as backing tracks
5. MIDI — your MIDI devices and per-song program changes. Devices are matched to the ones configured in Settings > MIDI Devices, and missing ones are created for you

Each follow-up importer also works on its own — open it from the Import dialog any time and drop the files directly.

Sheets & Recordings

Both importers take a zip straight from your export — it’s expanded in the browser, and files are matched to songs automatically:

• Files from a BandHelper export are matched through the export’s own song links
• Anything else is matched by filename — “Wonderwall.pdf” and “Oasis - Wonderwall.pdf” both land on Wonderwall

Every match is a suggestion: review the assignments, reassign or clear any of them, then confirm. Sheets accept PDF, PNG, and JPG and attach as lead sheets. Recordings accept MP3 and WAV and attach as backing tracks; .mid files in the same batch attach as MIDI clips.

Remove Demo Content

If your band started with the demo songs, the Import dialog offers Remove Demo Content once your own library is in. One tap clears the sample songs and setlists for the whole band — your imported and hand-added material stays untouched.

Choosing a Starting Point

When creating a band, the onboarding wizard asks how to start:

• Demo Songs — 20 sample songs, 3 setlists, and 2 groups to explore the app
• Import Your Library — the importer opens right after your band is created
• Start Empty — a blank library, ready for your first song

There’s no lock-in either way: demo content can be removed later, and the importer is always a tap away from the Songs tab.

Coming From Another App

Most setlist and sheet-music apps export CSV — that goes straight through the song importer, with column mapping to line up their fields with Gigmeister’s. Sheets and recordings can then be bulk-attached by filename through the follow-up importers.

Chart apps that export ChordPro — OnSong, SongbookPro, Setlist Helper, LinkeSOFT SongBook — are covered too: drop a single .cho / .chordpro chart, or a zip of them, and each file becomes a song with its title, artist, key, tempo, and chart. Chords-above-lyrics charts (.crd / .tab, or pasted Ultimate Guitar text) convert to Gigmeister’s chord format automatically.

If your old tool only exports a picture of each chart — a PDF with no text behind it — you’re not stuck: bring the files in through Songs From PDF and each one becomes a song with the chart attached. Get in touch if your app’s export doesn’t map cleanly.