Pixel 9 Pro Fold for Musicians

Google’s newest folding phone was just released last month, and I know I’ve been wondering… how might the Pixel 9 Pro Fold work for musicians?

My fiancé has been interested in folding phones and needed an upgrade anyway, so he bought the phone when it was released, and today we’re sharing how we can use the Pixel 9 Pro Fold for musicians!

Watch the Video

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An Overview of the Pixel 9 Pro Fold

The Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold is Google’s newest folding phone. It’s offered in 2 colors and storage options, and it starts at $1,799.

The front screen looks just like a normal phone and measures 6.3 inches diagonally; and the inner screen is almost square, measuring in at 8 inches diagonally.

But how can this phone be used by musicians?

Tonal Energy on the Pixel 9 Pro Fold

My favorite tuner and metronome app is Tonal Energy. I’ve tried it on my old Android phone, I use it almost every day on my iPhone, and I also use it on my Mac.

It works just as you’d hope, it works beautifully on the Pixel 9 Pro Fold, and handles the internal screen really nicely.

Built-In Voice Recorder App

Like most phones, the Pro 9 Fold has a built-in voice recorder. Google added quite a few extra capabilities to this app: it transcribes what it hears in realtime, different speakers are labeled in the transcription and in the sound waves, you can search by keyword, and music and speech are separated by color. You can also connect an external microphone via the phone’s USB-C port.

We tested the internal microphone in the video, and I think the sound quality was actually really good! Be sure to watch the video to hear it for yourself.

MobileSheets

So, can the Pixel 9 Pro Fold be used for reading sheet music? It pretty much can!

MobileSheets works really well on this phone. Harry (my fiancé) has a Surface Book 3 so we’ve previously tested MobileSheets on there, and it was pretty buggy. It didn’t really have anything to do with the app or the developer; the laptop itself is pretty slow.

We found that MobileSheets looks great on the full screen of the Pro Fold, and if you crop or zoom in to get rid of the margins, you can basically get the music large enough to read on a music stand!

While I could read the music well, there are two main downsides:

1. Since the screen is smaller than most tablets, you can’t see the full page of sheet music. This will require more page turns.
2. The Pixel 9 Pro doesn’t support any kind of smart stylus.

I’ve reviewed Bluetooth page turner pedals (Donner and Vangoa) on the blog, and I use them daily. I don’t however, love doing half-page turns, especially in performance and other high-stakes situations. If I were to perform music from this phone, I’d have to get comfortable with doing more page turns.

Finally, there’s no stylus support on this folding phone. I know other folding phones, like the Samsung Z Fold Flip have their own pens, but this phone does not have one and none are supported.

This means that if you want to write on your music, you need to either use your finger or an old fashioned stylus that acts as a finger: there’s no Bluetooth or electronic connection, and the phone thinks the stylus is a finger.

This makes it more difficult to annotate a score on this phone. You either have to write with your finger, which can be sloppy, or write with the stylus while keeping your palm away from the screen. Writing like that isn’t always very pretty either!

I think that, in a pinch, playing sheet music off this phone will work, but I wouldn’t want to use it for everyday practice and regular performances.

How are We Using the Phone?

My fiancé is a high school orchestra teacher, and here’s how he’s used the phone in the last month or so:

• A tuner and metronome in class
• Recording in rehearsals as a practice technique
• As a laptop replacement: connecting it the the projector in his classroom
• Reading private students’ sheet music in lessons so he doesn’t have to hover right behind them

These are all great uses for the phone, but you can do pretty much all of these things on other phones with varying success. The added benefit of a folding screen is definitely handy for reading sheet music, though!

Is This Phone Worth It?

The bottom line is that this phone is very expensive at $1799. My fiancé got some great preorder deals and got a great discount by trading in his older Pixel phone.

He’s happy with it for the price he paid, but he says that if he had to do it again with no discounts, he’d go for a cheaper phone and an iPad Air 13 inch model instead, and thinks that that combination would be better bang for your buck.

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What do you think of the Pixel 9 Pro Fold? Would you dare to read sheet music off it? Let me know in the comments, and be sure to watch the video for extra insight and opinions!