Peak SMS-20 Collapsible Music Stand With Bag

I carry a music stand to class twice a week. I need a portable stand that is easy to carry and pack and unpack and can hold a binder with 100 pages of sheet music. There are a lot of $10 music stands on Amazon that fold up small enough to put in a backpack, but I have tried a few and they are all too flimsy to hold my music book. This stand folds up into the included carrying case, but is too big to fit in a backpack, so I have to carry it separately, which is OK if I’m not walking more than 1 mile. The case has a shoulder strap that is not plush, but good enough.

This is the sturdiest music stand that I have tried that folds up small enough to carry for a moderate distance. It easily holds the weight of my music book. The shelf is big enough that my book never falls off and the shelf is shaped so I can easily turn the pages of my book. Yes, the shelf is plastic, but it seems durable enough and plastic is much lighter weight than steel (for people that carry the stand a lot). The legs and joints on this stand are also much sturdier than the $10 stands. $30 is a very reasonable price for a robust and portable music stand.

This is my first music stand and I held off writing a review. It’s July and I’ve been using the stand since March; not a long time but I now have some real life experience with it. I was hoping the group I joined would have some clear and compelling choices to offer but that wasn’t the case. I had to start from scratch and do some research as I’m always a little cynical when it comes to reading reviews of products available for sale on the internet for obvious reasons. There were a wealth of reviews of this stand (in its different versions); enough that I felt confident that were more reasons to buy than not to buy the stand. It is everything the reviews say it is. Relatively lightweight yet sturdy, is easy to setup and collapse, the clamps make it easy to adjust the height (up to 62″ by my measurement), it will accommodate a large, heavy binder due to the “deep shelf”. When extended to 48″ (my standing height), the stand is sturdy and gives me a feeling of confidence. The approx. 26″ footprint of the tripod base is the reason for this. The stand will cost a “bit” more than one of those cheap, flimsy metal stands but will not break the bank. The cliche ‘YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR’ applies. I personally don’t have a concern with the hinges. Take care of the stand by not handling it roughly and I believe it will last a long time. P.S. My stand came with a case and the total weight is roughly 6 lbs.

Al principio, al ver el precio de este atril, me pareció una barbaridad. Pero, al adquirirlo, puedo decir que valió totalmente la pena. Yo lo compré ya que soy un violinista que mide alrededor de 1.93mts y gracias a esto, se me ha imposibilitado comprar un atril a mi altura que evite que me encorve al tocar. Leí la reseña de un contra bajo de estatura arriba de la promedio, que lo compró más que nada por la altura y que había quedado satisfecho. A decir verdad, la altura es uno de los principales puntos por el que te llama la atención y lo adquieres pero, cuando lo recibes e instalar, ves que la durabilidad, los materiales con los que esta hecho y la estabilidad, son otro mundo. Claro, no negare que está más pesado que lo de un atril promedio, cuando lo transportas en la bolsa que ya incluye. Para mi ese punto, es lo que se debe de pagar por un producto de buena calidad.

Good features despite some bulk when folded. It has large, easy to operate and effective (1) cam-clamps on the telescoping tubing and (2) turn-knob for adjusting the angle of the desk. The tray is deep enough to hold a 3-inch 3-ring binder. The width spans a 3-ring binder. It’s stable and heavy enough to use outdoors in some wind and with heavy binders. The carry-case straps are long enough to enable shoulder or back-pack-style transport. The only drawback is that when folded, it is about 5″ by 5″ around because the desk consists of 4 sections, each about 4 inches wide (the vertical tubing retracts to about 2 feet long). Previously, I tried two other stands. One is a mid-weight foldable metal stand. It does hold a 1-inch binder and has more heft than the spindly $10 stands, but you end up reading at knee-level because it relies on set screws to fight gravity on the telescoping metal tubing. Also, the adjustment knobs are small and hard to turn. Another model I tried has a solid steel desk that never folds. For transport, the riser tubing and legs come apart and slip into holders on the back of the desk. The desk to tubing connection broke very quickly. We received a replacement connection, but the stand does not feel sturdy due to its design.