Top 10 iOS music apps

Whether you're learning music or just like listening to it, your iPhone can be your beat buddy, your piano pal or your... ok I'm out of music-friendship alliterations, but you get the picture. Here are ten apps for your iPhone to help you stay musical.

1. SoundHound - Free

SoundHound

If you're someone who listens to a lot of music and forgets the artist, or listens to the radio and would like to know what those damn kids are listening to these days, SoundHound is the app for you. The app has a pretty good speed rate for music recognition and what I like about it is you can hum a four second tune and the app will attempt to recognize it with fairly good success rates. An alternative is, of course, Shazam, but SoundHound has faster recognition (depending on your data plan) and has room for hums!

2. TuneIn Radio - Free

Tunein Radio

We're all a little bit angry that the iPhone doesn't come with FM but TuneIn Radio is a bittersweet fix. Sweet because you finally have radio on your phone. Bitter because it consumes a boatload of data if you're not hooked up to wifi. The app has categories of radio stations you can listen to from around the world like sports and news, as well as local radio.

3. Ringtone Designer - Free

Ringtone Designer

Ringtones can be quite the devil. Not only to listen to but also to make. Instead of converting the songs on your computer to .m4r and transfering over the song to your phone, make the ringtone from songs you already have on your phone using Ringtone Designer. If you have iOS 5, you can also use the app along with the songs on your phone to make text message and email alert tones.

4. Drum Kit - Free

Drum Kit

If you want to try a new instrument before buying it, or if you just want to annoy people, Drum Kit gives you a six piece kit with four toms, snare, bass, hi-hat (open and closed), crash, ride and splash, that you can tap and beat away. You can also practice "playing drums" by beating the app along with a song from your music library. To help you when you first start out, the app has a metronome you can use to keep you in beat.

5. Gibson Learn & Master w/ Studio Share - Free

Gibson

If you want to learn the guitar, your iPhone allows you to learn with one of the best. The Gibson Learn & Master features lessons made in collaboration with Legacy Learning Systems to create a lesson system for you to learn the instrument. The app also comes with a way for you to record what you learn and play to send to your friends and the social networks. The feature that allows this is called Studio Share and is free for 90 days and 45 hours, after which, you can start buying subscriptions.