new online music theory tool needs feedback

[bluebass79]

hey folks,

i'm richard, 31 years old - and i play bass and a little bit guitar. i wrote a small tool for building chords and chord progressions, which i think is very useful for making small sketches while songwriting or for doing some music theory. so the reason why i am posting here is, that i want to make this small tool public to anyone of you because it can help and makes the music online world a bit more innovative. right now i work on some new features because i got some feedback from guitar players. so i would love to get some reviews to make my work better and improve it.

the sound comes from flash its a small FM synthy class done by a awesome chinese guy

synth example
guitar examplee

so pleeeeasse write me some comments, let me know what your think...

oh and here is a picture

[wetdentist]

looks pretty good and useful. is it downloadable?

[bluebass79]

it's not downloadable yet, but i think it is possible. let's see, perhaps as an AIR application. i think it is more important to enable alternate tunings for the fretboards first but thanks for your comment!

[zthomas]

Pretty awesome, I think

[lauriovali]

Looks intresting.

[bluebass79]

i've built breaks into the app, for more rythm....take a look

http://shortchord.org/axRRx
http://shortchord.org/exRRx

[bluebass79]

check out the video tutorial!! i think this explains a lot:

[tapper mike]

Nice idea.
However both Band in a box and jammer blow it away.
Type chords in a box select a style and hit play.

[ah.clem]

I see this as being a great tool for arranging; you just got a great idea for a sectional voicing and you 1) either don't have your notation software available on the machine you're on (like at work, lol) or 2) you're on your netbook and don't have your DAW software loaded, 'cause it just doesn't have the horsepower needed to run it. Rather than scribbling notes to yourself that don't make any sense hours later (am I the only one this happens to?), just go to the bookmarked page, put in the entire big band chord voicing you are hearing in your head, and see how it really sounds and works (or not).

It's also a great tool for someone who is trying to learn arranging and doesn't have expensive notation software available, and/or lacks keyboard skills.

Does it run on handheld devices? Browsers on iPhones, Androids and Blackberries? If not, that's a suggestion I'd make.

I don't know if I'd send myself the chords, but I know I'll use this tool to hear the sound of a big band section or tutti when away from my DAW.

If it was downloadable I'd have it on my DAW desktop, DAW laptop, netbook and my machines at work. And my Blackberry, if it would run on it.

Great job on this tool, I see it filling a need for folks wanting to know more about what they are doing when writing and arranging any style of music, or just experimenting with harmonic ideas. I will certainly recommend it to folks on the comp and arranging forums I belong to.

[bluebass79]

Thanks a lot for your feedback! I think it runs on all devices which support flash 10. The tool is still work in progress and perhaps we are building a standalone version, but our intention was to build a tool that runs in a browser and has not to be installed on the os. Band in box and Jammer are great but they need to be installed. We'll see if we get the balance between both worlds.

Thanks agian for your feedback!!

[Artgiver]

I like the way you can drag the notes to the time-line below. Really nice!

Apart from the different chords you can choose, the tool IS going to have various scales you can print across the entire fretboard/keyboard, right? I mean that's a given. Or does it already have that? Let us know when we can download.
Is the price TBA?

Tim

[yairhol]

That is a very cool application. thank you for making it available for us.
For me, what would be very useful is the shortchord application suggesting a next chord progression based on my initial chord. Something like Harmony Improvisator/Navigator.
As far as I understand it, with the current application you need to know which chords you want to play and the application will show you how to play them and what your progression sounds like, right?
If there were chord progression suggestions made by the software, then we could start with a random chord and build up our progression from there based on how it sounds without pre-knowing what to play.

Anyway, thank you.

[re8]

Good:
Neat program to show chords!

Bad:
It doesn't show that a Flash movie is on the webpage in my Firefox with AddBlock + ImgLikeOpera. Most other Flash sites will have a big square outline as a place holder for the Flash.
Can't generate a link.
The link should be shorthand for the chords (eg http://shortchord.org/dsadd9+asmaj13)

Ugly:
After playing a chord riff, messing with the buttons, stopping the playback, it stopped on what looked like the bass guitar. But when I moused over the neck, keyboard keys showed under the mouse. Seems like I stopped it just after it was going to keyboard mode (since that was the next chord), but the area did not redraw.
cheers

[ouroboros]

If it would export midi, I would be in love!
Lots of fun and useful on the run.

[yairhol]

If it would export midi, I would be in love!
Lots of fun and useful on the run.

That's a good suggestion.
We are getting closer and closer with our suggestions to making this application clone Harmony Improvisator which I thought of buying but then heard the user manual was very bad and people have a hard time operating the software.