Easy Chords Studio: Creating music was never that easy before!

CyrielLenting

CyrielLenting

Inspired
This is a great app developed by a friend of mine. It helps you to find chords for a chords progression. Creating music was never that easy before ;)
Currently available for Android only. Let me know what you think of it!

 
Looks great. I have 2 questions....

1 Will it be released for IOS?
2 When selecting the chord progression slider thingy, how are you supposed to know by ear that song X uses chords I IV AND V OR I IV VI V?

Perhaps i'm missing something?

Either way, if it integrates with your iTunes library, i'll be all over it.

Thanks for sharing.
 
Fabio KTG said:
Looks great. I have 2 questions....

1 Will it be released for IOS?
2 When selecting the chord progression slider thingy, how are you supposed to know by ear that song X uses chords I IV AND V OR I IV VI V?

Perhaps i'm missing something?

Either way, if it integrates with your iTunes library, i'll be all over it.

Thanks for sharing.
Click to expand...

Thanks for liking it. Here are the answers:
1 Yes, we’re currently porting easy chords studio to IOS. So should be available May 2014 in the iStore.
2 This app is about creating new music, selecting a common progression just helps you when you’re out of inspiration ;D
The video just demonstrates that most (pop) tracks are based upon these included progressions.
 
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Neat little thing!

Just some suggestions for improving it:
You should also implement a graphical representation of the circle of fifths and show the chords there. This allows for some intuitive key-transitionings on break parts or solos, as the most harmonical transition of the key are pretty much geometrical shapes on the circle.

Also, you should implement the different modes.
 
Zwiebelchen said:
Just some suggestions for improving it:
...the circle of fifths and show the chords there...the different modes.
Click to expand...

Shit, if you know that - and it don't take long - then you don't need an app. You just hear and see it in your mind's eye. Of course, knowing inversions (and the three basic symmetry operations) helps, too.
 
Loquenau said:
Shit, if you know that - and it don't take long - then you don't need an app. You just hear and see it in your mind's eye. Of course, knowing inversions (and the three basic symmetry operations) helps, too.
Click to expand...
Well... I see this app more as a teaching tool for beginner songwriters, so it's definitely not a bad idea to include those concepts in a visual/interactive way.
 
What Suhrfer said.

I tell you, before the Internet and even well after, it was nearly impossible for fiscally challenged blokes like me to
learn music. Now, there's no excuse.
 
I'm sorry. I really dislike this kind of stuff. When technology tries to supplant on hand learning. Playing music, songs, practicing teaches you all this stuff. But folks today don't like to move their butts from in front of the computer screen. I don't know. I'm sorry. I just think this is stupid. The FUN of writing or playing is hearing and finding the chord progressions. And then LEARNING how progressions are constructed. But so many people want to have a computer algorithm spit some stuff out so they don't have to actually learn or know anything. Oh yeah, learn from the examples the program spits out. Arggh. Dumbing down makes people dumber.
 
I totally get your overall sentiment henry, but is it dumbing down or just a tool..?

Like so many things, it's difficult to say if it's really better, worse or just 'different'..?
thinking.gif
 
Both a tool and dumb. Some tools dumb things down to your own detriment. Music is a very simple thing. People spend so much time with technology, including Axe Fx and doo-dads and all the attractive accoutrements that they forget MUSIC. Music is itself a technology. I suggest learning the TECHNOLOGY of music, then stupid things like this aren't needed.
 
henryrobinett said:
Both a tool and dumb. Some tools dumb things down to your own detriment. Music is a very simple thing. People spend so much time with technology, including Axe Fx and doo-dads and all the attractive accoutrements that they forget MUSIC. Music is itself a technology. I suggest learning the TECHNOLOGY of music, then stupid things like this aren't needed.
Click to expand...

I hear you! Every time I click the tuner button on the Axe I wonder about the time and space they could have saved if they had just put a little hook somewhere to hold my tuning fork. :)

It's just a tool. I learned how to spell quite well over my life but have no issues or concerns using or depending on spellchecker thus allowing me to concentrate my precious time on more important tasks.

Thanks for sharing CryielLenting.
 
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henryrobinett said:
Both a tool and dumb. Some tools dumb things down to your own detriment. Music is a very simple thing. People spend so much time with technology, including Axe Fx and doo-dads and all the attractive accoutrements that they forget MUSIC. Music is itself a technology. I suggest learning the TECHNOLOGY of music, then stupid things like this aren't needed.
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Like having a bike really dumbs down walking.

Kidding.
I get what you're saying. My pubescent stepson is creating dubstep on his (illegally downloaded) Fruity loops program. I don't really consider it musical. It's more like producerial. Or arrangementerial. Basically creating endless diversions of the same three or four chords which he doesn't call a song, but a "beat". Sitting at my desk downstairs right underneath his, I only hear the chords. Endelessly for hours the same repeats. And there's a thick concrete floor in between. I have really found a great friend in and huge appreciation for my headphones and SO GLAD I bought a decent set last year.

That said, let's be honest. Most pop songs do the I-V-VI-IV indefinitely. And they are making millions.
It's infuriating once you pick up on it.

This may actually help people break out of it. Could be a tool.
 
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I'd definitely be interested in this when its ported to iOS. This shouldn't be used as a crutch to not learn music theory, but it can be a nice helper.

I agree about the producorial aspect of stuff like Fruity Loops. Back in 2000, when it was still made by Sonic Foundry, I was using Acid. This is when I knew nothing about synthesizers or keyboards, but I was making trance music that sounded pretty professional. A few days ago I threw together a nice trance tune in a few minutes using Logic X loops. Its fun, but not really rewarding like playing guitar is.
 
Dutch said:
This may actually help people break out of it.
Click to expand...

Seems to me that this will help keep them trapped in it. This tool shows you horribly recycled clichés, with no mental effort. I started guitar by learning Beatles by ear. Then moved on to Jimi Hendrix, Zep, etc. Then Allan Holdsworth. At each step, it was hard work for me, but well worth the effort. I see this app as little more than BS for beginners who want to be spoon fed nursery rhymes. It's a toy. Toys are great when you want to have a little fun. Beyond that, not much to them. It's like a toy piano with lighted keys that shows you where to put your finger. You aren't creating anything new. If it's fun, great. Have at it. I wouldn't give it to my son as a learning tool.
 
Any number of my songs I could give as examples of something a program like this could NEVER find chords for.

Tuning is an example, yeah. I use electronic tuners. I do like the convenience. But fercrissakes, I already KNOW how to tune a guitar. And ALL of my beginning students - I make them learn how to tune the guitar without them. And I test them repeatedly until they can do it. It's all about developing the ears, and one of the best ways to do that begins with learning how to tune your guitar by ear.

Threnody by Henry Robinett on SoundCloud - Hear the world

Crush by Henry Robinett on SoundCloud - Hear the world

There's no way a program could come up with these progressions. The FUN is coming up with them yourself. HEARING what's in your head, so to speak. Pulling it out. By learning to rely on a program outside yourself like this I think you end up doing yourself a serious disservice. But I guess I'm an old codger. As I said music is itself a technology worth knowing.

Getting some brilliant computer programmer writing code that spits out ready made guitar solos for you won't teach you how to spit them out yourself, as much as you might try and convince yourself otherwise. I mean it's the programmer's algorithm, not yours. So you use a program to find progressions for you, you didn't really write that, you know?

edit - BTW the above is jazz, as that's what I do. Those tunes were just an example of why those things can lead you in a dark corner, even if tunes are more basic or less convoluted than mine are.
 
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