This tool is intended specifically to study bass guitar. In particular, my study of the bass.
It is not intended to be a generic music editor.
This might help explain some of its slightly odd behavior.
The app is only for 4 string basses. Since I have no intention to playing a 5 string or more, so the app will likely remain this way.
I've been told that if you can play a 5 string bass, you won't need this app.
There are tooltips in the page but those will only appear if you can hover, thus will only be useful with a mouse.
About half the hints for the app are there and will not be repeated here.
Quick demo: click "Get the blues" button on the bottom of the page, then Play. You will need a good set of speakers
to hear the bass notes. Typically a tablet or phone has no bass at all. Headphones likely will help.
To add a note to the song, first adjust the note chord, chord modifiers, duration, and lyrics.
Then press the string just left of the fret.
Typically is is a note in the circle or square, but all strings and frets are always active.
The red circles are the roots, the orange are 5th's, the pink are 3rd's, the yellows are 7th's.
Selecting a rest will enter it immediately. Rests can have lyrics.
Occasionally there will be a chord change in a song without a corresponding bass note. This can be
accommodated with the "noteless chord or lyric" button. Guitar players go nuts if any of the chords are missing.
Select a note on the score by clicking it. You should get a blue box around it in the score and its circle
on the fretboard will become a square. All of the options will reflect the selected note.
A red box in the score indicates an insert area between two notes.
There are no bar measures to add. When the measure is full of notes, a bar (the end of the measure) will appear.
Delete will start deleting at the end of the note's lyrics until they are gone and then it will delete the note.
To alter a property of a note, select it, change the property (chord, duration, lyric, etc.) and then re-click the square on the
fretboard. Adjustments to the note's properties are not immediate. They will be forgotten if the note
is not re-entered. This is odd behavior I'm struggling to decide if it's a bug or a feature.
After a single note select (in the blue box), the enter key will assign the modifications to the note. These properties
include chord, chord modifier, duration and lyrics.
The mouse wheel will alter the score selection. The delete key will delete.
Once the score area is selected, the right arrow key, tab or enter will advance the score selection. The left arrow key will select the
prior selection. The up and down arrow keys will change the score line offset vertically.
While looping, click a different bar. The loop will stop and restart with the clicked bar as the first in the sequence.
This avoids the stop that would otherwise be required.
Select multiple notes with shift click. Control (or command) C, V, X, Z for copy, paste, delete and copy, and undo.
To Do List:
Won't play through a rest at the end of a song on a loop.
Fix swing pair followed by beamed eighth note.
Reread options at every loop end.
Introduce the notion of sections. Start each section on the left.
Chords are terrible.
Add triplets.
Use drum notes (X's) for custom rhythm
Improve ties that don't work properly across lines.
Indicate measures with bad beat counts.
Select multiple notes with mouse drag.
Entry line always visible.
Loop multiple note selects. Rounded out to measure boundaries.
Add toggle to force all measures be the same size.
And C key signature that uses flats instead of sharps
Use sharps for notes out of scale when ascending. Use flats when descending. Prior note may be in prior bar. Rests are skipped.
Lyrics on rests.
Add slurs
Add copy section to OS cut buffer to paste in other instance.
Triplets
musical repeats
section definition and playback sequencing. Nashville'ish style?
Read and write custom rhythms to/from a file
remember custom notation
apply custom beat to existing song
apply custom beat and/or blues to a segment
Undo of file read or "get the blues" should be the whole song.
Allow notes to slide across bar boundaries.
Known bugs:
Ties and beams together can do stupid things.
No one who knows music well has validated the accuracy of this app.
It's been developed on Google Chrome so I have little idea what other browsers may do. I try to keep it running on Safari.
The immediate voicing of notes on a fretboard click can have audio issues.
More complicated time signatures will not likely appear.
There are problems with 6 and 7 flats or sharps around E#, Cb and the like.
Recent updates:
fixed broken custom rhythms.
play chords with guitar sounds, not bass.
Show play indicator (bright green background) on rests.
Chords on every measure start doesn't work.
Beams with ties don't render correctly.
Beams are not always tall enough.
Bass was playing when asked not to.
Leading will repeat notes.
Lines above score adjusted.
Add non-blues song formats: chord progressions, scale fragments,
Add various forms of leadin notes: none, chromatic, scale, dominant(5th), upper/lower.
Fix leadin collisions with same next note (i.e. the following chord root)
Fix beaming on 1/16 -> 1/16 -> 1/8 to avoid flagging middle 1/16
Shorten 1/16 second beaming length. eg.1/16 -> 1/8 -> 1/16
Fixed: Mere selection of a group of notes changes the chord.
At minimum spacing, can't insert between two notes.
Default file name extensions have been moved from '.txt' to '.bsst'. For a while, the web page will
continue to accept '.txt'.
Use space bar to play/stop.
Ties improved.
Beams like 8th and 16th's together, for now, flag by up staffs and down staffs. Beam to common beats.
Song title in browser tab
Notes printed in quarter blocks i.e. timing-wise. measures nearly all the same size.
Alignment with lyrics within the measure should largely be ignored.
Override of the key's sharps and flats from a previous note lasts through the current bar.
Hints no longer damage score display
Multiple select with shift click. Control (or command) C, V, X, Z for copy, paste, delete and copy, and undo.
