Apps: Pitch

We've been testing a new app from Daniel Kuntz called Pitch. Kuntz has several apps including Tone, an ear training app. Kuntz describes the app as:

“Pitch is a sleek, minimalist instrument tuner for iPhone.

Features:

- Simple & easy to use
- Quickly tune any musical instrument
- Detailed analytics to help you track your progress
- Hear individual notes or chords with the tone generator
- Works great in noisy environments
- Transpose to any key
- Dark and light modes
- 100% free with no ads!”

— App Store Description

Pitch has some features you'll see in other tuner apps like displaying your proximity to actual pitch and generating tones. Where the app stands out from the crowd is analytics. The app tracks analytics over time and gives some long term feedback on intonation. The developer describes it as "...a fitness tracker for musicians."

“It’s a fitness tracker for musicians!”

— Daniel Kuntz

We found the app to be helpful and a handy way to see how intonation is shaping up beyond just one note at a time. Separately, we found the app easy to use and pleasing to the eyes (no ads!). 

Pitch is available on the ios store and is free. Let us know in the comments what you think about the app. 

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Pitch on the Appstore

Will we be the last humans using paper?

If you're like us, you mark up your sheet music with a pencil quite a bit. That first concerto or method book acquired many years ago shows its age and signs of being handled many times. Our parts of quintets from wedding gigs has become dog eared and ragged over the years. Despite that, it still works and we always get through the gig by dealing with the rips that have been repaired with clear tape. 

The world around us continues to move in the direction of being paperless. The music world continues to be stubbornly paper reliant. An account from 100 years ago would have no idea how to function with the modern spreadsheets and other digital tools their modern day counterparts use. Aside from reading recycled paper, a brass played from 100 years ago would notice almost no difference in the sheet music on their stand. Will we be the last to make the digital transition? Do we need to abandon paper and filing cabinets stuffed with dead trees?

Around the turn of the century, we began to see publishers begin offering sheet music for download on the web. Fear about piracy was rampant. This was in the era of Napster and the terror the recording industry felt was on the minds of other industries. This caused a number of providers to either avoid paperless delivery altogether or adopt a Digital Rights Management (DRM) system that made the digital copy so difficult to work with many consumers tried once and never again. Over time, many providers have switched to file formats and delivery systems that are more customer friendly such as the ubiquitous PDF. 

In the intervening years since digital delivery has taken hold it still culminates in the same end point. However you get the file or whatever format, it still means a visit to a printer. The delivery mechanism has changed for many, but it's still ink and paper that gets used at the performance. Will that change? The New York Times did a story recently on some taking the charge. 

“Ms. Wu takes pride in being an “early adopter” of the iPad and can rattle off its benefits to the traveling musician. By her own count, she is performing 42 works this summer. In the past, the attendant sheet music would have filled three quarters of a suitcase. Now she carries an entire library in a sleek tablet. Page turns have become quiet and elegant thanks to a wireless pedal. (Where her enemies were once awkward page turners, they’re now Chinese concert halls with Bluetooth blockers.) She needn’t worry about losing her scores or seeing the paper deteriorate over the course of a long tour. And in master classes, she scribbles notes for her students onto her tablet, saving a separate file for each player.”

— When Classical Musicians Go Digital-NY Times

If you believe this is where we're headed, the question then becomes what sort of device will we read our parts from? Even a big phone won't work for this. A kindle is great for books, but could be awkward for fitting a Strauss part on the display. Gvidio, a Tokyo based company, has an intriguing solution. The system is a 13 inch display and uses e-ink technology to give similar readability to a kindle. The display has two sides (think like a book that opens and has opposite pages) to give two pages at a time to view. There's also an ability to make notes on the page. 

Will this solution or another one ever pull us away from our file cabinets? Let us know your thoughts in the comments. 

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Kindle

When Classical Musicians go Digital

Apps: Click Pitch

We're always looking for apps we think are worth adding to your toolkit. There's a new one out from Justin Isenhour called Click Pitch. The app is built to be an aid for practicing audition pieces, specifically orchestral excerpts. The app is a great way to make long hours in the practice room productive. There's ways to customize the overlay tracks as well as tempos. The app has selections for Tenor Trombone, Bass Trombone, and Tuba. There's a promise of more to come in the future. We will watch with interest to see what shows up next. 

“Click Pitch is an excellence training tool for musicians. A step beyond traditional drones and static metronomes, Click Pitch is programmed for specific audition test pieces. Using a combination of organ (sustain), piano (articulation) and woodblock (metronomic) sounds, Click Pitch is a “pitched metronome” reproducing each excerpt with accurate rhythm and pitch (equal temperament).

But Click Pitch is more than just a play-along. Each selection contains four individual tracks. Tracks 1-3 contain portions of the melody and a click track provides a programmed metronome. When played all together, the entire excerpt with a metronome is heard. However, you have the flexibility to turn individual tracks on and off. This interface allows you to select how much of an excerpt you want to hear. Remove the click track as well and performers can begin to test their ability to maintain time through the excerpt.

Imagine a drone that changes with the melody/harmony combined with a metronome that can fluctuate subdivisions/tempos when needed. Then add to this tool the ability to test your own pitch and rhythm by only providing strategic moments within an excerpt. This is Click Pitch.

The current version contains material designed specifically for trombonists. This version was built with input from a variety of trombonists including Steve Lange of the Boston Symphony and Brad Edwards from the University of South Carolina. Later updates will include additional trombone excerpts as well as audition material from the repertoire of all orchestral instruments.”

— From the iTunes App Store Description

You get Click Pitch on iPhone and iPad. The app itself is free, however, to expand to additional pieces you need to make in-app purchases. For what you're getting, each one is a bargain. Think about it like this. How many hours will you spend with Bolero before that upcoming audition? 1 hour? 10 hours? 100 hours? $1.99 is a steal no matter what your answer for how long you will spend with Mr. Ravel. 

Let us know how you like the app in the comments. 

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Click Pitch on the App Store

iTunes is still bad, but slightly better now

To be clear, we still hate iTunes with the intense heat of a thousand suns. That being said, a recent update has made it easier to sort and search. Up until now, iTunes limited you to sorting by artist. 

“This update allows you to see works, composers, and performers while browsing Classical music in the Apple Music catalog. It also includes stability and performance improvements.”

— iTunes 12.3.2

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