Capo Touch by SuperMegaUltraGroovy
Gear Review by John Knowles
SuperMegaUltraGroovy Launches Capo touch, featuring Chord Intelligence and iCloud Sync!
Metal Exiles first got a look at the Capo software line from SuperMegaUltraGroovy during this past Winter NAMM Show in Anaheim, California. It was there that we were introduced to the Mac OS version of this amazing software. Recently the company unveiled the iOS version, known as Capo touch. According to the press release, Capo touch brings all the capabilities and power of the award-winning Capo 3 to musicians on the move. With your iOS device and a very reasonably priced download, musicians can be well on their way to learning their favorite songs from their iTunes library.
Capo touch is a beautifully designed app. Users will want to take note of some the apps basic features during the “onboarding” feature, which takes place once following the initial launch of the app after downloading (See screen shots below of the full onboarding display). This basic how-to will take users through 4 pages of helpful hints to get started. Once the onboarding feature is complete, the app will take users into the main program. At first glance of Capo touch’s interface users may feel a sign of relief at the sight of a very familiar display. Essentially, users will behold a look and feel that is practically identical to their iTunes music library. There is a tab for “Projects” – or works in progress – a tab for “Artist,” “Albums,” and “Songs,” as well as “Settings.” All of the songs from your iTunes library are laid out as if you launched your Music app, and are also available for Capo’s groundbreaking analysis.
Once the song is selected Capo does all the work of automatically detecting the songs chords, and showing the user how the chord is phrased through the very helpful chord boxes. Individual note suggestions are even thrown in as Capo detects tones outside of the previously played chord. From here the features of the app become invaluable tools in the hands of any musician. Regions of the song can be selected and looped, and the tempo can be adjusted by a simple slide of the tempo bar at the bottom of the screen (Within the Heads-Up Display, or HUD) – all without changing pitch. The HUD also contains the very accurate bar and beat counter which can be accompanied by a metronome in the settings screen (found at the top right of the screen depicted as an EQ meter). Sections of the waveform can be zoomed in or out as you would zoom in on a picture or web page. Other optional features found in “settings” are a 10-band EQ – with bass or mid isolation – as well as voice reduction and voice manipulation to fit the timbre of a male or female voice. Using the “Beats” tab in settings allows the user to turn the metronome on or off, accent the downbeat, and add a count-in for playing along with your newly learned song. Perhaps the coolest feature found within settings is the “Notes” tab. Here uses can select their instrument choice (chose between Guitar, 4-6 String Bass, mandolin, Ukulele, of 5-String Banjo), as well as their instruments tuning or capo position – Capo touch will then transpose the chord displays to be relative to the selected tuning or capo position.
One of the obvious improvements featured with Capo touch is Chord Intelligence, which provides an improved performance on the software’s chord detection accuracy, and a wider chord detection vocabulary. Chris Liscio, president, SuperMegaUltraGroovy, Inc. had the following to say about this improved feature: "Given the success we had with Capo 3 on the Mac, we were able to invest further in the R&D to build Chord Intelligence—our breakthrough new chord detection engine based on the principles of speech recognition and machine learning.”
The Heads-Up Display also features a second screen that can be accessed by sliding the bar/beat region to the left. On this screen the bar/beat counter becomes a min/sec counter, and the tempo slider is now a pitch slider for transposing the song into a different key. If at any point throughout your analysis or play through of the song you notice a chord that appears to be missing, screen 2 of the HUD allows users to insert a chord wherever the cursor is positioned.
Some naysayers might conclude that by using Capo musicians are not able to fully develop their own sense of pitch, circumventing the amount of dedication and hard work it takes to develop one’s musical “ear.” This is not so, friends. Capo not only builds upon a musicians pitch instincts, but it requires a level of learned pitch detection. Once users select the song they wish to learn, Capo does its very best to detect the chord being played throughout the many sonic sounds within any given moment of a song. Some songs contain moments where there are only a series of melodies played on top of each other. Capo looks at a snapshot of these melodies and determines the most likely chord to play over said melodies. Here there is room for interpretation. Capo may take a bar of your selected song and determine that a G7 chord is the likely fit. As the user, you can determine that in fact a G Major chord might be more appropriate, and with a simple click of the chord a new screen appears which allows the user to select a new chord altogether, or a variation or unique voicing of the chord Capo selected. Users can also select the chord on the screen and drag it to another spot on the timeline. Capo touch in this sense become a guide, a teacher, and a coach. Throughout all of our tests with many different songs of varying styles, tempos, and arrangements, Capo never failed to correctly identify the key of the song, and in many ways this could be the one most important step in learning to play a song by ear. In many ways Capo actually relies on the musicians current sense of pitch, and leverages the users ability to provide a very accurate analysis of the song.
For the music hobbyist who loves learning their favorite songs, to the musician in the studio trying to learn new parts or figure out a previously recorded original composition, and even to the live musician learning their part of a last minute cover song addition to the set list, Capo touch is one of the greatest tools in any musicians arsenal. With iCloud, a user’s Capo touch projects can be shared with Capo 3 for Apple OS, adding to the software’s already impressive versatility. Visit the iTunes App store to purchase Capo touch for the low price of $4.99, and become the musician you’ve always wanted to be.
Visit the App Store to BUY Capo touch.
Visit the official Capo website.
Gear Review by John Knowles
SuperMegaUltraGroovy Launches Capo touch, featuring Chord Intelligence and iCloud Sync!
Metal Exiles first got a look at the Capo software line from SuperMegaUltraGroovy during this past Winter NAMM Show in Anaheim, California. It was there that we were introduced to the Mac OS version of this amazing software. Recently the company unveiled the iOS version, known as Capo touch. According to the press release, Capo touch brings all the capabilities and power of the award-winning Capo 3 to musicians on the move. With your iOS device and a very reasonably priced download, musicians can be well on their way to learning their favorite songs from their iTunes library.
Capo touch is a beautifully designed app. Users will want to take note of some the apps basic features during the “onboarding” feature, which takes place once following the initial launch of the app after downloading (See screen shots below of the full onboarding display). This basic how-to will take users through 4 pages of helpful hints to get started. Once the onboarding feature is complete, the app will take users into the main program. At first glance of Capo touch’s interface users may feel a sign of relief at the sight of a very familiar display. Essentially, users will behold a look and feel that is practically identical to their iTunes music library. There is a tab for “Projects” – or works in progress – a tab for “Artist,” “Albums,” and “Songs,” as well as “Settings.” All of the songs from your iTunes library are laid out as if you launched your Music app, and are also available for Capo’s groundbreaking analysis.
Once the song is selected Capo does all the work of automatically detecting the songs chords, and showing the user how the chord is phrased through the very helpful chord boxes. Individual note suggestions are even thrown in as Capo detects tones outside of the previously played chord. From here the features of the app become invaluable tools in the hands of any musician. Regions of the song can be selected and looped, and the tempo can be adjusted by a simple slide of the tempo bar at the bottom of the screen (Within the Heads-Up Display, or HUD) – all without changing pitch. The HUD also contains the very accurate bar and beat counter which can be accompanied by a metronome in the settings screen (found at the top right of the screen depicted as an EQ meter). Sections of the waveform can be zoomed in or out as you would zoom in on a picture or web page. Other optional features found in “settings” are a 10-band EQ – with bass or mid isolation – as well as voice reduction and voice manipulation to fit the timbre of a male or female voice. Using the “Beats” tab in settings allows the user to turn the metronome on or off, accent the downbeat, and add a count-in for playing along with your newly learned song. Perhaps the coolest feature found within settings is the “Notes” tab. Here uses can select their instrument choice (chose between Guitar, 4-6 String Bass, mandolin, Ukulele, of 5-String Banjo), as well as their instruments tuning or capo position – Capo touch will then transpose the chord displays to be relative to the selected tuning or capo position.
One of the obvious improvements featured with Capo touch is Chord Intelligence, which provides an improved performance on the software’s chord detection accuracy, and a wider chord detection vocabulary. Chris Liscio, president, SuperMegaUltraGroovy, Inc. had the following to say about this improved feature: "Given the success we had with Capo 3 on the Mac, we were able to invest further in the R&D to build Chord Intelligence—our breakthrough new chord detection engine based on the principles of speech recognition and machine learning.”
The Heads-Up Display also features a second screen that can be accessed by sliding the bar/beat region to the left. On this screen the bar/beat counter becomes a min/sec counter, and the tempo slider is now a pitch slider for transposing the song into a different key. If at any point throughout your analysis or play through of the song you notice a chord that appears to be missing, screen 2 of the HUD allows users to insert a chord wherever the cursor is positioned.
Some naysayers might conclude that by using Capo musicians are not able to fully develop their own sense of pitch, circumventing the amount of dedication and hard work it takes to develop one’s musical “ear.” This is not so, friends. Capo not only builds upon a musicians pitch instincts, but it requires a level of learned pitch detection. Once users select the song they wish to learn, Capo does its very best to detect the chord being played throughout the many sonic sounds within any given moment of a song. Some songs contain moments where there are only a series of melodies played on top of each other. Capo looks at a snapshot of these melodies and determines the most likely chord to play over said melodies. Here there is room for interpretation. Capo may take a bar of your selected song and determine that a G7 chord is the likely fit. As the user, you can determine that in fact a G Major chord might be more appropriate, and with a simple click of the chord a new screen appears which allows the user to select a new chord altogether, or a variation or unique voicing of the chord Capo selected. Users can also select the chord on the screen and drag it to another spot on the timeline. Capo touch in this sense become a guide, a teacher, and a coach. Throughout all of our tests with many different songs of varying styles, tempos, and arrangements, Capo never failed to correctly identify the key of the song, and in many ways this could be the one most important step in learning to play a song by ear. In many ways Capo actually relies on the musicians current sense of pitch, and leverages the users ability to provide a very accurate analysis of the song.
For the music hobbyist who loves learning their favorite songs, to the musician in the studio trying to learn new parts or figure out a previously recorded original composition, and even to the live musician learning their part of a last minute cover song addition to the set list, Capo touch is one of the greatest tools in any musicians arsenal. With iCloud, a user’s Capo touch projects can be shared with Capo 3 for Apple OS, adding to the software’s already impressive versatility. Visit the iTunes App store to purchase Capo touch for the low price of $4.99, and become the musician you’ve always wanted to be.
Visit the App Store to BUY Capo touch.
Visit the official Capo website.
