Transcribe!'s new Chord Guesser

Craig Bumgarner

The latest update of Transcribe!, 7.40, has a new "chord guesser" feature. Very cool.

http:\\www.seventhstring.com

djangolin

I guess that technology is being licensed several places. I just got the latest update of Band in A Box which has the same module now. I've used it a couple of times. Not perfect but it gets you close enough to figure it out. Figuring out chord progressions isn't a strong suit for me so this really helps. I have found that recordings with more sparse instrumentation, it tends to pick up more of what the soloist is doing which may give a somewhat distorted idea of the actual chord being soloed over actually is.

djangology

awesome... how well does it work? have you actually tried it on a gypsy jazz mp3?

Craig Bumgarner

awesome... how well does it work? have you actually tried it on a gypsy jazz mp3?

I've only been using it since last weekend, but so far it seems very good. Yes, I've used it on GJ mp3s. Transcribe! handles mp3s very well in general and the chord guesser seems to have no problems with mp3s either.

As you can imagine, it needs a clean sample of the chord, but the analysis itself seems very accurate. The interface is very good, just postion the mouse over the portion of the spectragraph you are interested in and look to the lower right corner and the chord suggestions are there.

The only minor fault (if you can call it that) I have found so far is that it tends to over analyze because it hears harmonics and overtones. So sometimes the chords come out with a slug of tensions you probably don't want to play, but it is easy enough to strip them out to a more basic chord. Seems pretty much right on to me.

BTW, Transcribe! upgrades about every six months and are free to registered owners. It is available as a free 30 day trial download w/ full features. On line purchase after that. Sorry for shilling, but this is my favorite piece of music software and it just keeps getting better.

Craig

Craig Bumgarner

I worked with the chord guesser more last night on Bei Dir war es immer so schön which is getting traction over in the Repetoire section right now. The chords in the Bireli version are well defined and the rhythm chords so cool, I chose it to work on. The chord guesser is pretty good, but not perfect. It has no knowledge of the key for instance and makes mistakes on naming the chord properly for the key even though it got the notes right. It doesn't really know what to make of chords with no root such as a three note D7/A (A, F# & C). Wants to call it Adim7 cause it can't find the D. Of course A, F# & C is also Adim7, but within the harmony, following a Am7, it is a D7 (ii-V).

It also takes some fiddling with the location in the spectragraph to find a clean section that gives you something solid. If it doesn't find something solid, you get something pretty weird like F#7b9#11#13. Those notes are there, but that ain't the chord. On the otherhand, the fiddling for a better location is easy to get the hang of.

A good, eperienced ear (anyone know where I can get one?) and an understanding of harmony are still required , but the feature works so quickly and easily, that checking the guesser as you go or using it when you get stumped is a help. Besides, it's fun to try and out-guess the Guesser.

Craig